The audio above is an AI-generated 'podcast' crafted with careful prompting and highly selected data sources. You can view the prompt here. The podcast goes into more detail than the overview post below. Full references are at the end of the post. Prefer a quick read? Prefer listening while you're jogging, driving, or ironing? Now you can choose!
On Friday, I gave my first in a series of classes on rainmaking to a group of 10- and 11-year old learners. My daughter is one of them, so I take this topic seriously. I believe (natural, bioregional) rainmaking will be a highly sought after skill in the coming decade.
We started with a general discussion to find out how much they knew about a changing climate, pollution, energy, economics, and individual agency within a complex world order.
There was a lot of discussion about food production, and specifically meat- vs. plant- based diets as it relates to climate. One of the questions was a simple one, but with a complex answer:
“If CO2 is one of the building blocks of life, why are cow farts used as a reason to reduce the eating of meat?”
The question came from a meat-loving teacher, but the learners wanted to know the answer too. (For context, they were referring to our local farmer’s biodynamic cows that roam freely on well-nourished soils, not commercially-reared cows.)
Would you know how to succinctly answer the question, without repeating the false notion that “livestock production, particularly cattle, is a significant contributor to greenhouse gas emissions.”
To answer the question accurately requires an understanding of, at a minimum:
The Cycle of Globalization
The Rise of Oligarchy & the Drive towards Authoritarianism
Elite Overproduction & Competition for Control over Resources
Geopolitical & Macroeconomic Awareness & Analysis
Mis-, Dis-, Malinformation and Information Warfare
Climate Science and Competing Financial Interests
Naturally I couldn’t provide a cogent answer during the brief time we had in class, but I did promise to get back to the teacher. In thinking about how best to provide an answer appropriate for an 11-year old, I came up with an analogy.
You know that feeling when you’re watching a movie and suddenly realize the plot isn’t what you thought it was? That the good guys aren’t actually good, and the conflict isn’t really about what everyone’s been saying?
We’re living in that movie right now.
The Story We’re Fed
Politicians argue over important (?) issues of the day. Countries compete against each other for access to resources. Companies battle for market share. The news talks about inflation, geopolitical tensions, supply chain fragility, climate change, policy debates, and the latest “big drama.”
All of this is real. But it’s also a distraction from the bigger game.
The Real Game
Imagine a poker table. But instead of five friends playing for pocket change, you’ve got the world’s richest and most powerful people playing their egos. The stakes? Control over how 8 billion people live, work, and think.
These aren’t just rich people. They’re what we call oligarchs. An oligarch has soooo much money and influence that they basically run things from behind the scenes. They tell everyone what to do while the news (intentionally?) keeps us distracted from what they’re really doing.
There are Russian oligarchs. Chinese oligarchs. American tech billionaires. Middle Eastern oil princes. European industrialists. In the West, we mostly hear about the tech billionaires, but there are many from other cultures too.
They all agree that they want the same outcome. They want more control of the average people (who they secretly fear), less fairness, and fewer people questioning their authority and decisions.
But they can’t agree on who gets to be in charge. In fact, they’re each desperately trying to be the only one in charge. Their ego demands that they must win at the game of poker, at any cost.
Too Many Chiefs
Think about what happens in any group when there are too many people who think they should be the boss. Chaos, right?
That’s what’s happening globally. The money system we use has created more super-wealthy, super-educated, super-connected people than the system can handle. They all expect to have real power. But there aren’t enough seats at the power table. Just like musical chairs.
So they’re fighting. Sometimes in public and sometimes it’s in the shadows of the night. And we’re caught in the crossfire.
The Weapons They Use
They’re (generally) not fighting with armies. They’re using information to control the narrative. In other words, they’re messing with our minds.
They convince countries to shut down their own power plants. To sell their farmland. To depend on imports instead of making things themselves.
How? By making it seem like the right thing to do, often using climate change as the reason.
