Sacrifice

Dear friend,

Before sleep yesterday evening, Chiara showed me footage of Greta Thunberg’s group of young people being kidnapped at sea by Israel. The last image we saw was of a young man in a red life vest, both hands held hesitantly in the air, harrowing searchlights surrounding the crew from all sides.

We saw footage of a strange chemical being sprayed onto the boat.

Cruel, sick strategies.
Issued forth from cruel, sick minds.

We didn’t know what to do, but it seemed important to do something. We wrote to our MP, David Lammy.

We prayed, as we do now—for peace, and that all of those on the boat survive and return home to their families.

In the kitchen this afternoon, I had a moment of overwhelm. I stood with one hand on the edge of the kitchen sink, looked out the window, and let the balloon in my chest rise out through my throat. Tears escaped my eyes, and I felt better.

Moments later, a more buoyant energy moved me and I began researching ethical banking. I’ve had money with Barclays for decades, and more recently Chase—attracted like many others by their high interest savings.

Down in the depths of my gut, I knew both banks are part of the mycelial roots of a business model that profits from war. It’s odd how I could live with that compromise. But what’s happening now is so extreme it got through my cloudy conditioning—through its sleepy, forgetful drowsiness.

Chiara has been talking about this for years. And today, I got out of the burning building and started looking for alternatives.

I spoke to a lovely woman at Coventry Building Society who—after asking around—assured me they don’t invest in arms or fossil fuels. I explained about the wars and the banks and Greta and her friends, and how the courage of those young people had moved me to do something. Compared to what they’re doing, this is a very mild risk.

Chiara’s right: ethical finance is effective action.

We’ll all need to transition away from the old system sooner or later.

My search led me to the Global Alliance for Banking on Values. I’m surprised to find banking interesting—but I’ll be learning more. For now, I’m shifting to Starling for our current accounts. They don’t invest in arms or fossil fuels, and that’s better than Barclays.

The journey continues. I’ll share what I learn in case you’re feeling the pull. We use Triodos for our joint account—they’re the gold standard for ethical banking, though their online tools are a little clunky. So we keep them for direct debits and use Starling for the everyday stuff.

Just wanted to get that off my chest.

Within a week or so, I’ll be out. I know it’s not possible for everyone, but if you can, I hope you’ll consider what’s possible.

One way or another, the end of extractive, exploitative business models is inevitable. Why not take even one step now?

You know that thought experiment: if Earth’s entire history were a day, humans would arrive just before midnight?

The harms we’ve done can be healed.

The new, ethical infrastructure is already growing.

I hope a seed got planted today.
The way Greta and her friends planted one in me.

Till tomorrow,
Love,
Mike