I'm so warped from living during these times, that I believe the plan is to faze our carbon emissions at a rate that will ensure many of the World's poorest people die first. It is a plan hatched by unimaginable wealth that began collecting at the formation of the United States. Meanwhile, the war machine (same unimaginable rich people) are trying to start friction before the 2020 US election...
6
I have come to realize that the West does not care. Our political and business leaders know we will come up with tech solutions to mitigate the impact on our own lives. And if in the meantime a fifth of the world dies in poor Asian countries...oh well, decreasing the surplus population helps the planet get back to equilibrium, right? Denying and diminishing - and paying the occasional charitable carbon offset - is a great policy to hide the brutal truth that we plan to stand by and watch from our air-conditioned homes and corporate headquarters while millions die.
12
Well it's eat drink and be merry, for tomorrow we die. If you can afford the food and booze, that is. Much of the world cannot. Much of the world cannot afford Priuses. Much of the world clear cuts forests to survive. Much of the world burns cow dung. Much of the world has even more corrupt and incompetent leadership that we do, if that's even possible. They are incapable of the massive solutions needed.
So the only likely solution is nature taking its natural course - a massive die-off. When the grasses on San Clemente Island, off Los Angeles, became too tall they imported goats to chew it down. It worked beautifully. The goats ate the grass, thrived, and multiplied. Then there was no grass to eat and the goats died back. Nature at work.
So it's eat drink and be merry...
7
I believe that a pandemic that would kill billions is a likely thing that will save humanity. We must each act NOW by not buying plastic, composting, wear an article of clothing at least 36 times and then pass it along and upcycle after that, eat mostly vegan, grow gardens not lawns, bring one's own mug for coffee, consider how and where one travels, collect rain in barrels, plant drought resistant plants, use old rags rather than paper towels, gasp- in ones own home, use a cloth wipe when going to the bathroom, wash laundry in cold water with biodegradable soaps, vote with the issue of climate change in mind,... at least our consciousness will be changed. One step forward is better than nothing.
27
@JL I liked everything you said but in defense of lawns, I live in a very rural place and we let the wild weeds and grasses grow around us and mow and water them during summer because lots of bugs, birds and small critters rely on life in the grass to live. Watering grass carefully isn't a problem. It's using Round*p and other herbicides that is a problem. Natural grasses hold a lot of life and need some water...Be educated smart. Not just superficial smart.
12
Wonder what the climate change deniers would say about this information. Of course it is happening most prominently in "brown countries" so if you are Donald Trump and his corrupted sycophants why worry. Fact is - it's creeping up on this continent too. Maybe when enough people start dying of heat exhaustion society will boot the science deniers out of office and bring in people committed to address the problem head-on, though it's gotten very late in the day. We may now be in a situation where the best that can be done over the next decade is to mitigate the unstoppable fallout of what is happening now, arrest the growth of warming and lay the foundation for eventually turning it back.
9
It took years for the carbon dioxide levels to reach the level which has led to the crisis and if we stopped burning fossil fuel today, the momentum of the problem world not abate for at least 25 to 30 years. Political incompetence and corporate lying has not helped.
To have a president and political party which denies this is as astonishing as it is tragic. Everyone sinks when the earth ship goes down.
19
The new normal, although maybe not since it’s just going to get hotter. ”Normal” doesn’t exist any longer. As long as the worst effects are felt mostly by brown people, many in US won’t pay attention.
6
Welcome to the new normal.
8
Without real and intense action in addressing climate change this is all of our fates.
We are living in the begining of the end.
Yes, the sky is falling.
9
Every single bit of this article is true. With each passing year, the summer's been getting increasingly unbearable. The number "36" seems a bit off, because I don't know if we have proper agencies measuring these accurately. If we consider the 'discomfort index' and the ways in which people have been adversely affected, it's been a big hit to the human capital and I don't think our govt is tracking this accurately.
I pin the blame squarely on our municipal authorities and state governments.
