Honestly, the categorization of the #solarpunk vision as "Utopic" bothers the hell out of me as a Greek person. The use of utopia as a word has been a linguistic tool against optimism for as long as we've agree to hold onto it.
Ουτοπία (utopia) literally translates to "a place that can never exist", and our complacency to accept it as the opposite of dystopia is doing us harm by perpetuating this idea that a society built on "good" cannot happen; is impossible.
Believe it or not, there is a word for something which I believe describes solarpunk and our vision perfectly: Ευτοπία (Eutopia / Pronounced eff-topia), "the best POSSIBLE place" and we might as well adopt it
Utopia (from Ουτοπία) is an impossible Vision of the future, while Evtopia (from Ευτοπία) is the best possible Vision.
I have always understood utopia as a term to describe the idea of a society that is so idealistic that is sounds unlikely to be reached but not necessarily impossible.
The problem with the word Utopia is that most people use it for things that they don’t understand and don’t care to understand, assuming then that the idea they are rejecting is too unrealistic (too idealistic) to be possible to obtain.
But people fail to understand that the idealistic (or utopian ideas) are important to guides us towards a direction and discover things that we are capable to do that previous seemed impossible, inspired and dedicated by our ideals.
I have always understood utopia as a term to describe the idea of a society that is so idealistic that is sounds unlikely to be reached but not necessarily impossible.
The problem with the word Utopia is that most people use it for things that they don’t understand and don’t care to understand, assuming then that the idea they are rejecting is too unrealistic (too idealistic) to be possible to obtain.
But people fail to understand that the idealistic (or utopian ideas) are important to guides us towards a direction and discover things that we are capable to do that previous seemed impossible, inspired and dedicated by our ideals.