“Nuclear power is dangerous.” (So Germany shut down perfectly good nuclear plants and the price of their electricity skyrocketed.)
“Natural gas is boiling the planet.” (So the Netherlands shut down their gas fields and heating costs skyrocketed.)
“Farmers are destroying the environment.” (So the Netherlands tried to eliminate thousands of farms and cows.)
“We need digital money for financial inclusion.” (So they can track every purchase you make and control your behavior.)
Each time a country allows their minds to be messed with, it becomes weaker. More dependent on other countries. Easier to control. So the oligarchs can win their game of poker.
The Pattern
Look at any major change any country has made in the last five years. Ask yourself: “Do the people of the country making the change live a better life after the change? Who becomes more powerful because of this? Who becomes less independent? Who becomes weaker?”
Usually, the country making the change regrets it.
So Why Should We Stop Eating Meat?
We shouldn’t. At least, not because someone else tells us to. And certainly not because of climate.
Your dinner plate isn’t a battlefield for the oligarch poker game. It’s your dinner plate.
When you hear campaigns that try to change what you should eat or do, ask the same question: “Who benefits from this change?”
Sometimes it’s agricultural companies selling plant-based alternatives (that are less healthy because they’re highly processed). Sometimes it’s about limiting food production to get rid of the pesky “average people” that keep protesting against what the oligarchs are causing. Sometimes it’s about making you feel guilty just for living your life. Sometimes it’s about making you afraid because then you’re easier to control.
But it’s never about your actual health or genuine concern for Nature. It’s never, ever about making our world a better place to live for everyone.
The Simple Answer: Control Disguised as Climate Concern
“If CO2 is one of the building blocks of life, why is there so much pressure to reduce cows and the eating of meat?”
CO2 is a building block of life. Plants literally die if there is no CO2 to consume, so they can turn it into oxygen (while the sun shines). More CO2 generally means more plant growth, which is why commercial greenhouses pump in extra CO2 to increase crop yields.
So why the pressure to eliminate cows and meat-eating? Based on everything we’ve discussed about the oligarchical poker game, here’s what’s really happening:
It’s Not About the Environment
There is no doubt that we should have environmental concerns, but let’s be clear-headed about the right solutions. The campaign against meat follows the exact same pattern we can see with:
Energy (German nuclear plants eliminated under “nuclear safety” concerns and Dutch gas fields eliminated under “earthquake” concerns)
Food (Dutch farms eliminated under “nitrogen” concerns)
In each case, a legitimate concern gets weaponized to shut down strategic assets that ensure national independence and resilience. Our resilience is slowly but steadily being undermined at international, national, state, provincial, and personal levels.
It’s About Control
Eliminating meat production serves several oligarchical objectives:
Food Dependency: When you eliminate local farms and ranchers, people become dependent on industrial food systems controlled by a small number of corporations.
Land Acquisition: Forcing farmers out of business makes valuable agricultural land available for other more profitable uses — like carbon credit schemes, solar farms, or development projects that benefit wealthy investors.
Cultural Destruction: Traditional farming and ranching communities tend to be independent-minded and resistant to top-down control. Eliminating their livelihoods destroys the strong cultural bonds formed in these communities.
Behavioral Control: Once you accept that authorities can dictate what you eat “for the greater good,” you’ve accepted a level of personal control that extends far beyond food.
Pattern Recognition
You may be tempted to write this all off as some wacko conspiracy theory. But when you understand the seven phases every empire has followed over the past 12,000 years of human progress, you will know that these patterns of control repeat. Every. Single. Time. There have been 26 well-documented empires that have followed this same “conspiratorial” pattern. It’s not that there’s a group of people quietly plotting to take over the world. It’s the way every class-based empire works. Without exception.
Notice that the same organizations and funding sources behind the anti-meat campaigns are also behind:
Eliminating reliable energy sources
Reducing domestic food production
Promoting digital currencies that can be programmed to control purchases
Pushing policies that make Western nations more dependent on imports.
