As a social science teacher talking about climate change, I'd often get students who raise the fact that there are just 100 companies, worldwide, producing over 70% of all GHGs. Therefore, they reason, if we petition or protest or rally to shut down those 100 companies, then climate change will be over! It's a very simple solution, and it would be great it if worked. But it won't.
First off, we experience a lag time between mitigations and effects, so even if we stop producing GHGs on a dime, things will continue to get worse from all the things we did yesterday. And climate change is in the works already hitting tipping points and likely unable to completely stop or reverse, but it will slow down the effects, for sure, so we should definitely do all we can.
Next, let's look at what those companies do. Most are in the fossil fuels business, which we should keep in the ground as much as possible, but if we shut it all down today, how will you heat your home or take a bus or buy a new phone or anything with plastic in it or get food that isn't grown within cycling distance? It's all so integrated and complex and global that it takes a while to get everyone to understand that things won't change without it affecting us significantly. We also have to change the way we live. We can do that right now, but it would definitely be easier with government mandates, and subsidies in the right direction, and an authentic, global unified path that comes with consequences if ignored.
So then I get this argument: It's just the rich people that need to change how they live.
Before we go after the rich with pitchforks, realize that, worldwide, you're in the top 10% if you have a net worth (the value of all assets including a house and car and savings, minus debts) of about
$130,000. That figure is five years old, so it's likely a little higher now, but right now in Canada, if you own your own home, you're likely in the top 10% worldwide. It can certainly
feel like you're not if you're surrounded by people who have more than you do, and especially if you own a home but sometimes have to make tough decisions when paying bills. We rarely see the kind of poverty that most people experience.
Living near people, or just watching them online, feeds our expectations what we should be able to do for our own enjoyment, what we deserve to be able to have and do for all our efforts. This expectation change has skyrocketed in tandem with how little enjoyment we get from what we do. When we override a desire for contentedness with a continuous internal quest for the next new thing, we numb our capacity for joy.
For instance, only a fraction of our world has ever flown in an airplane - some say 5%, but
elsewhere it's 20%. Nobody seems to know for sure, but suffice it to say that the expectation to fly a few time a year is
rare globally. My parents were never in a plane despite both being professors and making a good buck. We went camping every summer as our yearly vacation away from home. They just didn't feel the need to see and experience all the things possible or drag their brood of kids around to look at things in person. We owned a set of encyclopedias with pictures! My dad played in a couple bands, and my folks played bridge with friends and Rummoli with the kids, and we all went for walks, and we all read newspapers and commented on the news. And that was their whole life. And it didn't at all feel like it was a life
unlived. On the contrary: They were madly in love and very content.
But I had a "friend" once tell me that my parents were social isolates because they never did anything, and that I'd turn out like too if I'm not careful.
Narrator: She wasn't careful.
I have many friends who fly for pleasure at least once each year, and it's often the main part of our conversations: where they've been, what they saw and did there, and where they're planning to go next. Being in classes is one of few places where I meet people to discuss our understanding of the world, and it's delicious. I worried that I'd lose that in retirement, without philosophy classes to argue with, but instead I found it in spades with classmates. But outside of class, without those guiding prompts, it's like we don't know how to have conversations of depth. So if you don't travel, if you just walk in the woods and watch the chickadees bouncing from limb to limb, then you have nothing to add to the conversation. And then you're the worst thing ever in this timeline: You're boring.
There's a lot riding on you getting out there and doing exciting stuff or buying new thing, so you can tell people about it later show them proof that you exist. No wonder loneliness is a huge problem exacerbating our current mental health crisis.
The most depressing idea I often hear from students is to just move to the moon or another planet. That implies they've been led to believe it would be easier to colonize space than to fix the mess we've made here.
It's pretty late in the game, but it can help to petition the government to change what industries are subsidized, get the big picture with a focus on better rail and bus instead of just pushing for everyone to buy electric cars, and then try to decrease your personal reliance on GHG producers as much as possible. Every little bit can help if we all focus on it, and at the very least, it's good practice for when we stop being able to rely on the electricity grid. Here are some ideas; do what you can. I'm working on doing better too. It's hard when we're surrounded by all the trappings of capitalism as it slowly implodes.
- take a walk in a nearby green space instead of flying to Cancun
- fight to protect green spaces like your life depends on it (because it does)
- cycle, bus, or walk as much as possible
- eat chicken instead of beef
- eat beans and lentils instead of chicken
- don't buy anything you don't actually need, and repurpose things when they wear out
- turn the heat down in winter, and avoid A/C in summer as much as possible
- hang clothes instead of using a dryer - anything that heats or cools is a problem
- don't worry about being interesting or exciting --> you can just be
Happy Earth Day!
ETA: A poem:
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