Bread and Circuses

You know about that canary in the coal mine, right?

When a canary kept inside a cage dies, the miners need to get out immediately. They are in extreme danger.

For us, the canary is coral reefs. They are dying now, at a rate never seen in human history. We are in extreme danger.

Capitalist commerce and industry are wrecking the planet's biosphere, tampering with the food chain that keeps us and millions of other species alive.

➡️ https://apnews.com/article/coral-reef-bleaching-climate-change-fdbeddf7ae3ccc9d7cf85d1c3267e581

#Science #Environment #Climate #ClimateChange #ClimateCrisis #ClimateEmergency

84% of the world's coral reefs hit by worst bleaching event on record

Harmful bleaching of the world’s coral has now grown to include 84% of the ocean’s reefs in the most intense event of its kind in recorded history. That's according to the International Coral Reef Initiative. Warming oceans cause corals to expel the colorful algae living inside of them, putting the coral at risk of death. Healthy corals are essential for seafood production, jobs and coastline protection worldwide. Scientists say it's essential to reduce greenhouse gases that are the main driver of atmospheric warming. Last year was the warmest on record, and much of that heat is going into oceans.

AP News
Apr 23, 2025 at 11:30amWeb
Show threadBread and CircusesApr 23, 2025

The more CO₂ the ocean absorbs, the more acidic its chemistry becomes. After years of working overtime to take in some of the excess carbon we’ve pumped into the atmosphere, ocean acidification has already increased 30% compared to pre-industrial levels, and could increase an additional 120% in the decades ahead. That, in turn, could lead to severe disruptions in the worldwide food chain, followed by famine and starvation such as we’ve never seen.

I wish I was exaggerating. But I’m not. We are in grave danger.

➡️ https://www.pbs.org/newshour/science/the-ocean-helps-absorb-our-carbon-emissions-we-may-be-pushing-it-too-far

When it comes to sucking up carbon emissions, ‘the ocean has been forgiving.’ That might not last

The ocean helps relieve our atmosphere of a lot of the excess carbon dioxide we've pumped into it. Here's how its "twilight zone" makes that happen, and how the impacts of climate change make it harder for the ocean to do its job.

PBS News
Show threadWanstead Climate ActionApr 23, 2025

@breadandcircuses

Possible consequences of ocean acidification (like the climate crisis, caused by fossil fuels) could be _even worse_ than famine, starvation and conflict.

It seems to be part of the 'kill switch' for previous mass extinctions, and possibly we're over half-way there already.
https://news.mit.edu/2019/carbon-threshold-mass-extinction-0708

Breaching a “carbon threshold” could lead to mass extinction

Today’s carbon dioxide emissions may trigger a reflex in the carbon cycle with devastating consequences, according to a new MIT study.

MIT News | Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Show threadMetacurityApr 23, 2025
@breadandcircuses I was snorkeling in the Andaman Sea, once the home to thriving reefs. They were all dead - no wildlife. That was five years ago.
Show thread🍄🇪🇺ashtime🇪🇺🍄Apr 23, 2025
@breadandcircuses I remember learning about this in school several decades ago-DECADES-and yet here we are.
Show threadCavyherdApr 23, 2025

@ashtime @breadandcircuses

Just yesterday I was pondering the 55th anniversary of my deciding to never own a car. I look at the world around me now & wonder what even is the fucking point?

Show thread🍄🇪🇺ashtime🇪🇺🍄Apr 23, 2025
@cavyherd @breadandcircuses our personal decisions matter, small acts of rebellion give fruit to a revolution eventually - the sad part is that we need to live through the destructive swan song of the macho world in order to get to the other side.
Show threadCavyherdApr 23, 2025

@ashtime @breadandcircuses

I keep telling myself that.

It's hard, though. Especially on days like yesterday, when using public transportation adds THREE FUCKING HOURS to an already too-long workday.

Show threadKent PitmanApr 23, 2025

@breadandcircuses

«That’s deadly to corals, which are key to seafood production, tourism and protecting coastlines from erosion and storms. Coral reefs are sometimes dubbed “rainforests of the sea” because they support high levels of biodiversity — approximately 25% of all marine species can be found in, on and around coral reefs.»

I'm convinced that these are things that are poorly communicated. Like the polar bears, which people see as a cuteness thing, I think people see tourism here and figure they have their own problems that are more important.

