I was talking with a friend about illegal immigration, and I was thinking, We non-politician citizens here in America are damned dumb if we worry about these alleged Middle Easterners and welfare sponges and criminals heading toward our country and ignore our more serious problems. For example, Conor Lynch enlightes as to the clear and present danger of climate change (global warming): “Hurricane Florence is devastating the Carolinas, and … Republican lawmakers in both North and South Carolina are notorious for their climate denialism and have done little to prepare for the impact that a changing climate will have on their states. One can only hope that the very real storms we are witnessing today will convince Americans across the political spectrum that we must address the clear and present danger of climate change before it’s too late.” I live in coastal South Carolina, and this guy is spot-on. I wish Republicans at the national and local level (politicians, that is) would stop using wedge issues and other techniques to distract from pressing issues such as the steel trap of climate change. Here are some quotes about global warming and climate change to inspire your thinking:
“We are the first generation to know we are destroying our planet and the last one that can do anything about it.” ~ Tanya Steele
“Virtually everyone in the world believes that climate change is real and is caused by human beings, except Republicans in the United States. Especially the people who would know best: 97 percent of climate scientists agree that climate change is real and caused by human activity, and I suspect the other 3 percent are being paid by the fossil fuel industry.”
“Every once in a while I feel despair over the fate of the planet. If you’ve been following climate science, you know what I mean: the sense that we’re hurtling toward catastrophe but nobody wants to hear about it or do anything to avert it.”
“Even when we address something, the plan can never start until years down the road. Congress’s climate change bill mandates a 17% cut in greenhouse gas emissions… by 2020! Fellas, slow down, where’s the fire? Oh yeah, it’s where I live, engulfing the entire western part of the United States!”
I think the future looks grim when any of us focus on the news, the political realities of the day, the phenomenon of globalism. There is a huge sorrow in my own heart about the ramifications of an unleashed capitalism on the world. I think we, as a global community, really need to come together to have conversations of consequence about what is ethical at this time.
“This is the Seinfeld presidency. It’s a presidency about nothing. That’s not to say that Obama didn’t do a few good things, especially using his executive powers, but by January 21 next year those will all be wiped out anyhow. More importantly, even on issues where he has something of an admirable track record, like climate change, he did absolutely nothing—nothing!—to move public opinion and build a solid national ethos and a public willingness to fight for something important.”
“Why worry about minor little details like clean air, clean water, safe ports and the safety net when Jesus is going to give the world an ‘Extreme Makeover: Planet Edition’ right after he finishes putting Satan in his place once and for all?” ~ Arianna Huffington
“No new chapter in human civilization will ever emerge if we just sit around with our hands in our laps waiting for a holistic convergence to foster a new way of thinking. A critical mass of people in society must stand up to make it happen. That means you and me, and many others around the planet. And now is the time to get started.” ~ Ervin Laszlo
“A true ecologist would wish for as hasty an extinction of the human race as possible so the planet could repair itself.”
Climate change is not just another issue. It is the issue that, unchecked, will swamp all other issues. The only hope lies in all the countries of the world coming together around a common global project to rewire the world with clean energy. This is a path to peace – peace among people, and peace between people and nature.
“With corpses on the streets of New Orleans, we may have seen a glimpse of the future of climate change. Let’s hope it shakes Mr. Bush out of his complacency.”
“The climate crisis also offers us the chance to experience what very few generations in history have had the privilege of knowing: a generational mission; the exhilaration of a compelling moral purpose; a shared and unifying cause; the thrill of being forced by circumstances to put aside the pettiness and conflict that so often stifle the restless human need for transcendence; the opportunity to rise.”
“Congress, in its wisdom, has decided that all climate legislation should be sent to a committee chaired by Oklahoma Republican James Inhofe, who has declared that global warming is a hoax and added that those who demand action remind him of the Third Reich. The Environmental Protection Agency has declared that it doesn’t consider carbon dioxide a pollutant – it’s as if the Food and Drug Administration announced it didn’t consider wheat a food or the Coast Guard declared that the Atlantic Seaboard was really not a coast after all.”
“We scorch the earth, set fire to the sky;
We stoop so low, to reach so high.”
Last winter, unforgettable video footage online showed a starving polar bear, struggling in its Arctic hunting grounds. Because of global warming, the ice was thin and the food supply was scarce. The video generated a wellspring of sympathy for the plight of this poor creature, and invigorated calls for stronger efforts to combat climate change – and rightly so.
“…we are passengers on a runaway train that is heading rapidly towards an abyss. We cannot continue with business as usual. We shall either change voluntarily, or the climate of our planet will change, and take entire nations with it. …So the pressure to re-examine the ethical basis of our lives is upon us in a way that it has never been before.”
“We urgently need to decrease our energy consumption and push for a just transition to community-controlled renewable energy if we are to avoid devastating climate change. We must stop subsidizing fossil fuels and put this money towards community-based energy solutions.”
Read more about climate change HERE
Read another blog I wrote about ethics and social criticism for Americans HERE
Photo credit: The Guardian, Canada
