Solarpunk Attempts

French self-proclaimed writer and Solarpunk explorer | Ecrivain français autoproclamé et explorateur Solarpunk

[wilkfnch-blog]

Can We Redesign The Modern City With Synthetic Biology? Could We Grow Our Houses Instead Of Building Them?

Imagine waking up every morning in a house that is just as alive as you are. With synthetic biology, your future home could be a living, breathing marvel of nature and biotechnology. It’s a bold ambition, but this could be the key to achieving sustainability for modern cities.

Currently reading this. No. Not reading. Eating it up.

[blackberryshawty]

No but like seriously like capitalism works as not just an economic system but like also as an ideological framework that is toxic and seeks to separate people from communal support structures

[wilkfnch-blog]

Ideological yes and when they succeed in this framework they use it to take advantage on other people which makes the whole ideology stronger

And this so-called success is built on the poverty and oppression of silent suffering people

Ok I’m not saying something new whatsoever but it needed to be said

Even the computer I use took hands and sweat and maybe blood to be built

[wilkfnch-blog]

DAY 3 : BAIT

[L’histoire se déroule dans un univers de science-fiction où les personnes de différents genres vivent séparées]

C’était un leurre. Ce « débat hommes-femmes » avait un autre objectif : réunir les hommes et les femmes pour débattre ; les autres genres pour protester contre cette exclusion. Cette nuit, pour la première fois depuis longtemps, des personnes de tous genres discutaient ; mieux encore : iels s’entendirent.

 [The story takes place in a sci-fi world where people of different genders live apart from each other]

This was bait. This « men-women debate » had another purpose. It would gather men and women who seek debate and other genders who’d protest against the exclusion. This night however, for the first time in years, people of all genders talked. And which is better: they understood each other.

[dangercupcakemurdericing]

“If you’re poor, the only way you’re likely to injure someone is the old traditional way: artisanal violence, we could call it – by hands, by knife, by club, or maybe modern hands-on violence, by gun or by car. But if you’re tremendously wealthy, you can practice industrial-scale violence without any manual labor on your own part. You can, say, build a sweatshop factory that will collapse in Bangladesh and kill more people than any hands-on mass murderer ever did, or you can calculate risk and benefit about putting poisons or unsafe machines into the world, as manufacturers do every day. If you’re the leader of a country, you can declare war and kill by the hundreds of thousands or millions. And the nuclear superpowers – the US and Russia – still hold the option of destroying quite a lot of life on Earth. So do the carbon barons. But when we talk about violence, we almost always talk about violence from below, not above. […] People revolt when their lives are unbearable. Sometimes material reality creates that unbearableness: droughts, plagues, storms, floods. But food and medical care, health and well-being, access to housing and education – these things are also governed by economic means and government policy.[…] That’s a tired phrase, the destruction of the Earth, but translate it into the face of a starving child and a barren field – and then multiply that a few million times. Or just picture the tiny bivalves: scallops, oysters, Arctic sea snails that can’t form shells in acidifying oceans right now. Or another superstorm tearing apart another city. Climate change is global-scale violence, against places and species as well as against human beings. Once we call it by name, we can start having a real conversation about our priorities and values. Because the revolt against brutality begins with a revolt against the language that hides that brutality.”

— Call Climate Change What It Is: Violence, Rebecca Solnit. (via kuanios)

[wilkfnch-blog]

"Because the revolt against brutality begins with a revolt against the language that hides that brutality.”

[wilkfnch-blog]

DAY 2 : MINDLESS

[Don’t hesitate to correct my english if needed ]

Je regarde passer les vols d’aéronefs –

L’esprit loin, embarqué sur leur pont maladroit.

Ces aventuriers vont, repartent derechef,

Sont légers comme l’air et vifs comme soldats.

  Mon âme est retenue dans le technococon –

En pleine agitation. Pollution sonore,

Coquelicot brisé, l’esprit dans un flacon :

Contre l’idiocratie nous demeurerons forts.

    I watch the hoverships passing me by –  

My mind, away, stands on their awkward deck.

These adventurers come then reach the sky –

They are light as air, pawns ready to trek.

  My soul is the techno-cocoon’s hostage –

Boiling in fuss and all covered with noise.

Broken poppy, mind in a flask: wastage.

Fight idiocracy: there’s no other choice.

[sunkeepersolarpunkmusic]

Telling people about solarpunk (the proper way?)

People are always asking the question *what exactly is solarpunk?* and it can be hard to reply accurately. Then usually, they're told a vague description of solarpunk like "it's a perfect eco-utopia!" and can't help but say "but that's not even 'punk' so..."

That's why it's important to convey what solarpunk is according to its emphasis on ECO-STRUGGLE and ECO-RESISTANCE.

Below, I've collected and condensed the main guidelines of solarpunk fiction and story worlds, into a little reference guide that quickly shows the punk in every aspect of it. (they're only guidelines--check the comments to add your input!)

