Look at the headlines around the world, and around the country, in recent days, and one thing becomes inescapable and undeniable: we are facing some real crises in terms of climate change.
Not for the first time, the west is seeing a serious drought. Also not for the first time, the west is seeing historically hot temperatures and conditions. This was particularly true in the Pacific Northwest, which saw scorching temperatures never before seen in that region, on both sides of the northern border.
Then, there was another phenomenon that made headlines and raised more than a few eyebrows. Of course, I am speaking about the so-called “fire in the ocean” that everyone is writing about. Now technically, it is in the Gulf of Mexico, but that is besides the point. Indeed, we see a fire burning right in the middle of an enormous body of water, one way or the other. And this seems so obviously counter to what we know about the relationship to fire and water, that what is equally obvious is that is not some natural phenomenon. Indeed, the conditions for this to exist at all are created by human beings.
Now, fire in water is not something that we have never seen before. In 1969, the Cuyahoga River famously caught fire. This created some shock waves in terms of reaction, and ultimately led to the Clean Water Act. In fact, the horrific stories and clear, undisputed evidence of the detrimental effects of human activity on our environment became so obvious in the sixties and the seventies, that it led to the creation of the Environmental Protection Agency, which in turn, led to cleaner air in the nation, especially in the cities.
Since then, however, there has been a movement to deny all of these horrors, and to undermine the impact that human activity has on our environment. These people deny any connection of human activity to climate change, and some even deny climate change itself, of course. Infamously, Donald Trump claimed that climate change was a “Chinese hoax,” something that he at once both proudly declares when it suits him, while also simultaneously denying that he ever said it, also when it suits him. In typical fashion, you just have to wait and see which way the political winds are blowing to get a different version of what Trump meant by saying or doing something, or in this case, denying that he ever said it.
Unfortunately, it is not just him. One man is one thing, but when he gains a legion of loyal fans numbering not just in the millions, but in the tens of millions, you have a national tragedy brewing. With Trump, it is not just the death of democracy that may be just beyond the horizon. It is growing economic inequality at a time when this is already at record levels. Also, since he and his supporters always seem to side with big corporations and against any kind of environmental standards and regulations, then it is the very health of the planet that is at stake.
Is that an exaggeration? Not really. When Trump dropped the United States out of the Paris Accord, other world leaders began to consider doing the same, because it is easier when you are literally not the only ones. When Trump weakened environmental regulations and made it easier for big polluters to get away with their crimes, it gives other major corporations and big polluters the green light to do the same, and indirectly, it gives corporations in other countries the idea that they should be able to get away with the same, as well. As Martin Luther King, Jr. once stated, "Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere."
And environmental standards weakening here in the United States is a threat to environmental standards everywhere. Trump gave the green light, and this broken policy has still not been fully remedied. Denying that we actually are facing a crisis is, for all intents and purposes, is tantamount to giving more green lights for greedy politicians in the pay of major polluting corporate interests to continue to deny climate change and allow still more pollution, more drilling, more fracking, more everything that poisons our air, our water, and our Earth.
Frankly, these are not serious positions. They have been discredited. They lost the debate, and this does not change simply because they cannot concede. There are no arguments left to deny that we are facing a crisis. As for those who loudly proclaim that it is all a hoax, they have lacked credibility for a long time now. It is time to unplug the machinery of massive pollution, if we hope to even begin to address a situation that has gone too long without being taken seriously.
Burst pipeline causes bubbling, steaming "eye of fire" to emerge in the Gulf of Mexico by Li Cohen, July 3, 2021:
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/fire-ocean-gulf-of-mexico-burst-pipeline-eye-of-fire/
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