This past September a clock was installed in New York City’s Union Square counting down the hours remaining before the world’s carbon emissions reached an irreversible level.
Much like anyone else that saw the clock, I was frightened at how small the number was, and at the idea I wasn’t doing enough to slow the time. However, it was when I came across this tweet that I had the unsettling realization the conversations I was having about climate change was wrong.
The climate crisis is every single persons’ problem and responsibility, and yet as @treasurefbrooks points out in her tweet, this responsibility is always put on what she refers to as the “common folk” – those of us with small ecological footprints. We are constantly told through advertisements, political speeches, and climate debates, about the little things we should be doing. One of the most basic being recycling, yet at the same time companies are legally allowed to mass-produce unrecyclable products. We aren’t taught how to combat corporations that recklessly emit carbon and create waste, or how to petition for systematic change. Instead, we’re taught how to properly clean a yogurt cup before throwing it in the recycling bin. In other words, we’re taught to make ripples instead of waves.
While recycling is just one small example of what an individual can do to combat the climate crisis, we need to stop pretending this crisis comes from a single person not doing enough. The true problem is that corporations are legally allowed to destroy our planet. The idea that the issue of global warming can be solved with these small measures belittles its significance and allows for companies to continue their destructive business.
If we want to see real change, the discussion around the climate crisis can no longer be about the responsibility of “the common folk”. There is no time for that anymore. Climate change discussions should move toward how “the common folk” can vote for local leaders that have plans to deal with global warming, and how they can vote with their wallet on which corporations deserve to continue working.
If these changes aren’t made, it will be those with the smallest ecological footprint bearing the brunt of climate change consequences. We can already see it happening here in Canada where food insecurity in First Nations communities is worsened by warming temperatures.
If there are only seven years left, as the clock suggests, large systematic changes are the only way to decrease carbon emissions. So, the clock would be a lot more impactful if it faced inward into the offices of the people that can make real change, rather than outward over a crowd that looks powerlessly upon it.