SOLARPUNK (usually) IS:

- An optimistic, eco-friendly vision of future Earth (without being blindly utopian) which shows the costs of getting or maintaining that sort of world (usually a severe struggle, hence "punk")

- Renewable energies and sustainable societies are either widespread and the norm or attempts are being made to make it that way (usually by resistance or revolution I. e. "punk")

- A visual aesthetic centered on art nouveau yet strongly resistant to Eurocentric/Colonialist homogeneity. In other words, a diverse visual style influenced by the sunny, organic elements of many world cultures, identities (LGBTQ+), and abilities (such as disabled, neurodivergent etc.)

- A society and culture(s) that fit that same description above ^ (or is fighting to. Again: "punk.")

- A biocentric economy (nature's balance is first priority, and then wealth & profits are distributed to the people.) This requires sacrifice from the people and companies, so it always needs improving on, but political attackers try to tear it down completely to restore capitalism (or some other failing economic system) and therefore it needs defending (hence "punk").

- And at its very core: Solarpunk shows the struggle to find or keep balance between man and nature. "punk" = that struggle, and each story is unique in what exactly that struggle is in their story's set of circumstances.

[wilkfnch-blog]

I’d add that in Sunvault : stories of solarpunk and eco-speculation (edited by Phoebe Wagner and Brontë C. Wieland) there is a short story by Yilun Fan that takes place in a dystopic Earth ravaged by climate change to the point that people live in hoverships.

Still, the story is solarpunk because it talks about cultural resistance.

So the Solarpunk may be not in the whole world but in some resistance cells that are part of this world.

The struggle is definitely at the core.

[malaayna]

Solarpunk!!

Hey so I'm finally getting into solarpunk

And I have quite alot of knowledge about plants, animals, food growing etc (it's one of my special interests)

So if any of y'all need information or help, hit me up

Even if I don't know the answer straight away, I know enough to be able to wade thru the bullshit easily

[wilkfnch-blog]

Pour mes camarades écrivains ! (ça sonne communiste en français, en fait)

For my fellow writers !

[wilkfnch-blog]

DAY 1 : RING

Visiblement : deux hommes installés de part et d’autre d’une table, coiffés d’un casque de Réalité Virtuelle. Dans cette RV, ils se battaient sur un ring pour gagner leur place au sein d’un réseau de drogue. Une sonnerie retentit. Alors MiniMax activa son anneau solaire. Il savait qu’il avait gagné.

It looked like two men sitting at a table and wearing a Virtual Reality helmet. In this VR they were fighting on a ring to win their position in a drug ring. Suddenly a ring shrilled. At this moment Minimax activated his solar ring. Now he knew he had won.

J'utilise le compteur de mots de Microsoft Word.

I use Microsoft Word’s word counter.

[wilkfnch-blog]

Je vais tenter ça. J’écrirai en français et je ferai également une version en anglais. Je me donne la permission de jouer sur les mots-thèmes autant que possible entre les deux langues !

Bien sûr il s’agira d’histoires courtes solarpunk !

-

I intend on trying this. I’ll write the story in French and then I’ll translate it to English. I’ll allow myself to play with the thematic words as much as possible between the two languages !

Of course it’ll be solarpunk short stories !

[wilkfnch-blog]

Why technology puzzles me so much

1 - I once was a scientist

Because or thanks to my studies I find it very difficult to picture a technology that would be fully made-up. Why ? Because I need and want to be able to explain everything, to write a coherent story, something one would read and think : “wow, this could be real man”.

Of course I could just come up with an idea, with no explanation and pretend it is magical and so on. Or another way out would be to go read some novels where technology is more or less described. Like in The Ice People for example. Need to read that book again. 

to be continued

[wilkfnch-blog]

First thoughts

So, if I believe that manifesto Solarpunk may be seen as an other way for our future ; i.e an alternative to cyberpunk as it has already been said on this post. Of course I still need some documentation and of course to read the already existing short-stories such as Glass and Gardens : Solarpunk Summers from Sarena Ulibarri, Solarpunk, Ecological and Fantasticals stories in a Sustainable World from several brazilian authors such as Gerson Lodi-Ribeiro and Roberta SPindler or Hieroglyph from Ed Fynn and Kathryn Cramer.

ANYWAY I will try to write out some stuff. May it be relevant.

On storytelling

I still want to explore some ideas. I often read one thing that could be opposed to Solarpunk and this thing was a potential lack of conflict and therefore a difficulty to reach such thing as a climax.

On anticipation

Some talk about long-term forecasts. A world that would have had the time to build itself. I speak about centuries. Time spent to build big cathedrals. Now picture a sustainable cathedral - like an art nouveau stylised castle with vegetation, sustainable energy supply facilities...

And right now appears the probable necessity to gather proper documentation on energy. I also think about low-tech stuff. Have to keep that in mind. Where was I ? Ah, yes: anticipation.

A story that would take place in a far future would not be as striking as would be a near-future scenario. Something close to what we are now may be a good starting point.

On technology

I am still trying to find out a way to solve this problem : how could I talk about a made-up technology if research has not been there yet ? The first solution that comes to my mind would be to pick up the different obstacles to one given technology and then imagine a way to fix them, that way being necessarily NOT scientificly provable. My mind hates it. There is still the possibility to say something like "scientists overcame this issue and succeeded to create the [name]-thing". Turns out this post is a total mess. I should write one article / subject. [to be continued]