I've been talking smack about posting this for like 2 months. Here it is, and please guys, take it to heart. If you dont think climate change is affecting you now, take a closer look. If it actually isn't, then it will in the near future. So it's relevant.
About those "other things":
1. Can Wolfowitz please just be fired already? Not only is he a piece of crap, but he symbolizes the corruption and hypocrisy of the World Bank as a whole.
2. Can the U.S. newsmedia please stop its mission of sensationalizing stories into oblivion and just take up the simple task of providing accurate and broad-based information to the public so that we can all be more informed and stop supporting imperialist Republican-Bushite policies (or being complacent enough to let it happen)?
So to the main feature: Climate Change and the question of Climate Justice.
Climate Change: So, to give a couple facts to preface things: climate change is not a far-fetched and slow-coming notion that scientists have come up with. This is a current issue and it has been going on since the Industrial Revolution. It has been studied since the mid 60's and it is just now that it is gaining international attention. This is not because it hasn't been a legitimate issue until now. This is because we have gotten to the point where, given current rates of fossil fuel consumption and greenhouse gas emissions, we are beyond a point where we can completely reverse the trend of climate change. Which is bad, bad bad. We can only maintain current rates and prevent future acceleration in the rate and severity of climate change.
Climate change, as the human-enduced warming of the world's atmosphere caused by the burning of fossil fuels and release of other pollutants in the atmosphere, has consequently caused fundamental shift in the earth's climate. Not temperature - climate. The term "climate" encompasses our weather patterns, the air we breathe and what it is made up of, the water we drink, and the ground we walk on. Climate change example: an increase of warm air causes an increase in major storms such as hurricanes. An increase in hurricanes and their intensity means a short-term increase in rainfall and humidity. Increases in rainfall and humidity in areas that are not ecologically acclimated to such changes (i.e. areas that arent a tropical rainforest or wetland) leads to increases in stagnant water, landslides, and waste runoff into our water systems. Increases in stagnant water = more mosquitos = more malaria, west nile etc. (depending on where you are). Landslides lead to degradation of the soil which leads to lower crop yields, not to mention houses being destroyed. Contaminated water due to waste runoff means contaminated vegetables (read: e.coli outbreak). This list could continue forever and applies for all weather related events caused by climate change, like drought, which has contributed significantly to conflict in a variety of regions, most notably Sudan.
This little thing called climate change embodies virtually every issue that governments and individuals alike hold dear: the availability of food and water, susceptibility to conflict, major health problems and widespread sickness, poverty, the health of the world ecosystems that we rely on to survive, every day, national security, the global economy, the wealth of nations (whose natural resources are simultaneously being depleted by our use and endangered by climate change), birth rates, death rates, standard of living, household incomes, energy needs and supplies - again an interminable list. I will stop here.
So this is a big issue, but it's importance as a question of global justice is often overlooked. To me, this should give any and everyone who thinks about it a permanent sense of outrage and urgency in terms of how this is being dealt with. So what is the "climate justice" issue? The simple idea that Western nations have singlehandedly caused this problem, and the nations of the southern hemisphere and Third World will suffer most acutely from it. Just ask yourself: who is affected more by drought - a family in California (which has been drought stricken for the past 7 years) with a small but nice house, one car, running water and a grocery store nearby, OR a family in Chad or Mauritania who survives off of their 1-acre plot of land (which needs seasonal rainfall) to grow crops and feed livestock that they sell in return for money that pays for water that does not run from the tap because it is too scarce? Yeeeah.
The U.S., for example, holds 5% of the world's population but produces 25% of the world's greenhouse gas emissions. Effectively, the poorest nations of the world are suffering from the excessive consumption of Western nations. This is what I am referring to when I say that the world needs climate justice, because every second, minute, and day of inaction or ineffective action on part of the US, Canada, Europe and Asia is another moment of climate injustice. So this is a moral issue as well as an economic and political one.
I could go on about this forever, but what I am getting at is that people need to develop a stronger sense of what climate change is and how it is an issue that endangers everyone, everywhere, and is also an issue that highlights how interconnected our world is. We need to think about the global effects of our actions on an everyday basis, we need to think about the industries and the politics that we buy into (ideologically and financially). We need to re-think where we would like to see ourselves and our world 20 years from now. The crisis of the global environment is something that is going to fundamentally change life on a global and personal level in the years to come, and the burden of dealing with this falls on our generation. You don't need to be an environmental activist for this to concern you. It will concern you regardless. It doesn't matter if you're interested in literature or science or politics, this issue will affect you in all of these respects because this is about the world we live in and the earth that has made it possible for our species to exist in the first place.
There are too many people who are pretending not to notice the problem and not doing anythign about it. There are too many people who know about this problem and refuse to do anything about it. There are too many people who are just sitting on the fence.
There are too few people who are truly committed to seeing the full scope of this issue and solving the problem. Let's get outraged at where things stand, let's get motivated to think about it and plan for it and do something about it. Let's just get involved, even if it just means reading a book about it or turning off the TV when you're not home or just using a bike or walking around town more often. Or just thinking about it - how it affects you, your countr[ies], yur future, your career and your loved ones - for like 15 minutes everyday.