They want to develop our cities as per western standards, all the while forgetting we are a tropical country.
Yes we need concrete roads, but how will paving every surface and filling in lakes and water bodies help? Borewells are being dug, but who will ensure replenishment of the water table? We don't need glass fronted buildings; these reflect sunlight, causing extreme discomfort to the throngs on the roads. Mumbai had beautiful canopy trees from the British times, quite a few of which have been brutally hacked down.
Cities like Bangalore and Hyderabad were known as the 'city of lakes'. The Nizams and rulers of yore ensured that we had a brilliantly connected network of water bodies. It's all gone.
25 years ago, hardly anyone had ACs. Today we can't but help running the ACs all through the night.
It's unfortunate that people died. But if we consider the ways in which people have been affected adversely, the number of affected would run into millions. And we are to blame.
16
This article is very enlightening and tragic. But I live in the central valley of California where we are experiencing triple digits plus every summer and to exacerbate the problem there are many towns in the central valley that have no source of potable water. I do not mean for a moment to downplay the situation in India, but we have many of the same problems here in the USofA. Can we look to our present administration to alleviate the situation? Glad you asked. The answer is, of course, no.
12
I remember when the Guinness Book of Records in the 1970s listed Al-Aziziya, Libya, as the place holding the record the hottest daytime temperature on Earth (122 F in the shade). That number seems like a distant memory today.
7
@PMN
And this is happening with 1 degree C warming. Now imagine 4 degrees...
10
Unhitch those poor horses. Humans are so clueless and mean.
19
Based on the limited number of comments that realize how incredibly dire and irreparable this situation is, I feel like these few are the canaries in the coal mine.
9
In the presentation linked to below (1) the glaciologist Richard Alley shows a map of the world (2) with red areas where he says that if we don’t change our ways, by the time his students are old the average summer would be hotter than anything yet experienced, with 90 percent confidence.
And that we would lose 40 percent of the ability to work outside in the hot months, with some countries it’ll be closer to 100 percent. (unless you can afford an air-conditioned tractor)
By late in this century you’d start to have places where it is projected to be too hot to survive outside, it’s like being locked in a hot car on a summer day with no air conditioning, you die.
Next century those areas would spread. We’re talking about taking the average out of human experience in a world where our food is already stressed by heat.
1. https://youtu.be/KsecTT1SIrg?t=38m45s
2. http://images.slideplayer.com/25/7879892/slides/slide_17.jpg
7
No mention of how city municipalities, in India, have paved over parks and filled ponds in the past 20 years?
Anyone remember when Bangalore was a relative backwater?
8
Seeing those skinny horses harnessed to carts breaks my heart. One of them appears to be covered in scars.
12
Every unnecessary death is a tragedy.
But for comparison's sake, it is also true that 36 deaths in India is fewer than 3 per hundred million inhabitants, or less than 3 percent of 1 percent of 1 percent of 1 percent of the population.
3
@polymath
Very clinical....unless of course it is you or yours.
8
Higher overnight temperatures are the big health problem. India needs to stop building coal plants. What are they thinking?
8
@Bob Why would the hundreds of millions of people there want cheap electricity -- maybe to pump water? to run medical equipment? to light their schools? to refrigerate food? Are they less entitled to those benefits than the nation that has contributed early and massively to climate change to satisfy the desires of a far smaller population? Have you or I given up water from the tap and electricity in our homes? Do we ever access medical care? Eat food kept in a refrigerator or freezer? India is new to its role in contributing to climate change. We're the leaders in that.
19
@Betsy
Why does every developing country need to repeat the mistakes of richer countries? Why not develop sustainable pollution free energy resources? Solar and nuclear power will alleviate the problem.
6
Last election victory resulted from campaign of hate for minorities, inciting people in name of religion and nationalism and so next five years will be spent further nurturing the same hatred to win 2024 election instead of working towards removing pollution, fighting effects of climate change which make heat wave worse. Water management is also essential part of providing relief during heat wave but requires human energy which will go towards generating more hatred.