The Real Agenda
The “climate” and “sustainability” agenda has nothing to do with saving the planet. It’s about a small number of people controlling food production, energy supplies, financial systems, and entire populations while everyone else becomes dependent on their systems for survival. This same pattern plays out during the final phase of every single empire.
The instinct demonstrated by the teacher that something doesn’t add up about the “eating meat” and “eliminating CO2” narrative is correct. When environmental concerns are used to eliminate independence and concentrate control, we’re witnessing information warfare, not environmental protection.
The bottom line: Eat meat. Don’t eat meat. That’s between you, your body, and whatever you decide based on your values.
Don’t let someone else’s poker game affect what ends up on your fork.
The big decision isn’t so much about what we eat. It’s about whether we’ll let oligarchs make our personal decisions for us.
Once we see the real game that’s going on, we can’t unsee it.
The next time you see a news story about energy policy, agricultural regulations, or restrictions because of climate, ask yourself: Who really benefits from this? The answer might surprise you. Use the prompts below the References to get to the bottom of it all.
References
The Cycle of Globalization is a 7-phase cognitive map that helps us understand and make sense of seemingly illogical decisions and actions from a ruling class that are a hallmark of late-stage civilizational collapse. Deep dive: https://bit.ly/7-Phases-Glo
The Rise of Oligarchy is the inevitable outcome of wealth concentration during the final decades of a civilization. Deep dive: Oligarchs by Country
Big Philanthropy is a study of the upstream sources of who’s funding social movements in civil society. It includes names like George Soros, Bill Gates, Warren Buffett, MacKenzie Scott, Michael Bloomberg, Jim & Marilyn Simons, Mark Zuckerberg & Priscilla Chan, Steve & Connie Ballmer, Jeff Bezos, Pam & Pierre Omidyar, Reed Hastings & Patty Quinn, Susan & Michael Dell, and many others. Deep dive: Big Philanthropy
Elite Overproduction occurs in a society where there are too many potential Power Elites relative to its ability to absorb them into the power structure. Deep dive: https://bit.ly/Elite-Over
Information Warfare involves the planned use of propaganda and other psychological operations to influence the opinions, emotions, attitudes, and behavior of the general population. Some argue (myself included) that Climate Change, Net Zero policies, and the Sustainable Development Goals are coordinated government campaigns to manipulate public opinion. In other words, these initiatives are not genuine environmental or development efforts; they are tools for social transformation and oligarchical control. Deep dive: Psychological Warfare
Climate Science is a longstanding debate over whether global warming is occurring, how much has occurred in modern times, what has caused it, what its effects will be, whether any action can or should be taken to curb it, and if so what that action should be. There is ample evidence to suggest 'science' has been cherry-picked to manipulate the story in favor of the outcomes oligarchs want. Deep dive: https://bit.ly/Clim-Science
Germany’s Atomausstieg (nuclear phase-out) is an example of how declining powers can be manipulated into abandoning strategic assets through their own democratic processes, under the guise of climate change. Deep dive: German Nuclear Shutdown
The Netherlands closure of the Groningen gas fields shows how declining powers can be weakened through carefully orchestrated campaigns that appear legitimate on the surface while serving broader geopolitical goals. Deep dive: Groningen Gas Field Closure
The Dutch farmer crisis is one of the most sophisticated information warfare operations of the 21st century, systematically designed to eliminate Europe’s most productive agricultural system under the guise of environmental protection and climate change. Deep dive: Dutch Farmer Crisis
NEXUS 2030 AI Prompt
For Paid Subscribers: The "Understanding the Changing World Order" Prompts
This systematic approach of 27 stacked prompts will help you cut through surface narratives to understand the deeper power dynamics shaping our historical moment, whether you’re analyzing domestic policy changes, international conflicts, economic developments, or social movements. Use them to assess any current event that smells fishy to you.
Listen to this episode with a 7-day free trial
Subscribe to NEXUS 2030 to listen to this post and get 7 days of free access to the full post archives.
