Is it just me or does every mainstream op-ed, presentation, or social media post about climate change by a scientist end with a message of hope? We can turn things around in time. Yes, we can. We just need to work together and cooperate to suck the CO2 emissions and save our children and their children.
Seriously, I am pretty amazed by anyone still optimistic about the climate crisis.
According to the Stern Report (Stern: 2005) and the AR4 (IPCCC: 2007) climate Armageddon will start right around 2050 … oh but wait, cause shit seriously hits the fan in 2100. Notice how the goal posts are conveniently moved?
No scientist really believes we have time to save the planet from disastrous climate change before 2050.
They know it is already too late.
What makes the whole thing irritatingly insulting is when scientists continue to feed into politicians game. You can see see straight through the bullshit messages.
Remember when the UK heralded their 2008 Climate Act with an 80% reduction by 2050? That was meant to be enough if every big emitter followed suit.
How come is it now not enough? Why in 12 years is Net Zero by 2050 become the norm (trend)?
I’ll tell you why.
It’s because since 2008 we have not done shit to save the planet. A whole bunch of greenwash by companies and governments. All of the latter have dedicated themselves to riding the sustainability gravy train since we coupled climate change to economic efficiency.
So even if world leaders, scientists and anyone with a little more insight into sustainability than what companies would like you to have, know that there’s realistically nothing we can do to stop and reverse global warming this century. Fact: Carbon emissions emitted today will be in our atmosphere for the next 100 years. And they still have not peaked.
But it’s bad PR to not at least appear hopeful.
People, the plane is going down. So, let’s sell our cheap asses to corporate media and provide mixed messages of hope.
I mean, why tell the truth?
Surely, you’ve felt changes in your local weather systems right? You don’t need someone else to tell you that things are headed off a cliff and you’re just another rat following the Pied Piper.
Excess carbon dioxide heating up the atmosphere?
Climate advisors and politicians say “That’s okay, we’ll develop carbon sequestration technology that will remove the excess carbon and store it underground indefinitely and not worry about the environmental degradation that accompanies this technology and the fact that we’re already several decades too late for it to be a current viable solution.”
Seriously?
The biggest carbon sequestration plant in the world captures the equivalent of three seconds’ worth of emissions per year. There aren’t enough of these extremely costly plants in existence to offset emissions.
OK Pablo, shut up and let’s plant more trees!
Sure, we’ll just ignore the fact that there’s not enough available land due to its appropriation for agricultural usage and that there’s not enough time to plant the amount of trees needed to grow to their full potential to sequester enough carbon to slow down the warming caused by the increasing rate of carbon dioxide and methane and warming that’s already been thrown into the atmosphere.
And guess what?
Increasing wildfires release even more of that sequestered carbon creating an endless feedback loop of increasing temperatures which leads to… yes, more wildfires. Trees can’t adapt fast enough to the increasing temperatures.
Since 2020, twenty percent of the giant sequoias were wiped out of existence due to wildfires. Twenty percent of some of the oldest living organisms on the planet that were once considered fireproof are wiped out forever. Don’t count on restoring them anytime soon. It takes hundreds of years for them to reach their full height.
Efforts worldwide to conserve water usage have resulted instead in more water usage. How is that even possible if we are serious about it? If people can’t be convinced to conserve water during an unprecedented global drought and in fact do the opposite, what hope is there for humanity?
What about the bees?
We’re losing more than 70% of our insects.
Some will tell you, no problem, we can hand pollinate the fruit and vegetables and mimic what the bees and insects do to ensure our food supply. We don’t need the bees if there are enough of us willing to do their work for free. If bees are disappearing from our region, we’ll just steal them from somewhere else (because that’s the trend these days in the world of beekeeping).
We’ve permanently lost about fifty percent of the Great Barrier Reef in Australia and over 90% of it has experienced bleaching in 2021.
But do not worry.
Studies have shown that selectively breeding corals that can withstand warmer temperatures are "promising". Some of them respond favorably to sounds coming from speakers that simulate a healthy oceanic environment. So bring on the warmer ocean temperatures!
Let’s all vote for the concerned political candidate who will fight against big oil companies and lobbies who line their pockets because political elites are all good courageous people who care…about…the…fuck… we are so doomed it’s not even funny.
Oh, but hold on. Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, Bill Gates. They’re the heroes of our capitalist system. They have the power to influence financial resources and create real change. They can come up with innovative solutions to save the planet! Right?
Nope, instead we have penis-shaped rockets and Twitter takeover deals, so never mind.
Power-hungry sociopaths aside, the average person on the street doesn’t care either. Just try to bring up the topic with friends or family. You will either get an angry reaction, outright dismissal, or pleas to seek treatment for mental health. They think you’re insane to feel anxiety over such trivial matters.
I get it, you can’t be bothered to care about such an inconvenient topic outside of what’s on Netflix these days.
We should have been protesting the shit out of our crisis many decades ago and worked furiously to come up with solutions to slow and reverse the damage that we’re seeing now.
To be perfectly clear, we should have looked beyond the profit motive as a solution to all of our problems.
It’s pathetic and sad that the climate crisis spokesperson who singles out world leaders for not making climate change the number one priority is a teenage girl.
Unfortunately, we have proved to be incapable of divorcing ourselves from this profit-driven system to come up with any meaningful solutions to save our asses and secure the viability of future generations.
Human reactions to this crisis tell me that there is no hope.
I already knew this years ago when I quit my job as Climate Change Attaché and wrote my Master’s thesis about the green economy. I thought that at the very least a lot more intelligent and influential people then myself with all of the glaring evidence of the current environmental collapse would take over. Make a difference. Produce the needed paradigm shift in society we need to save us.
In short. I quit the fight and trusted the powers that be.
I have now lost hope and so should you.
And now I’m just another asshole complaining. Don't believe anyone when they tell you there is hope. Keep them honest, keep them working and then, maybe then we will know how bad the situation really is.