At first, I was going to only post this on my literary website, but I am cross-posting it on my policy website because I believe that it has both literary and political merit.
As I write this, I am in the midst of a climate-induced anxiety attack.
There is no one cause. Alberta’s been breaking heat records this summer.[1] Our forests are burning. I’ve started a new job where I’m working on energy policy. I just watched a video on how energy companies have systematically undermined efforts to combat climate change for over half a century.
I’m not afraid for my own future. I probably should be. Heat kills seniors[2], so it is not improbable heat will be the end of me. Or perhaps I will die defending Canada’s natural resources.[3] Climate change may make soldiers of us all, if not in sacrifices today then in the wars of tomorrow.
It is not fear that makes me anxious. It is anger, and it is guilt. I don’t know if climate change will be true apocalypse or if it will merely kill millions (billions?), but I feel that we have failed. Those in power have failed because they have systematically chosen power and wealth over the very future of our planet, and we, we the people, have failed because we let them.
I have failed.
The problem is beyond me, of course. Far greater men and women than I have ground themselves to dust against the global apparatus, screaming into the void that we seem so hellbent on joining. And yet, I despair at the things I could do if I had but the will and the wit.
There are many ifs and buts. I do believe that climate change is increasingly gaining momentum in the global consciousness. I think nations are actually starting to take net zero seriously (though I do not believe we will achieve it by 2050). Technological innovations in clean energy continues to accelerate.
Sometimes, however, I just want to wail in despair. To wail, and hear others wail in kind. To tear away the pretense and the petty conflicts and just weep together at the failures of human kind.
I’ll forget this pain tomorrow. Next week I will return to working on policies that might even help reduce global carbon emissions, and I will be practical and pragmatic. Tonight, however, I grieve for what should have been.
[1] https://globalnews.ca/news/9897547/temperature-records-broken-alberta-heat-wave/ [2] https://www.cbc.ca/news/health/why-heat-waves-kill-elderly-risk-1.4737544 [3] https://www.usnews.com/news/best-countries/articles/2021-10-29/how-climate-change-may-increase-global-conflicts
Image by ojosujono96 on Freepik
Hozzászólások