changing for climate change
Wildfires burning across the West, this time threatening Reno, Nevada. Flooding and storms in Indiana, and residents in Gary have not had power for twelve days. A tornado lifted the roof off a high school gymnasium, where students were sheltering, and I don't even remember where that was because it's all so common now. Just another day in paradise.
After getting into it with a climate change denier last night, I ended up skimming a very long article which summed up the entire history of the subject, from the first clues that it was even possible down to the cultural divide of today. The one thing that struck me in particular was something I had already intuited: that many people don't believe in climate change, or don't believe that it's something we need to worry about, not because they aren't intelligent enough to understand it, but because they don't want to. To put it another way, they're scared.
It's well known that the left in this country tends to believe in everything that is considered an accepted scientific truth, while the right often disputes anything that would cause them an inconvenience. The Covid pandemic is the perfect example. Despite people on both the left and right dying from it, there are many to this day who still believe it was a hoax. It comes down to this: The left tends to believe that we are a global society, separated by arbitrary borders, and that global action is needed to solve our greatest issues. Sometimes the government, being that there is no other body capable or that is not in it only for the money, must enact measures to help solve these issues. After all, what else are governments for, if not for things that we can't do individually?
The right tends to believe that society is based on people who look and act like you, believe what you believe, and live in the same country as you, and that we should focus on taking care of our own, regardless of the magnitude of a problem. They believe that government's main purpose should be to protect your country from other countries, and to ensure free and equal trade; anything beyond that is considered overreach and an intrusion on their freedoms.
When you understand this, it should be no mystery why all the climate deniers are either right-wing or libertarians. If climate change caused by humans turns out to be true, it would force them out of their comfort zones. It would force them to admit that we all need to work together, and that, at least temporarily, we're going to have to make sacrifices and give up some of our so-called freedoms (i.e. the "freedom" to drive a huge gas guzzling truck for no reason other than that it's fun). The only sacrifice right-wingers like to make is the "ultimate" one: dying for your country. I'm not making light of that; obviously dying is indeed a sacrifice, it's just that they've basically fetishized it while ignoring all the other sacrifices that people make on a daily basis.
It's important to note that these are only general attitudes. There are people, especially in very rural areas, who were "raised" conservative in the same way that someone is raised in a religion, and they know nothing else, but some of these people wouldn't hesitate to give you the shirt off their back, no matter who you were. At the same time, there are very liberal people living in big cities who walk by homeless people every day without giving them so much as a glance, because they're too busy talking on their thousand dollar iPhone and drinking their ten dollar coffee. (I've been wanting to point that out for a long time.)
But regardless of all the cultural differences, or the country you live in, or how much money you have- regardless of everything- climate change is happening, and it will eventually be happening to you, if it isn't already. Even among the believers, we aren't doing nearly enough. Most people will do a little recycling, maybe buy something at the store that claims its more environmentally friendly over the one that doesn't, and call it a day. That's where we're at. It's not even one percent of what we really need.
The sad truth is that we are far too comfortable in our lifestyles. I'm aware that the oil and mining companies, the megacorporations like Walmart and Amazon, and the military industrial complex contribute the bulk of the pollution. But it's not like they're completely independent entities that can exist without human intervention. We're the ones who burn the oil and gas, we're the ones who both shop and work at the corporate stores, and we're the ones who keep voting in establishment warmongers instead of protesting in the streets until they're put in prison where they belong. We're all culpable in this, even if we aren't the ones sitting in boardrooms coming up with all the evil plans.
Peter Thiel, who himself is very much an anti-Christ, has accused Greta Thunberg, a literal hero of modern times, of being anti-Christ-like. This is what people like him do: turn reality upside down on its head and convince the gullible and the lost souls looking for a leader that good is bad and bad is good. The truth, in my opinion, is that we need one million Greta Thunbergs. Of course, there are plenty of non-famous people working just as diligently against climate change or for social justice, but without the visibility, they're less likely to spur on large-scale societal changes.
I don't like to over-simplify things, but in large part our inaction comes down to this: None of us want to be the first person on the dance floor. That metaphor, particularly in regards to addressing climate change, first occurred to me over a decade ago, but I've applied it to other aspects of our lives as well, because it's such an overwhelmingly powerful force. It is very important to us that we have some group we belong to, some people who we fit in with, and that we "keep up with" these people enough that we can relate to them. It would be more difficult for someone making minimum wage as a cashier to be friends with a multimillionaire investor than it would be for another wealthy investor. Likewise, it would be more difficult for someone who doesn't go out of their way to listen to music and only knows radio songs to be friends with someone for whom music is life than it would be for someone heavily involved in the music scene. Tribalism is one of the main factors that shape both our individual lives, and society as a whole.
If you were to make the decision right now to completely alter your life in order to be more environmentally friendly, what sacrifices would you have to make? Obviously, at least some which would make it more difficult for you to fit comfortably in your friend group. Less time to trade stocks, listen to new music, or whatever it is your type is into. You'd "fall behind," and become less relatable. Our friend and peer groups are all standing around near the walls, while the Dance Floor of Change is mostly empty. Greta and others are out there, and those of us who are believers are vocally supporting them, but when are we going to go out there ourselves? For most of us the answer is: not until our friends do.
Unfortunately, the natural world does not wait for humans to be comfortable. What will happen will happen, whether we're standing in front of our house dressed like Rambo and surrounded by a circle of sandbags, or sitting on the couch watching sports with our hand deep in a bag of chips. Since it seems, at least so far, that we aren't going to get ahead of this, we can be certain that changes are going to come instead on nature's terms, and a million Donald Trumps calling it a hoax won't deter those changes in the slightest. The question each of us needs to ask ourselves, if we truly believe that it's real, and that it's a threat, is whether we're going to face it now, when it's bad, or later, when it's worse.
August 24th, 2026