My writings - and those of others.
Celebrating Women
Begun in 19111 and marked annually on March 8th, International Women's Day (IWD) is one of the most important days of the year to:
celebrate women's achievements
raise awareness about women's equality
lobby for accelerated gender parity
fundraise for female-focused charities
The theme this year is Choose to Challenge. It directs people to do so by looking a statements on social media, through images that show bias and stereotypes, and to foster discussions, The Canadian Women’s Foundation has been particularly active in sponsoring gender justice.
And as the pandemic’s effects continue and there is a call to return to “normal” it may also well to to rethink the less attractive aspects of normal. You can see some of them.
Saving the Planet according to Bill
I am at least somewhat inspired by the fact that one software billionaire decided to resign from operating his company and putting his money to work on the most critical issues of our time. Even he is mystified by the conspiracy theories that have resulted from his work in virus development and prevention. His medical student daughter who has received the vaccine says that unfortunately it didn’t contain the microchip so loved by the conspiracy crowd that might make her as smart as her dad.
Bill Gates has written a book about how to save the planet and several reports have summarized some of the steps. Here are seven of them where we need to send a message:
Advocate for governments to support research and development in clean energy technology if and when the private sector refuses to do so. That’s how we got to where we are with modern technologies - government funding
Level the playing field of production costs of carbon use. Both the actual producer and consumer needs to pay for it. Otherwise we all do.
Ensure that the right information is available to home owners and landlords re upgrades. That’s a government responsibility to know and communicate.
Ensure that government keeps up to date with building standards and mandates the best construction policies.
When communities transition from fossil fuels and jobs are lost, respond that governments respond with financial help to ease the obvious pain that the changes bring.
Ensure that government policies work on the big things - not just the small stuff.
Take a coordinated approach to technology, policy and markets. It’s not as though they aren’t all connected.
Eco Anxiety and Climate Grief
In a discussion a year ago before we were all locked down, one participant expressed the view that there was little we could do about climate change and we should grieve and accept the death of many things we now take for granted. Another expressed how she was trying to do make small changes in her personal life – like using laundry detergent processed in small sheets. I wondered whether small changes mattered in the face of their impact and thought we should get better at lobbying. All these expressed our anxiety. We’re now more likely to be anxious about new spikes in the virus or access to vaccines, but these feelings are still there.
Some practitioners of mental health are doing something about it. A recent New York Times article reveals some interesting examples. One practitioner noticed how her students were reacting when they said they were losing sleep or constantly worried about the effect of climate change. Another remarked that hearing activists report on current issues left her in tears. In the last five years anxiety has doubled from 13 to 26 perc cent, according to research conducted jointly by George Mason University and Yale.
One scientist, Britt Wray, decided to do something about it. She started a weekly newsletter called GenDread. She offers practical advice and asks questions of her readers about what should be the priorities – moving them from depression to focusing on realistic actions they might consider. She also recognizes that negative emotions also can relate to denial and can serve as an invitation to wake up. Using a common Covid-19 mantra, she minds us that we are in this together.
Most of us have experienced eco-distress. I have it when I buy food in supermarket plastic containers – and as a single person, find that I throw out far too much packaging and food waste. I’m even experimenting with a food box order, where portioned ingredients create less waste and packing materials are recyclable. I’m reminded that my anxiety is minor and that the mental health professional remind us that serious anxiety or depression needs therapy.
One such therapist works with anxious Americans in workshops – but also counsels India farmers who have real threats to their crops caused by changes in weather patterns that threaten their livelihood. This is a good reminder to us affluent North Americans how privileged we are in avoiding the brunt of the problem so far. She notes that some of her American participants are moved to volunteer.
We can also learn from our First Nations people who express their grief with a much closer recognition of their unity with the land – taken from them by settler first by seizing it and then creating practices that destroy it.
Dr Wray reminds us that supporting one another can reduce our stress. The sense that we are in this together creates hope – and studies support this. Her own hope was well demonstrated when, after dealing with her own anxiety, she and her husband decided to bring a new infant into our challenged world.
A friend also sent me a link to the site of a European writer who is tackling the mental health and spiritual dimension of these problems as well. you can find them here.
The Climate Change Challenge
President Biden’s returning to the Paris Climate Accord, halting the Keystone Pipeline project and putting new restrictions on oil and gas production is good news; but it is only the beginning of a long challenge for the leader who has vowed to become the climate president. As he vows to cut fossil fuel emissions, the oil and gas industry is immediately mobilizing to challenge any changes. Executive orders are immediately viewed as job killers in an already over stressed economy. Biden counters that new production in areas like electric cars will create and replace jobs. Last year was the hottest ever recorded. Environmentalists say that the challenges have never been greater. The US has to be a partner in climate change with the world.
