Climate Change

It is my personal key area of action. I think this is the most important issue of modernity that is about to, or is already overshadowing all other aspects of social and environmental breakdown. It is the stark presentation of the global effects of modern civilization. The poverty, the wars, the exploitations and humiliations were local, now it all becomes officially global. When the poor and powerless had, for centuries, no power to strike back, the Nature now steps in.

This is a wake-up call we cannot ignore. This is the opportunity we mustn't miss.

Re: Climate Change

Well said.  Climate change is everyone's problem…it has no geographical boundaries, no population restrictions.  ALL are affected.  ALL must affect a change.

Re: Climate Change

Catastrophe - Our Only Hope.

I am no diviner, but I think this year there will be a great catastrophe, and that we need it. The speed with which science of Climate Change advanced over the recent years, together with the speed of the advance of the global warming itself, is astonishing. A major and swift change is needed, globally, action that the politics is unable to force today. So I turn to nature for “help” on this. There's going to be a major disaster. And we must make most use of it.

There is no disagreement amongst scientists. The overall heating and “energising” of the atmosphere is on the rise. This year will be the hottest to some and the wettest/windiest to others of all the previous years on record. Disaster is brewing. I don't know what it will be - a major hurricane, a disastrous flood, a disease pandemic, a military conflict - but in any case if and when it happens we must all clinge onto it as onto our only hope. Let me explain why.

Science, which is in consensus and precise, is adamant: 2 degrees Celcius temperature rise is all we can afford. Above this a “feedback mechanism” is started: we can then shut down all factories and scrap all cars and planes - it would no longer matter. Permafrost starts melting large-scale and releasing methane (23xCO2 greenhouse impact), the rainforests are committed to dying and releasing their stored CO2, the soil reaches a point of releasing its stored CO2, the ocean and oceanic bed releasing more greenhouse gases… Everything falls together, like a cardboard house, like a snowball rolling downhill. Two degrees warming and 400 ppm CO2 concentration that commit us to this are our aim, our limit.

We blew it. Atmospheric concentration of CO2 is over 380ppm, we'll cross 400ppm in less than a decade, and permafrost is already thawing. Best political plans aim at useless reductions by a useless date (mid-century). This is fatal. There is no time to “slow down”, to “develop alternatives”, to “ensure growing economy”. We must now shut down everything, sit quietly in a dark corner hugging our teddy bear, and hope the big monster outside will pass by without noticing we're there.

If the economy is falling already without major climate change, what will happen when the big problems hit? The newspapers talk about a “large GDP loss” and “end of prosperity”: nobody understands what climate change really means for us. It is the end of civilization, if not of all humanity, not just the end of “prosperity”. Unless we have another glimpse into what climate change really means to us all, nothing will happen. We desperately need a wake-up call.

So whatever disasterous event happens this summer, cling onto it. Connect the dots, link it to climate change explicitly. Push it into people's faces, into companies' faces, into governments' faces. We must be reckless and informed. Local businesses must be scared into shutting off their wasted night lights and heating, the governments must be scared into stopping oil subsidies and tax breaks immediately, and we must be scared of starting our cars that every extra time or leaving those lights on an extra minute, as if this may trigger a bomb in our basement. And this must happen now, this year.

Yes, we must decend back into 18th century life, voluntarily. And immediately. Or we will be forced into bronze age, and our children - into stone age. For this we need a catalytic eye-opener, and only a major disaster can be up to the job.

As for people who will blindly refuse to do anything… Buy them a gun, a real live loaded gun, and ask them to shoot one child every few minutes. In the head. Because that's what they're doing.
Because that's how serious it is.

(Crossposted from Zet White's blog entry.)

Re: Climate Change

it is really serious… that cyclone in Myanmar is really bothering me. On the weekend they were saying hundreds were dead. Now the number is 15,000 with 30,000 missing people, and people are saying it's like the tsunami.

grieving,

nicole

Re: Climate Change

I am afraid this is only the beginning. If you come across a site collecting money for Mayanmar do post here please?.. As for my previous post I am implying something that would hit the west too. (Yes, I know, as if Katrina wasn't enough.. Well, apparently it wasn't…)

Sending them light.
Zet

Re: Climate Change

Myanmar: Cyclone Nargis

Cyclone Nargis hit the southern delta region of Myanmar on May 2nd, leaving a trail of destruction in its wake. High winds, heavy rain and flood water have destroyed homes and livelihoods and left hundreds of thousands of people in urgent need of emergency shelter and basic supplies. According to state television, nearly 4,000 people have been killed and 3,000 are still missing.

The Red Cross response was swift. Soon after the cyclone hit local Red Cross relief workers were on the ground distributing life-saving relief items, such as drinking water, clothing, food, plastic tarpaulins, and hygiene kits.

Along with relief items, the Myanmar Red Cross is distributing insecticide-treated bed nets to help prevent malaria and purification tablets to provide clean drinking water. Also, emergency relief supplies are available in Red Cross warehouses in Kuala Lumpur and Dubai if requested.

More detailed assessments are being carried out to determine the longer-term needs of vulnerable communities.

For more information please contact:

Canadian Red Cross
Media Relations Line
613-740-1994

Posted May 5, 2008

Re: Climate Change

Avaaz.org has taken up a chance to make some very influential points about climate change for the G8 summit, through the Prime Minister of Japan. Japan HAS the potential to lead the world on this issue! This could be a breakthrough - please consider signing the petition at www.avaaz.org/en/g8_climate_wakeup - they need lots of signatures by Wednesday.

Thank you!

Re: Climate Change

Thanks! I put the call out to my pod too.

Love,

Nicole