I imagine the person writing the story is trying to enumerate a lot of different effects and imagining that people will be alarmed about some or all these, but I wonder if enumerating a bunch of things obscures the thing(s) that would really catch people's attention.

For example if this just spoke only of seafood production ... And to be honest I wonder if it should say "seafood", not "seafood production" because in my head I'm calculating how many people do not propagate effects and don't realize, as stupid as it sounds, that if seafood production is affected, available seafood will be. In other words it sounds when you put production in there like you're saying it's going to affect the jobs of people doing seafood as opposed to affecting what's on the dinner table.

Maybe I'm being overly pessimistic, but given the small degree of climate action that we've seen it's hard to believe that that could possibly be true, or maybe I'm just focusing my concern in the wrong place, but I feel like people don't think through the cascade effects in their minds.

So I wonder if you don't just say that the death of corals could very well mean the end to some are all seafood, or whatever the thing is you wish people were inferring, in super blunt plain form, whether anyone gets it at all.

Just thinking aloud. But I feel like people are not responding to things like this. Pictures are of coral turning white and again sound like some tourism far away is not going to work. We speak of ecosystems and I'm sure people understand that in a vague sense, but I'm not even sure people know that they are in the ecosystem. Many might think they visit it on weekends.

I'm not sure there's a bigger point here, so I'll just stop. Maybe others have thoughts.

#climate

Show threaddasgrueneblattApr 23, 2025

@kentpitman "Many might think they visit it on weekends." is a good way of putting it, yes, that's how it is.

@breadandcircuses

Show threadJoan of Contention 😷Apr 23, 2025
@breadandcircuses How do we get out?
Show threadRADman11Apr 23, 2025
@breadandcircuses I'm not an expert, but I have been reading the published peer reviewed papers on climate science not behind pay walls for about 20 years. You should calm down. We've been beyond the point of no return for quite a while now. Can you say extinction?
Show threadFrank EikingApr 23, 2025
@breadandcircuses and it gets even worse: on the reefs around Bonaire, Dutch Caribbean, like on many other Caribbean reefs, 30% of the hard corals like brain corals have died due to the Stony Coral Tissue Loss Disease. In just 3 years time! Maybe no coincidence that the infection started right where cruise ships are docking…
Show threadCavyherdApr 23, 2025

@breadandcircuses

I do hope we take the opportunity presented by the current wave of RW nonsense to burn it all down and build an actual, life-supporting social order.

Not holding my breath, to be clear. But it would be very lovely....

Edit: Floating this to the top from @breadandcircuses 's retoot elsethread:
https://eirenicon.org/troubled-times/

#Resilience

Navigating Troubled Times

Comprehensive OSINT dashboard tracking the escalating Israel-Iran conflict June 2025. Updates on Israeli airstrikes, Iranian missile retaliation, cyber warfare, nuclear setbacks, and geopolitical risks with authoritative sources.

eirenicon llc
Show threadeswillwalkerApr 23, 2025
@breadandcircuses The problem is that we are all trapped in the coal mine with the canary and the killers of the canary.
Show threadmrflash818Apr 23, 2025
@breadandcircuses Soylent Green will be people, it seems : |
Show threadNicole ParsonsApr 23, 2025

@breadandcircuses

Six dynasties fund the death of ocean corals through climate denial.

Bradley, Koch, Scaife, Coors, Seid, Uihlein.

https://www.desmog.com/2024/08/14/project-2025-billionaire-donor-heritage-foundation-donald-trump-jd-vance-charles-koch-peter-coors/

These folks are willing to start world wars to keep frying the planet.

https://vsquare.org/heritage-foundation-mcc-ordo-iuris-russia-european-union-european-court-of-justice/

https://www.desmog.com/2025/03/14/heritage-foundation-project-2025-allies-mcc-ordo-iuris-discuss-dismantling-the-eu-european-union/

Saudis Arabia, Russia, and Koch Network are the new axis alliance.
https://www.politico.com/news/2025/04/22/trump-middle-east-trip-00303616

https://www.politico.eu/article/russia-us-saudi-arctic-energy-rdif-ukraine-russia-capital/

https://www.westernstandard.news/alberta/cold-fright-trump-putin-arctic-energy-talks-freeze-out-canada-and-denmark/62347

6 Billionaire Fortunes Bankrolling Project 2025

More than $120 million from a few ultra-wealthy families who have spent years working to promote climate change denial has powered the Heritage Foundation and other groups that created the plan to remake American government.

DeSmog