The Rude Pundit: I'm So Sorry, But We Need to Talk About Climate Change

[babylonsister]

The Rude Pundit

Proudly lowering the level of political discourse
4/19/2022
I'm So Sorry, But We Need to Talk About Climate Change


A couple of times a year, I write about the catastrofuck or the fuckpocalypse or the fuckageddon that will be caused by the effects of climate change. Sometimes it's about searing temperatures somewhere in the world, the effect of which will be eventually be to cause a refugee crisis in the neighborhood of a billion people and pretty much completely upend the way in which we all exist. And that's not even mentioning the floods, the fires, and the wildly fluctuating weather and its effects. We're screwed. But every single time I write a climate change post, without exception, it does some of the lowest numbers of anything I put out.

We know that's one reason why there is so little coverage of climate change even as its effects ram our asses every day: no one wants to see that we're fucked by something so massive that it would require the entire world to do something about it. Of course, you can make the news compelling if you want, but I guess that inevitable doom is a turn-off.

But we need to talk about climate change. And I'm really sorry. I know you'd rather the political shit that goes straight to the dopamine center of the brain and floods you orgasmic satisfaction. Trust me, I'd much rather be writing about Tucker Carlson's nut tanning or the ludicrous decision by a Trump-appointed idiot judge that overturned the mask mandate for public transportation. I'd love to spend my time mocking them and calling them horrid names. (I mean, to be fair, last Friday, I already spent a good bit of time on Tuckus.)

So fucking listen for a few minutes here because we're fucked beyond fucked, fucked in a way where you look at everything going on and think, "Yeah, it's horrible that such suffering goes on, but, basically, we've got a few decades and we're all gonna be suffering horribly." I know, I know, I fucking know that you know this and you try to put it out of your heads, like we good Gen Xers did with the threat of nuclear annihilation back in the 1980s. But listen:

A couple of weeks ago, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) from the United Nations put out the third part of its assessment of the state of the climate crisis. This was the final piece of the assessment, and it focused on "Mitigation of Climate Change," as the title read. It was the section that was supposed to give us hope after the screaming alarms of the first two parts. Except this one screamed at us, too. And the scream was "What the fuck is wrong with you? We're gonna die and you're doing almost nothing to stop it!"

more...

https://rudepundit.blogspot.com/2022/04/im-so-sorry-but-we-need-to-talk-about.html

[2naSalit]

1. K&R

[BlueJac]

2. Head in sand mentality!

[brer cat]

3. K&R

[HuskyOffset]

4. The show The Newsroom covered this

[Buckeyeblue]

5. I don't think the humans of the world are willing to make the necessary changes

They just aren't. For one thing, you still have deniers. Lots of them. And there is still a great deal of dependency on fossil fuel.

Green energy has come a long way. But people haven't.

We are currently in a fight for our democracy. Cristofacism is running a muck right now. My concern is that environmentally focused candidates get lost in all the shouting.

Sorry to be pessimistic. But I'm not convinced that long term human survival is possible in our current environment. Hell, Putin could go rogue tomorrow and drastically change all of our lives.

[hunter]

9. I actually think we can pull ourselves out of this mess.

I am kicking this thread to point out once again how posts about the environment quickly drop off the first page of General Discussion.

It's like we all know we are part of the problem (God knows I am!) but we don't want to talk about it. I don't even want to calculate how much gasoline I've burned in my life for frivolous reasons, and I know I won't quit tomorrow.

It's a lot easier to blame "The Fossil Fuel Companies" or something. Sadly, they are us.

[Buckeyeblue]

11. 100% agree. Which is why I think the clock will run out on us

Think about it: there is nothing more absurd than a 200 pound person getting in a 4,000 pound car to drive a half mile to the store to buy a loaf of bread that weighs 1 pound.

And to make that car work, we use oil pumped out of the ground in the gulf of Mexico that is refined in Texas and shipped in a truck (that also burns fuel) to a gas station in Michigan. Just so that 200 pound human doesn't have to walk to the store.

We aren't getting passed that.

[hunter]

13. Only a small fraction of humanity lives like that.

That kind of automobile culture isn't universal and it never can be, not with the human population nearing eight billion.

It just seems more common, living here in the U.S.A..

This is the kind of problem that can be solved with clever urban planning that's not biased towards car culture.

One of the reasons car culture became so prevalent in the U.S.A. was simple racism. White people could afford cars, others couldn't. Car culture and lower density suburbs were a way for white people to isolate themselves from people they wouldn't tolerate.

I grew up in a city that was 99% white and kept that way by various underhanded means even after such practices were outlawed. One of the police department's favorite sports was harassing non-white drivers. DWBs were common. That sent a strong message that non-white people were not welcome.