About those "other things":
1. Can Wolfowitz please just be fired already? Not only is he a piece of crap, but he symbolizes the corruption and hypocrisy of the World Bank as a whole.
2. Can the U.S. newsmedia please stop its mission of sensationalizing stories into oblivion and just take up the simple task of providing accurate and broad-based information to the public so that we can all be more informed and stop supporting imperialist Republican-Bushite policies (or being complacent enough to let it happen)?
So to the main feature: Climate Change and the question of Climate Justice.
Climate Change: So, to give a couple facts to preface things: climate change is not a far-fetched and slow-coming notion that scientists have come up with. This is a current issue and it has been going on since the Industrial Revolution. It has been studied since the mid 60's and it is just now that it is gaining international attention. This is not because it hasn't been a legitimate issue until now. This is because we have gotten to the point where, given current rates of fossil fuel consumption and greenhouse gas emissions, we are beyond a point where we can completely reverse the trend of climate change. Which is bad, bad bad. We can only maintain current rates and prevent future acceleration in the rate and severity of climate change.
Climate change, as the human-enduced warming of the world's atmosphere caused by the burning of fossil fuels and release of other pollutants in the atmosphere, has consequently caused fundamental shift in the earth's climate. Not temperature - climate. The term "climate" encompasses our weather patterns, the air we breathe and what it is made up of, the water we drink, and the ground we walk on. Climate change example: an increase of warm air causes an increase in major storms such as hurricanes. An increase in hurricanes and their intensity means a short-term increase in rainfall and humidity. Increases in rainfall and humidity in areas that are not ecologically acclimated to such changes (i.e. areas that arent a tropical rainforest or wetland) leads to increases in stagnant water, landslides, and waste runoff into our water systems. Increases in stagnant water = more mosquitos = more malaria, west nile etc. (depending on where you are). Landslides lead to degradation of the soil which leads to lower crop yields, not to mention houses being destroyed. Contaminated water due to waste runoff means contaminated vegetables (read: e.coli outbreak). This list could continue forever and applies for all weather related events caused by climate change, like drought, which has contributed significantly to conflict in a variety of regions, most notably Sudan.
This little thing called climate change embodies virtually every issue that governments and individuals alike hold dear: the availability of food and water, susceptibility to conflict, major health problems and widespread sickness, poverty, the health of the world ecosystems that we rely on to survive, every day, national security, the global economy, the wealth of nations (whose natural resources are simultaneously being depleted by our use and endangered by climate change), birth rates, death rates, standard of living, household incomes, energy needs and supplies - again an interminable list. I will stop here.
So this is a big issue, but it's importance as a question of global justice is often overlooked. To me, this should give any and everyone who thinks about it a permanent sense of outrage and urgency in terms of how this is being dealt with. So what is the "climate justice" issue? The simple idea that Western nations have singlehandedly caused this problem, and the nations of the southern hemisphere and Third World will suffer most acutely from it. Just ask yourself: who is affected more by drought - a family in California (which has been drought stricken for the past 7 years) with a small but nice house, one car, running water and a grocery store nearby, OR a family in Chad or Mauritania who survives off of their 1-acre plot of land (which needs seasonal rainfall) to grow crops and feed livestock that they sell in return for money that pays for water that does not run from the tap because it is too scarce? Yeeeah.
The U.S., for example, holds 5% of the world's population but produces 25% of the world's greenhouse gas emissions. Effectively, the poorest nations of the world are suffering from the excessive consumption of Western nations. This is what I am referring to when I say that the world needs climate justice, because every second, minute, and day of inaction or ineffective action on part of the US, Canada, Europe and Asia is another moment of climate injustice. So this is a moral issue as well as an economic and political one.
I could go on about this forever, but what I am getting at is that people need to develop a stronger sense of what climate change is and how it is an issue that endangers everyone, everywhere, and is also an issue that highlights how interconnected our world is. We need to think about the global effects of our actions on an everyday basis, we need to think about the industries and the politics that we buy into (ideologically and financially). We need to re-think where we would like to see ourselves and our world 20 years from now. The crisis of the global environment is something that is going to fundamentally change life on a global and personal level in the years to come, and the burden of dealing with this falls on our generation. You don't need to be an environmental activist for this to concern you. It will concern you regardless. It doesn't matter if you're interested in literature or science or politics, this issue will affect you in all of these respects because this is about the world we live in and the earth that has made it possible for our species to exist in the first place.
There are too many people who are pretending not to notice the problem and not doing anythign about it. There are too many people who know about this problem and refuse to do anything about it. There are too many people who are just sitting on the fence.
There are too few people who are truly committed to seeing the full scope of this issue and solving the problem. Let's get outraged at where things stand, let's get motivated to think about it and plan for it and do something about it. Let's just get involved, even if it just means reading a book about it or turning off the TV when you're not home or just using a bike or walking around town more often. Or just thinking about it - how it affects you, your countr[ies], yur future, your career and your loved ones - for like 15 minutes everyday.
