“A myth is a nugget of truth wrapped in a pack of lies” – Anonymous.

Dear Climate Healers,

We use myth in the technical sense of a narrative that contains an element of truth but functions as a high-level controller that constrains admissible policy and design choices. On Planet A, five interlocking myths govern socio-technical organization:

Myth 1: Endless growth as the master objective.

Economic expansion is treated as a necessary condition for human well-being and institutional stability. The necessity for growth is coded into currency architectures and governance objectives so that political, corporate, and scientific actors are constrained to preserve growth even when it conflicts with ecological limits. This normalization persists even in high-consumption societies already in ecological overshoot who are often considered “too big to fail,” where official plans explicitly commit to cutting emissions without reducing growth.

Myth 2: Consumption and commodification as social logic.

Consumption is elevated from means to organizing value. Advertising infrastructures continuously stimulate demand, while supply chains optimize for the accessibility of exotic, discretionary goods rather than universal sufficiency. The result is systemic misallocation so that a food system which procures multiples of required quantities produces chronic hunger and widespread fiber and micro-nutrient deficiencies.

Myth 3: Separation from Nature and human exceptionalism.

A story of human separation from the rest of Life, bolstered by cultural and scientific framings of the self as a discrete, competing unit for scarce resources, licenses the differential moral valuation of beings and the routine exploitation of non-human animals. Explicitly speciesist institutions such as slaughterhouses are thereby normalized even as analogous harms among humans are condemned. This asymmetry is a root driver of ecological breakdown and social harms.

Myth 4: Mis-specified responsibility for ecological breakdown.

A fourth, more recent myth narrows causality for ecological breakdown to fossil fuel combustion alone, politically obscuring food-system drivers through selective accounting choices. This mis-specification diverts effort toward growth-compatible efficiency fixes on the energy infrastructure while marginalizing high-leverage dietary and land-use transformations.

Myth 5: Technological solutions for environmental constraints.

A fifth myth frames environmental constraints as solvable through future technological innovations. This myth diverts effort toward technological research and development, while once again marginalizing behavioral transformations.

A secondary example illustrates the mechanism of myth-making. The pedagogical association of protein with animal foods and calcium with dairy foods obscures the ubiquity of protein and calcium in all foods, naturalizes animal consumption and erases plant sources with measurable health and equity consequences.

Join us at V-COP23

Please join us in Toronto for the Vegan Convergence Of the Peoples #23 (V-COP23) on Nov 1-2 to help shape and implement our system design plan for Planet B. The theme for V-COP23 is offered by our co-host, Plant Based Treaty: Redirect, Relinquish, Restore::

Redirect our focus from fixing Planet A to building Planet B.
Relinquish the excess resources we have taken from the planet.
Restore the life-support systems of the planet with the relinquished resources.

Please be there and let us make some history.

With much love,