It’s easy to be focused on one’s own country, so I was interested in a modeling in the New York Times this morning that allowed me to look at the primary risks for Canada. It is well worth looking at the model which presents the insights modeled by the company Four Twenty Seven with comments placed on top of maps of the areas.
The chart posits that our major climate hazard in Canada will be flooding - followed by wildfires, water stress, cyclones and sea level rise. These could affect 60% of the population. Our gross domestic product and agriculture could also be affected by at least one of the hazards.
We won’t be alone - 90% of world populations will be threatened. Some of the figures are staggering and defy imagination. In the first 18 years of this century, 165 billion people were challenged with flooding. It will be even greater by 2040.
Climate change has unequal effects. The poor suffer most and economic inequality increases. Other factors, like population density add to the discrepancy and food shortages and infrastructure decline, lead to mass migrations. Rich countries like ours are not immune from the challenges The Covid - 19 pandemic has brought home the lesson that we are all connected and the lesson is immediate. The climate pandemic is much more serious but easier to deny.
Here are some of the perceptions of Americans about climate change identified by PRRI (Public Religion Research Institute), a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization dedicated to conducting independent research at the intersection of religion, culture, and public policy. I will try to find comparable information re Canadian perspectives later.
Americans rank climate change last on a list of important issues. Only five percent of Americans say climate change is the most important issue facing the U.S. today.
When asked which environmental problem is most important for the current administration to tackle, nearly 3-in-10 (29%) Americans point to air, water, and soil pollution. One-quarter (25%) of Americans say climate change is the most pressing environment problem, while a similar number (23%) identify water shortages and drought. Fewer Americans cite the shrinking of wilderness areas and animal habitats (11%) or endangered species (4%) as the most critical environmental issue.
Americans are significantly more likely to believe that people living in poorer developing countries will be harmed by climate change than they are to say that they personally, or U.S. residents as a whole, will be negatively affected by climate change.
Less than one-quarter (24%) of Americans believe that they will be personally harmed a great deal by climate change, while 30% say climate change will affect them a moderate amount. More than 4-in-10 Americans say climate change will have only a little (23%) or no impact (22%) on them personally.
The Climate Change Concern Index—a composite measure that combines perceptions about whether climate change is a crisis and whether it will have adverse personal effects—finds that nearly 3-in-10 (29%) Americans are very concerned about climate change, 21% are somewhat concerned, 29% are somewhat unconcerned, and 21% are very unconcerned.
Close to half (46%) of Americans say that the earth is getting warmer and that these changes are primarily the result of human activity. We characterize this group as climate change “Believers.”
One-quarter (25%) of Americans believe the global temperature is rising, but say the change is due to natural fluctuations in the earth’s environment or are uncertain about its cause. We describe this group as climate change “Sympathizers.”
Finally, more than one-quarter (26%) of Americans say there is no solid evidence that the earth’s temperature has been rising over the past few decades. We call this group climate change “Skeptics.” Skeptics were asked to share, in their words, why they believe the earth’s temperature is not increasing. Answers varied considerably, but the most frequently cited reason (33% of all open-ended answers) was that they have not noticed a change in the weather around them.)
Climate change Believers are substantially more likely to than Sympathizers or Skeptics to score high on the Climate Change Concern Index.
Clearly what we believe counts - the challenge is to determine what it is base on
Plastics - Everywhere
Bill McKibben has noted this week in the New Yorker that we have to stop burning things - and notes that trading wood for oil based material may create as many problems as it was thought to solve. That may be a topic for another time. He goes on to discuss the prevalence of plastics in our lives.
Who knew the extent? He interviews Judith Enck, who tells him:
“Microplastics can be found in everything from drinking water to soil to beer to table salt to a cup of tea. In fact, we’re all ingesting roughly a credit card’s worth of plastic each week. Stunningly, scientists recently found plastics in human placentas.”
Enck, who formerly worked in the Obama administration, is a visiting professor at Bennington College and the president of Beyond Plastics, It starts by framing the plastics trifecta - focusing on the three most prominent single use products that can be replaced - and suggest that citizens in the US approach all levels of government to ask for their banning. Canadians can take note. See if you can guess the three most villainous pollution products. They have even created a sample bill to send to legislators, making the case that single use banning is less effective than looking a bans for one product individually.
This is a really good site. Go to it and take advantage of all the resources it offers. There are a number of concrete actions that citizens can take - from writing tea companies to asking food delivery companies to hold the plastic in their packaging. Individual actions are good - but they have to be supported by going to the source of the polluters and telling them what we think.