6
I'm sure that Indian government incompetency has absolutely nothing to do with the (mis)management of this crisis.
Yes, it's climate change. But it's also a fact that Indian is essentially a failed state. Bad combination.
Are you all going India's failure to provide sewage treatment for it's billion plus population on climate change as well?
9
India a failed state? What on Earth are you talking about? It’s an overly populated poor country, but by no means a failed state. India is a democracy. Every adult has a right to vote. Unlike this country, the polls go to the people. Here our government wants to prevent its people from voting. In that sense America is a failed state.
15
@Paul
Did you actually read the article? It states very clearly that the number of deaths has been brought down every year, and quite dramatically so. All this while your President leads your country to ever greater heights of climate abuse.
Which is the failed state?
12
Paul Hawken's "Draw Down" rates refrigerant chemicals, the stuff that makes your AC work, as the #1 worst climate change hazard. They have a proportionately huge impact on global warming, much greater than carbon dioxide. And their use in small AC units is growing. Proper maintenance of the units is haphazard.
2
How are the state of West Bengal, Bihar and Orrisa effected? Curious to know.
1
Climate deterioration Worldwide is partly due to population increase in countries like India & China. Unless Global approach is taken we are killing generations to come. It looks like We are the most selfish generation on this planet Earth.
1
@MrK
Have you noticed Mr Trump’s latest effort to ROLL BACK emission standards in the US?
Not just a selfish generation, a rather silly one to have voted this man in, and then talk seriously about giving him another term.
6
India is a mess, and too populous, and dysfunctional, and the result of this overheating will be deaths, and probably, famine. Our government has been dysfunctional as well, but we occupy a lightly better geographical location , tho' the misuse of vital resources will be our downfall as well.
The overheating of the Earth should be covered as the beginning of World War III. I think we've past the opening battles already.
7
@cheryl
And the next war will be about water.
3
@Anne no shortage here. The Great Lakes are arisn’.
“One of India’s longest and most intense heat waves in decades,”
Why not say how many years? 20? 50? You use “decade” twice in the first two paragraphs. I know what the word means. But why not just say how many years? Or if it’s just ten then say ten.
9
I was in India in 2010. In Delhi the temperature was 111 to 113 every day. Farther north, in the foothills of the Himalayas it was 100 to 104. I thought that was normal. Maybe it's the new normal. If so, it's a tragedy of unimaginable and largely insoluble proportions.
People in India are outside *a lot*. Many* work outside as it is common to earn a living as a street vendor, or rickshaw puller. Many people use open air transportation (tuk-tuk like vehicles) and motorbikes. Air conditioning is a luxury hundreds of millions don't have. And people work *hard*. I saw building excavation projects being done by workers with picks and shovels, not back hoes and bulldozers. It's dangerous to simply be out in that kind of heat. It's many times worse with that much exertion.
*When I say many I mean *massive* numbers.
25
Could you please provide annual numbers of deaths from heat in India for the last 50 years please? Thanks.
6
@areader - I assumed you typed this on a computer. So use it to look up what you seek.
10
@Nicole
I could find the number 36 on a computer, too.
Why did I see it in the article?
@areader The suggestion was probably that you could pretty easily look up the data on Indian death rate due to heat. Within a few pages into a search, it shouldn't be hard to find, and probably along with a lot of other related information -- faster than waiting for someone else to do it.
2
How long until the world truly looks like the horror envisioned in Children of Men? I hated that movie because, other than the sterility, it seemed too reasonable.
7
@Horrified I guess you could take solace that all men in that movie ("Children Of Men"), even the soldiers, revered new human life, the birth, hope...We don't have to let Earth become eaten up by idiocy, greed, hatred, the worse of what we are capable. We must wake up and understand what the problems are and our options to heal them. We have to work together around the world. No more capitalism around just a few entities. I think we can do it but it will be hard on all of us. Everyone needs to participate. Wake up!
