Sunday, May 2, 2021

The Wrong Message About Climate Change


 

John Clarke

I wish I could be more effective in convincing left and progressive thinking people of how utterly wrong headed, reactionary and dangerous this message is. It attributes the climate crisis to some inherent evil in human nature but this is so wrong. Do the Inuit people who have shared this area of the world with bears like this for countless generations, carry the blame for what is depicted here? Are small farmers in Africa responsible? The problems with this message are:


1. The climate crisis flows from the destructive irrationality of a social and economic system based on the pursuit of short term profits that is incapable of developing a sustainable relationship with nature.


2. This diverts attention from challenging the system that is frying the planet and channels anger into a useless exercise in self loathing that achieves nothing.


3. This leads to the conclusion that the solution is to eliminate as much of this human 'virus' as possible. It, in turn, gives comfort to deeply racist ideas of population control focused on poor and oppressed countries. There are those who are only too happy to help deliver that message.


This is misanthropic nonsense and it utterly undermines the struggle for climate justice.

No comments: