@stephen

That's a good point.

I feel like we're no longer trying to prevent climate change. But framing that as a path to minimising the worst outcomes is a better way to look at it. Feels more honest, and achievable.

@stephen It's not too late for mitigation, but also, for revenge.

If the people destroying our ecosystem thought that there would be very very negative consequences to them personally, they would behave quite differently.

@stephen @baldur

I’m also increasingly of the belief that none of us can do it (anything) alone anymore. All there is, is supporting each other, being there for each other. The only way we survive is when we start understanding that we _have_ to do it together.

I don’t know how to translate this to a global scale yet. Surely it has to start local. Help your neighbors. Actually give a damn about other people. Invest your time and energy in others. It’s the only way.

@stephen

I've started to block the extreme climate doomers.
And with "extreme climate doomers" I don't mean people who are frustrated / depressed about the lack of climate action by politicians!! I mean those people who claim that they are the only ones who have truly understood this catastrophe, that they are the only ones that are clever and enlightened and that every one else who cares for our climate - people who advocate for climate action (including actual climate scientists!!) - is wrong.

@stephen @stefan

This doomerism are they denialist debate isn’t particularly productive.

Look - WE have agency over the path of emissions we take in the future.

Yes, we have already begun one path.

Yes, the longer we stay, the more challenging the correct course.

But that option to switch to a lower carbon Path is never closed.

It will ALWAYS be meaningful to get back on a low emissions path.

@stephen
As I see it, we're currently in a race.

Renewables are being deployed at an exponential pace and will take over for purely economic reasons.

Climate change and its consequences are also accelerating.

Things that may look like details can have quite large impacts on which of these trends becomes dominant. Now is exactly the time to fight hard.

@stephen it can both be true that it is too late to avoid catastrophe and that we must do everything we can to avoid the worst of it.

"It's too late" is not a form of denialism just because it makes you uncomfortable, it just means we put our big boy/girl pants on and save what we can.

@stephen

Deciding it’s too late to do anything about #ClimateBreakdown, you are giving yourself permission to do nothing about the situation…hence denialism.

But how does it make you feel driving a diesel car everyday, sat in traffic, wearing your disposable fast fashion, heating your home with fossil fuels, buying plastic crap that will soon be in landfill.

If you believe in climate change, you feel personal guilt. Better mentally to do something and persuade others.

@stephen These little things make me smile, because they help the local situation. Making changes with good local impacts is a key defense to the 'drop in the bucket' fatalism.

Fenceposts: Futurepost and the soft plastics scheme would likely not have started without passionate individuals making this an issue that could not just be ignored. Another firm reworks broken tall vineyard fenceposts into short posts for other farms, made economic because burning them is no longer accepted.

@stephen These little things make me smile, because they help the local situation. Making changes with good local impacts is a key defense to the 'drop in the bucket' fatalism.

Fenceposts: Futurepost and the soft plastics scheme would likely not have started without passionate individuals making this an issue that could not just be ignored. Another firm reworks broken tall vineyard fenceposts into short posts for other farms, made economic because burning them is no longer accepted.

@stephen

That's nice.

@stephen a few years ago my aunt asked me if I thought we were responsible for climate change

My answe was that it doesn't matter as it's something we need to deal with in either case

(And also we are definitely responsible)

@stephen I think this is underpinned by a pessimism about humanity I see in younger people a lot, they’ll say things like “humans are shit anyway”, “the planet/universe will be better off without us”, “all we do is kill each other anyway”.

And I absolutely see how they got there, growing up in the world they grew up in. Being hyper-aware of all these immense problems and abuses while being more aware than any previous generation, I think, of how little power they have to do anything about any of it.

Doesn’t help when their mass movements quickly get either shut-down or co-opted and corporatised, and elections are an ever-descending spiral of ‘lesser of two evils’.

I think first we have to get people to care about humanity, in the abstract, and that’s really hard after 60 years of neoliberalism. But worthwhile, I agree. The other path is dangerous.

@stephen HU mans struggle, it seems, with conscientiousness, enthusiasm, and precision/accuracy. Yeah, you can't sweat the small stuff, but you'll build your passion for something if you put more work into it. Sunk cost isn't always a fallacy.

We don't need to do all the things because all the things will matter that much in the math, we need to do all the things because it stretches us as humans. So, all of us need to stretch in all the ways... without snapping.

@stephen

Very much agree. In fact, I've come to hold that there is nothing soft about it. Doom is the new Denial - both advocate inaction. A lot of it looks remarkably like an influence operation.

There are many excellent references to this, but Rebecca Solnit's article from The Guardian last year does a good job of covering it.

Oh, and if somebody replies to this post with doomism they'll be instantly blocked, as I'll take them to be a bad faith troll.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2023/jul/26/we-cant-afford-to-be-climate-doomers

@stephen I totally agree with that. I do my part the best I can everyday, I search how I could make things better, and I try to convince people around me to do the same.

But I think, no that is too late, that is not enough, and too much people still continuing destroying our planet everyday.

It's not denial, I will continue fighting for me, and fighting more for my kids. I sincerely hope I'm wrong, but I truly think the game is over.

So yes, I'm a climate fatalist, I'm scared, absolutely scared. 😭