Sri Lanka is a canary in the coal mine, for the global collapse that’s yet to come. We have no buffer to print money and bullshit our way through problems, so they just hit us immediately. But the underlying problems are the same as yours. We’re just the canary in the literal coal mine. Hear us sing.

Our Problems

Right now, and I mean literally right now, we don’t have power. The country has hours of power cuts every day.

So I sit in the heat, listening to UPSes beep. We wait for the rain, to fill up the reservoirs again. For decades we stopped building renewable infrastructure, like we had for thousands of years. We protected and nurtured few of our own industries, integrating instead into global supply chains.

So now we have nothing.

Just ships full of oil, circling the port, waiting for dollar payments that we don’t have. Just dead investments in fossil fuels, poisoning our own air and flooding our own coastlines. Just the promise of ‘development’ turned into certain doom. This is life on the edge of Empire, where things have already fallen apart.

But make no mistake, there are much bigger historical forces at play. Even the center cannot hold.

Why Our Problems Are Your Problems

While Sri Lanka is certainly ruled by idiots, we’re all ruled by idiots. In fact, the biggest idiots are the rich countries goosing their economies through crisis after crisis without changing course.

While Sri Lanka is feeling the consequences of bad infrastructure decisions, of bad energy investments, White Empire made those same decisions. We were literally following them. Unlike our rich ‘friends’, however, we can’t print and stimulate our way out of consequences. We just have them, immediately.

But all the money printing, all the bailouts, it doesn’t make the underlying problems just go away. White Empire is going to face the same consequences, just on a time delay.

Poor countries are just canaries in the coal mine. You’re in the fucking coal mine too.

The Coal Mine

The fact is that there is no debt crisis within White Empire only because it’s able to cover it up with even more debt. We’re in a hole yes, but they’re still digging. Sri Lanka’s debt-to-GDP ratio is actually better than America’s.

The fact is that White Empire made even dumber investments in forever war, fracking, highways, and a whole bunch of long-term liabilities. The bills for those are astronomical. And they’re quickly coming due.

Poor countries can’t cover up the consequences of dumb-fuckery with magic money, but those consequences still exist, however much you waive the monetary wand. Even if the Empire can somehow hold together, the climate simply will not. Pandemics, fires, unrest, this is just a taste of what’s to come.

The truth is that we already hit the iceberg, decades ago. The icebergs are literally melting. We’re just pouring on steam and heading straight for the Arctic ice sheet, to destroy that too. Rich people have printed enough money to keep the tunes on the Titanic playing, but the piper eventually will get his due.

The poor countries already feeling the effects of capitalism gone wild, we’re viewed as a curiosity, as dumbasses. We just did it wrong. But remember, you’re dumbasses too. It is a wrong idea. Remember, we were ‘developing’ to be like you. What do you think is coming for you?

Yes, we’re over the side now, but we were on the same fucking boat. We’re in the same fucking coal mine. What’s happening to us is not merely alarming, it’s an alarm, and it’s ringing for you.

So hello from Sri Lanka, from the dark people in the dark. We’ll see you soon.