4
The horses trying to doze while still crudely harnessed. Fairly certain they are beaten to wake up. No water will be "wasted" on them, yet their owner will wail poverty when he kills them.
19
@Hypatia So you looked at the photo. Try reading the article too.
7
Chronic water shortage in every metro city in south india is by design. Government officials and politicians whom they serve use this shortage to sell water. It's how the system works. There has been virtually no effort to prevent encroachment on water bodies within cities. Most have them have been sold / encroached upon with blessings from local government.
Privatization of water supply with assurance of 24 hour supply is in progress. How will it be possible for a private company to supply a resource that is scarce, when government agencies who have failed to build/ maintain lakes that can store water during monsoon ?
There is contention for water flowing across state boundaries with each state upstream trying to build dams to block water from flowing downstream. They even argue that letting water flow into a ocean is a crime. This eventually disturbs the natural balance and environment.
Federal government doesn't show interest in ensuring proper water sharing despite numerous court rulings directing them.
Water is only available for sale in many places, people get water through public utilities once or twice a month. Cost of water is easily a dollar per gallon. No guarantees about purity though.
Uncontrolled and unplanned urbanization results in disaster of epic proportions.
28
Alright then - no global air conditioning in the heat in India.
To paraphrase Jerry -
“Ladies and Gentlemen I implore you”... Global warming is real...
5
Currently, only the middle classes and wealthy can afford access to air conditioning in India. As temperatures continue to rise due to Climate change, this disparity will become increasingly deadly. It must be the duty of the government to mitigate such dangers by ensuring all residents have electricity, access to air conditioning, decent shelter, healthcare, education, food, water, safety in the case of natural disaster and much more. Modi’s neoliberal crony capitalism couched behind Hindu nationalist identity politics is not capable of addressing these challenges, let alone addressing them in a way that is not extremely carbon intensive.
23
@Basant Tyagi
Replace air conditioning with education, and it fits perfectly with Trump’s America.
4
Talk about bad luck! How ironic.
Of all the rocks in the Galaxy, we happen to occupy one that harbors life, one that evolved self-aware species, some with demi-god like power, born in the exact sliver of time to not only discover the invisible workings of "reality" such as DNA, particle physics, quantum computing etc., but also be a witness to our own demise.
Isn't it a strange prediciment to find oneself in?
I am hopeful. I really am. Like the stars of our own show...watching it all unfold.
22
If it's so hot, why would a man be lying around in long slacks with a scarf?
@CK I can't afford AC, so I thoroughly cover my clothes in water and sit/work in front of a fan. When they begin to dry, I do it again. I used to have to work outside in the Mojave Desert, and that is where I learned to keep my long sleeved shirts and long pants wet in order to survive.
32
@CK, and if you’re in direct sun, keeping your skin covered with loose clothing will keep you cooler.
5
Covering the skin actually keeps some heat off the body.
6
Canada and Alaska are looking nicer and nicer....
9
It's a sick parody that those in the global south with have to pay for the sins of those of us in the global north, but there it is. India, the entire Middle East and Africa will be plagued to even greater degrees now, and in the near future. They'll ALL be knocking on our door. The United States, Canada and Europe need to prepare for mass migration like they've never seen it. It will be unstoppable, and it will be our fault. You reap what you sow, and you definitely can't fool Mother Nature.
52
I was in Chennai last week. The temps were only around 100F each day, but there has been a prolonged drought. The major temples in India have large catchment lakes which serve aesthetic and practical purposes - they catch rain water which is used by poor residents for drinking and bathing. Every temple I visited had a dry lake. No water in them for the last few years, according to residents I spoke with.
Further, Chennai has an insufficient public water system for a city of 11 million people. Water is trucked in on 4 thousand lorries a day, 5 full tanks per truck, per day. Poor people wait in line to fill plastic jugs and carry water home on a bike or by hand. If that's not tough enough, there's a water truck strike presently, with less water being delivered to the city.
