My friends think the Extinction Rebellion (ER) protestors in London should be hauled off the streets and deposited in jail at the earliest opportunity. They dislike them strongly and hate the fact that they are disrupting their lives.
I don’t see it that way at all. Ben Cooke the Times obituary writer explains my feelings far better than I can.
To summarise, Ben says that the demands of ER for the UK to be carbon neutral by 2025 look ridiculous and impractical but they are not. Climate change is a genuine existential crisis but it is not recognised by the country’s leader and big business as such. Humans have to see it and feel it before they believe that it exists. It is the same with car air pollution. You can’t see it.
You have to believe in climate change to be sympathetic to ER. If you see climate change as an existential crises ER’s protests make sense. We have to do something big and bold to protect our planet for our children who will be senior adults when Spain starts to become a desert and when the mass migrations from overheating countries head towards cooler countries.
World food production would be halved under climate change conditions of 2100 when temperatures would be 4-5 degrees C higher. The oxygen in the oceans would be depleted and marine wildlife would die. We would follow.
Under that threat ER are not hysterical beatniks but desparate, rational and brave eco warriors. I’ll quote Ben if I may:
“It takes courage to confront a problem that you know you cannot solve alone, in the hope that others will help you. It involves a constant struggle against your own fatalism and cowardice.”
Ben Cooke
Humankind has to wake up on climate change for a children’s sake.
P.S. Climate change is about the animal-human relationship for the obvious reason that we are killing the planet.
