ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on the real and metaphorical fires in the current context, the ones making it difficult to reorient education and research towards ecosophical aims. It begins with the boil water advisories in rural and remote First Nations communities in Canada and then discusses the Flint, Michigan, water crisis to describe an erosion of the spirit of Mni wiconi by Mad Max logic. The chapter also discusses how the brutality of late-stage capitalism leads to the educational policy and school renewal efforts that are antithetical to compassionate witnessing and an attunement to the more-than-human-world. It considers how the traditional media and social media shape climate change discourse for better and for the worse. Many right-wing political leaders who pursue draconian changes to public school systems are quite adept at activating and manipulating the affects-of-late-stage-capitalism.