Climate change and water shortages are enormous problems and are going to get exponentially worse, even as we work to correct them. I fear there will be mass deaths in places like Chennai before officials figure out how to keep people cool and hydrated. These disasters are coming.
40
@Triple C
Perhaps some encouragement to use birth control would be helpful?
14
@smcclellan To both Triple C and smcclellan I would say that 1) the population growth rate in India is falling fast although it has still not reached zero. That is expected by 2030, or in a bout a decade and then the population will start to decline. It has already reached that point in Tamil Nadu (whose capital is Chennai) that Triple C is referring to. That city is on the coast of India. With the availability of sea water and the heat, that is omniprsent in India, there should not be any shortage of desalined water if only the leaders of that state (and country) would use its natural resources and help its people.
India has 7000 kilometers of coast line and unlimited heat. And it gets adequate rain every year. Water should not be short if only.....
7
@Amit Bhatt
True, Amit. As I noted, there's work going on to fix the supply problem. I believe there are 4 desalination plants in Chennai already. Its just that the weather is changing faster than progress on remediating the supply problem.
And your point is valid, the government must make water security a priority all over the country. As must other countries around the developing world.
5
36 dead? In Europe 70,000 died during a summer of heat waves. It never reached 126°. Something is off with this number.
22
What we're doing to the planet is like burning the furniture in your house with the windows closed.
How do scientists know climate change is due to human activity?
- Because they know the greenhouse effect is caused an increase of carbon in the atmosphere.
- They have instruments that can measure the amount of CO2 in the air.
- They've been monitoring a rapid acceleration of CO2 emissions into the atmosphere over the last 40 to 50 years.
What is the principle cause of CO2 emissions?
- The burning of fossil fuels.
The same scientists who are trying to warn us also have the solutions. But we're running out of time. We're talking decades before we reach the point the point of no return and the effect of too much carbon in the atmosphere will no longer be reversible.
Climate change is here. We see it in the fires, floods, heat waves and violent storms on the news almost on a monthly basis. The deniers are gambling with the extinction of the planet.
I suggest everybody who can watch an HBO documentary special called "Ice on Fire."
18
Geoengineering should be explored to alleviate international heat waves, "artificial volcano" is a model based on a proven phenomenon for lowering surface temperatures. The mining of fossil fuels needs to end soon, because CO2 at about 400 ppm is approaching the 1,000 ppm concentration at which people begin to notice poor air - at that point, there's no "good air" to be had anywhere. Development of technologies such as artificial photosynthesis hold good promise for developing a properly sustainable hydrocarbon business (the fuel is manufactured directly from air-borne CO2, forming a complete cycle).
2
Climatic crises are becoming more frequent.
Governments (all united) must invest to change the energy matrix: http://nuevaeconomiaycompartir.blogspot.com.ar/2014/02/la-necesidad-de-un-nuevo-paradigma_13.html because market is going slower than the planet needs.
http://nuevaeconomiaycompartir.blogspot.com/2017/12/como-cambiar-la-matriz-de-energia.html There is no other solution.
A new energy matrix will also mean less employment and readaptation of large portions of society, oil companies, electricity companies.
Likewise, a global plan to seed trees should be implemented.Only Latin America every year lost, by cutting down, an area equivalent to Belgium, as if you took away a lung´s piece from the world.
Only a divine help from the spiritual hierarchy, which will be present in a very short time, with Maitreya, Jesus, Koot homi, Morya, Hilarion, Rackozy, Paul the Venetian and other masters, can present us with the panorama of complete crisis, not only ecological, but in several aspects: http://nuevaeconomiaycompartir.blogspot.com.ar/2012/08/la-ayuda-de-maitreya-esta-muy-cerca.html This will be the most important event in the history of mankind .
