JOLLY DAYS

The World Without Us

There is a grim, engrossing quality to this book's theme. I've heard the author of The World Without Us interviewed numerous times. The author's speculation speaks to the self-punishment fantasies evoked by liberal guilt.

[The author…] imagines what would happen if the earth’s most invasive species — ourselves — were suddenly and completely wiped out. Writers from Carson to Al Gore have invoked the threat of environmental collapse in an effort to persuade us to change our careless ways. With similar intentions but a more devilish sense of entertainment values, Weisman turns the destruction of our civilization and the subsequent rewilding of the planet into a Hollywood-worthy, slow-motion disaster spectacular and feel-good movie rolled into one.

It is a good thing that at least the author of the book gets the irony. Part of the fascination of Al Gore's current incarnation is the satisfaction he has in earnestly telling us of impending doom while getting fatter and richer; Gore has higher approval ratings with his target audience than he could ever have achieved as president. Sometimes Gore seems like a variant of Wayne Dyer, relentlessly sermonizing with an unerring understanding of what his audience wants to hear. Jeremiads seldom have utility.