Climate Change Isn’t Your Fault. It’s Capitalism’s

This myth goes something like this. “I’m going to eat less meat! I’m going to travel less on airplanes!! And anyone who does those things is bad! They must not care about the planet!” It’s a fairy tale, my friends. Like so many myths, its purpose is to shield us from a truth we don’t want to face — or aren’t capable of facing yet.

You're not the problem. The system is, The global
economy's broken, and self-blame is not going to fix it.

Now, this is an old American fantasy — the fantasy of individual action. The idea that everything can be fixed by our individual actions — the more heroic, the better. But collective action?Cooperation? Those can never be allowed to exist. It’s the same myth, really, that caused America to end up without a working healthcare, education, or retirement system. Individual action, not collective action — everything’s your fault, and therefore, your responsibility, too. The system can never be at fault. There shouldn’t be a system for anything in the first place, except for anything but profit. Bang! Social collapse.

Here’s the truth.

Read the story Eudiamonia by Umair Haque - “Climate Change Isn’t Your Fault. It’s Capitalism’s.”

One person’s recycling won’t stop climate change in itself. We must act collectively

Climate change is happening now and it’s happening faster and much worse than predicted. It’s threatening to the world we know and everything in it. It’s already killing people. This is beyond doubt or argument.

 ‘School children going on strike demanding climate
 action provide a shining example of disruptive, urgent,
agenda setting activism’ 

We have just years to change course. If we manage it, we could save the world, at least the one we recognise. Realistically, the prognosis at the moment is that we won’t manage to steer the ship around in time.

So why have we, as people with everything to lose, not acted sooner?

Read the story from The Guardian by Emily Mulligan - “One person’s recycling won’t stop climate change in itself. We must act collectively.”

Why can't the Top End pipe some of its abundant water south to assist drought-stricken states?

Every political cycle, a cavalcade of federal and state politicians dust off their Akubras, RMs and plaid shirts and head north, ready to pledge the nation's drought-ravaged farmers everything but actual rain.

Piping water from the north to southern Australia isn't a new idea.

The possibility of piping the water resources of northern Australia to quench thousands of thirsty southern agricultural paddocks has been floated by a litany of leaders keen to make use of the annual downpours of the tropical wet season.

But how plausible is the idea of pumping water from the Northern Territory down south to ease the dry soils of pastoral properties in Queensland, NSW and Western Australia? Or is it just a pipe dream?

Read the ABC News story by Matt Garrick - “Why can't the Top End pipe some of its abundant water south to assist drought-stricken states?”

The Forecast for Recovery

ON ITS FACE, WEATHER IS the great equalizer. Car commuters, no matter how pricey their respective rides, have to navigate the same icy roads and poor visibility as those with beat-up vehicles. A rained-out baseball game affects cheap-seat buyers and behind-the-plate ticket holders the same. Tidal waves take out everything – and everyone – in their paths.

A member of the United States Coast Guard wades
 through flood waters in the aftermath of Hurricane
 Florence in Lumberton, North Carolina.

But when it comes to escaping, surviving and recovering from a natural disaster, it's the poor who suffer the most, experts say. And with the extreme weather patterns and storms associated with climate change, the economic divide will only accelerate, they predict.

"The rich can survive well, and the poor don't," says Columbia University professor John Mutter, author of "The Disaster Profiteers: How Natural Disasters Make the Rich Richer and the Poor Even Poorer." "And it continues to separate us.”

The disparity starts even before a natural disaster hits. Lower-income people may not have cellphones, broadband or regular use of technology that will keep them abreast of looming danger.

Read the the story from U.S. News and World Report by Susan Milligan - “The Forecast for Recovery.”