The world is facing now a lot of problems:
http://nuevaeconomiaycompartir.blogspot.com.ar/2016/03/resumen-del-blog-el-desafio-de-crear-un.html
https://www.amazon.com/Nueva-Era-Econom%C3%ADa-Sociedad-Sabidur%C3%ADa-ebook/dp/B07239C47R
2
123 F is 50 C which is heat that kills.
17
india in the summer of 2020 is arizona, texas and the whole southeast in the summer of 2050.
and india, the middle east, africa in 2050? don't ask.
37
@drollere
I suppose you'll soon be moving to Wi.
PS: it's cold here !
3
Really this effect of climate change is not important for how many people it kills. Humans are not in short supply, and are the main factor in increasing climate change, so reducing humanity's numbers is always a good thing.
The main problem with these lethal heat waves is how many animals and plants they're killing. These heat waves are far more deadly to animals and plants, because they have no way of dealing with these sustained high temperatures. More species will go extinct from these environmental changes.
41
@Dan Stackhouse
I get the sentiment, but climate change is driven by the decisions of a relative few number of humans, and the poorest among us have very little control over it's effects or the lifestyles that they live, especially in countries like India where the average person doesn't use air conditioning or leverage a huge volume of imported items. The people who have pushed propaganda and misinformation about fossil fuels and climate change denial do not die from climate change. The losses of these people are still unnecessary and tragic. The ire should be directed at the industry heads and corrupt government officials who have dragged their feet on action in the name of short term profits, and the resulting deaths of the impoverished should be mourned as much as the deaths of other creatures and populations who have done nothing to invite this calamity but have still suffered the consequences.
41
Bourgeois eco-primitivists from wealthy countries often have a callous and hypocritical lack of regard for human life. They misguidedly romanticize a constructed “primordial nature”, which they view in theological terms. Not only is their worldview cruel, it’s also completely untenable even on their own terms. An individualistic love of nature that condones (or even relishes) the prospects of mass human suffering and casualties will never garner the global support required of any successful attempt to combat climate change.
6
I’m going to the faucet and have a glass of water, no charge
In the future that same glass of water will cost me three dollars.
7
India especially has been thoughtless and completely aping the west in development models. Can you begin to fathom a 1.2 Billion population beginning to see upward social mobilty and beginning to be able to afford cars (starting at 5000$),
We need to examine alternatives with urgency. should have been planned well ahead but still. There is no way green or otherwise that the roads and highways can meet even 20% population on cars. MAss transits, metros being done but need an urgency.Afforestation on an unprecendented scale.
restriction on number of car permits on lines of Singapore.
Conserve the rivers. Huge desalination plants, underground water conservation all need to be explored. Several states already face an acute water shortage bound to grow only worse.
25
This is just a taste of what is going to come if we don't end our dependency on oil as fast as possible. The entire world and the fate our children and grandchildren hang in the balance.
45
We should not be too hasty to dismiss stories of far off places. We are looking at our very near future.
63
Please stop over-simplifying Anthropogenic Global Warming (AGW) with lines such as "due to rising greenhouse gas emissions."
If CO2 emissions from man fell to zero today, the planet would and will keep right on warming. Acceleration of natural processes which were "kicked off", if you will, by the net change in atmospheric CO2 balance caused by human activity in the last 200 years, are now operating independent of that stimulus and will continue until there is nothing left to melt.
Hothouse Earth is an assured certainty and, sad to say, this story will be eclipsed by something even more dire in the very near future.
Andy Revkin would do the world a great service if he would cut through the mumbo jumbo and report on the very real likeliehood that the tipping point has long been passed. In the years ahead we need rapid adaptation to ever-worsening conditions, or our very survival will be at risk.
Go right on reporting all of these fantasies about stopping, slowing, reversing AGW, all without any proof nor precedent.
Maybe not the Greatest but certainly the Biggest Story Ever Told is what man has done to irreversibly destroy the only habitat available to not only him but to all life. It's a staggering thing to have accomplished in a mere 200 years, all the more amazing because we received ample warning 30 years ago and proceeded to devolve into factions instead of coming together to solve it.
Quite a legacy to hand to our children and grandchildren.