[Ron Green]

14. THIS.

[smirkymonkey]

6. K&R

Unfortunately, I am not optimistic. Humans being what they are.

[niyad]

7. Spot on, RP.

[hunter]

8. We know how to fix this. We don't want to.

We're like smokers who can't quit.

By the way, the United States and Canada have the highest per capita carbon emissions. Carbon emissions of the average North American are about three times higher than the world average.

https://www.worldometers.info/co2-emissions/co2-emissions-per-capita/

Here's some ways we can fix this:

- Our cities need to be rebuilt in such a manner that car ownership is unnecessary.

- We need to support the education and economic empowerment of women worldwide.

- Birth control and realistic sex education need to be universal

- Fossil fuel power plants need to be replaced with nuclear power plants.

- Factory farming of meat and dairy products needs to stop.

Obviously there are irrational cults and religions opposing all of these.

The largest problem is how we define economic "productivity."

What we now call productivity isn't productivity at all; it is in fact a direct measure of the damage we are doing to the earth's natural environment and our own human spirit.

Here in the U.S.A. it's not entirely a Democratic / Republican problem. Democrats are more likely to accept that climate change is real, but every point I've made above has offended people who fully support the Democratic Party, people who consider themselves environmentalists, and people who are liberal and progressive activists in all of their politics.

Followers of conservative ideologies, religions, and cults will, of course, reject all the points I've made above.

Democratic Underground's Evironment & Energy group is a great place to follow climate change issues but it can be quite depressing.

https://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=forum&id=1127

I think that's why people would rather discuss the ephemeral scandals and tragedies they've seen on the television news and opinion shows.

The problem with global warming is that it won't go away. It won't fizzle out like wars do, it won't be pushed into the closets of our memories like any single mass shooting, or stupid thing a politician did.

It's the kind of problem that will be staring humans in the face for thousands of years, always threatening to kill them in horrible ways; by famine, by flood, by fire...

If we ignore the problem it will only get worse.

[Hugin]

15. Not to mention pestilence...

Disease specifically. Increasing in both frequency and severity.

We can pretend that COVID-19 is over. Pandemics are only getting started.

Look for insects, too. Some of them carriers of viruses and bacteria only seen in the tropics.

Yeah, I'm a debbie-downer as incredibly sexist as calling someone that is.

[Javaman]

10. just watch the Antarctic glaciers.

specifically the ice shelf holding back the Thwaites and Pine glaicers.

that shelf goes (which is predicted to happen anytime between now and 5 years), all bets are off.

[Javaman]

12. humans, the general masses, just can't wrap their heads around it.

from the article:

"Most of us didn't hear a goddamn thing about the report or the protest. I get it. An article on the protest has been sitting in my tabs for the last week or more, reminding me to write about it. And I'm not saying that shit like the war in Ukraine or "Don't Say Gay" laws or gun violence in the United States aren't important. Absolutely they are, and, as awful as they are, we can comprehend those challenges in a way that we can't with the climate emergency. "

we, as a species, understand hate, bigotry, racism, war, death, etc, why? because we have been there done that and more will come.

Climate Change? not so much.

in many parts of the world it's very real, in other parts it's still an existential threat. "sure it's hot but it's summer!", "it's fire season, fires happen", "hurricanes cause damage and floods", etc. it's our pea brain collective conscious trying to rationalize the problems.

And as we continue to rationalize the irrational, things get worse and the excuses get more bizarre.

I used to think that until congress is standing in ankle deep water in Washington, then things will get done (way to late, of course), but now, I don't believe that, I think they will just state, "it's always been like this"

we have areas of Miami that now experience flooding on a regular basis. "it's just a big high tide". WTF?

Venice has built a tidal lock, but now the various powers that be in Italy, are beginning to think that it might not be enough.

Tornado's were once only thought to take place in tornado alley (with the rare few here and there) and during a certain time of the year. Nope, all year long and all over the place now.

the gigantic hurricanes are now more numerous and more frequent.

there is no more fire season. it happens all year long now.

insane snowstorms, record cold epic floods and horrific droughts are the norm now. And that's now! what will it look like 10, 20, 50 years from now???

I shutter to think.

and as always, until the moneyed morons that run society and keep us all fighting each other, are directly effected, nothing will change. in fact less than nothing. what does that mean? they will make things worse. if another disastrous right wing know nothing gets in office in this country, we are in a word: fucked. Let me extrapolate on that: we're completely fucked.

we aren't witnessing Nero fiddling while Rome burned, we are witnessing the dance of death orgy by the right wing.