143
Well stated; the truth hurts. Adaptation is the only hope of survival of the species, and part of that process will be depopulation on a previously-unimagined scale. The process won’t be “managed,” it will be a chaotic, instinctive journey of survival for the few that make it through the bottleneck. It won’t be leaders flying to symposiums in private jets, negotiating treaties. That will all be over soon enough.
So, enjoy it while it lasts and don’t lose a minute’s sleep regretting “lost opportunities” or fantasizing illusory “solutions!”
13
@Walt Bennett And yet, people scoff when I say it's irresponsible to reproduce in 2019.
35
@Walt Bennett I'm not ready to give up, but I am sorry to see you and so many people are. We need to act. Mashal has not "over simplified". He has reported on the situation in India today. But he has obviously triggered a simple reaction in yourself. Take a deep breath and don't forget to vote.
3
Climate change is upon us and it is only going to get worse. In Old Testament parlance the rains have begun but the flood is yet to come.
I really do not believe we will have to wait until 2030 or 2050 to see some really dire stuff. Scientists are by nature conservative and the projections years ago have proven to be low regarding the impacts of dumping all of this carbon into the atmosphere. I am 57 and expect to see some really nasty stuff in my lifetime- I do not wish to think about what the next generations will see in theirs.
Beyond the physical impacts of sea level rise, the disruption of agriculture is going to drive huge migrations that no wall will be able to stop. The natural world is already migrating away from the equator and one wonders about what happens when the tropics become untenable for human life.
61
The weather in India has changed significantly these past 40 years because the population has increased from 800 million to about 1200 million, well to do families are driving imported cars loaded with powerful ACs requiring lots of gas, and homes and offices now have AC systems requiring too much electricity. Will only get worse especially being connected to China with identical problems.
17
@rudolf yea, the weather changing in India is 100% India's fault, it has nothing to do with western world's use of fossil fuels...
18
Can you be more specific?
Now it is the people of India. I feel for them, and I am sorry to say it is our nation which has supplied most of the CO2 increasing temperatures worldwide.
If we don't find our way to a government serious about addressing climate change, soon enough it will be all of us.
We know this as clearly as we know anything.
We've pursued cleverness, yet forsaken wisdom.
I wish I had more faith.
Like many, I've cut back on carbon.
I've marched in the streets over this issue.
I've called and written my congressional representatives.
I've engaged regularly in environmental activism.
But I'm losing hope.
I pray for the children, and the elderly,
and the livestock and the future
of the Indian people.
I pray for all our children.
I don't know what else to do.
56
@C. Whiting - i guess the consolation here is that hope, faith and praying never really solved anything; taking personal responsibility (cutting back on carbon), marching, calling, writing, activism -- these things do contribute to change, and they do matter.
there are three steps at the personal level. you become concerned; you become informed; you become outspoken. marching and protesting are the extreme versions of the mealtime, social gathering, workplace conversations where you express your opinion, rebut misinformation, simply raise the issue.
the main barrier is not what people say to pollsters or write to their "leaders" (AKA, the followers), but what they *don't* say to their parents, children, friends, colleagues; it's the personal example of apathy that lets the complacency, ignorance and denial flourishing all around live on as "acceptable".
make your concern about climate more visible to those around you. if they are not concerned, they may become so; if not informed, they may learn; once informed, they will join you in speaking out.
5
@drollere
Good advice.
Already ascribe to all of it.
Have for most of my adult life.
Still the greenhouse gasses rise.
Still the politicians lie.
I will continue, as will you, to fight for a livable future, but my hope is not untethered from the realities all around, and it is taking a beating.
You can say prayer and hope solve nothing.
I would contend that they are a useful counterpart to action--guiding the common good in that action and carrying our spirit forward when it appears other avenues have failed.
Many who have done so much for this world lead from a sense of spirit. Typing this, my own hope has increased a little. The maple tree I planted yesterday waves in the wind.
Bless everyone who is doing what they can, in what ever way they best understand how to approach this work.
10