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It is nothing less than surreal for those of us who expect an imminent collapse of industrial civilization to see the American public and its political leaders either studiously ignore the rapidly mounting evidence of multiple existential threats, or to react in increasingly lunatic ways. A few examples:
James Hansen — one of the first and most strident alarmists about global warming — has participated in a new study that shows the earth is warming faster than anyone predicted. Earlier studies had projected that the earth would warm by 1.5 degrees Celsius in another decade or so. The new study says it will blow through that level, causing widespread crop failures and severe droughts — in a few years.
Breaking news: psychedelic therapies are proving to be effective in treating acute climate anxiety, a “new and growing area” in psychiatry and psychology.
The increasing frequency and destructiveness of hurricanes in Florida, tornadoes in the Midwest, and wildfires in California, all effects of climate change, have caused many home-insurance companies to go bankrupt or stop writing policies. The cost of insuring homes against storm damage in these areas has become prohibitively expensive if it is available at all. In five of the last six years, extreme weather events have inflicted more than $100 billion in damages.
Breaking News: While Congress remained paralyzed by epic battles over who would be Speaker of the House and who could propose the most outlandish cuts in taxes on the rich and benefits for the poor, the Federal Emergency Management Agency ran out of money in August and had to suspend $2.8 billion in funding for thousands of disaster recovery projects across the country.
More than 3 million Americans lost their homes to climate disasters last year, and a substantial number of those will never be able to return to their properties. Over the coming decades, the total number of displaced will swell by millions and tens of millions. This enormous climate migration of people seeking a safe place to live will, within a few years, affect every community in this country and almost every country in the world.
Breaking news: Hedge funds and wealthy investors are flocking into hurricane-ravaged areas of Florida seeking to buy damaged homes at bargain-basement prices. The business plan is to build a far grander home on the property and sell it at an enormous profit. The trick is you have to get it done before the next hurricane. But the market is there: people are still moving in massive numbers not only to Florida, but to wildfire-prone areas of California and drought-stricken Western states.
Meanwhile, clownish politicians scream at each other about banning abortions, banning books, regulating the sex lives of strangers; a public that mutters darkly and constantly about inflation and high prices makes Taylor Swift a billionaire, Barbie a billion-dollar movie, and gorges on movies about comic-book superheroes.
It is as though, driving down a lonely, dead-end road, we see the check-engine light come on, the temperature gauge bound into the red and the oil pressure gauge drop to zero; and we respond by pressing down on the accelerator and turning up the radio.
I’d missed that about “climate anxiety”. Didn’t see it coming, either.
Climate anxiety – yep; psychiatrists, psychologists, social workers, substance abuse counsellors, life coaches, twelve steppers, pill pushers and dope dealers of every stripe are all doing great!
Even the Rehab-Industrial Complex (which has been an expansion industry since its inception in the 80s, what with the then demise of the mental hospital system and the emergence of the practice of public lunacy venting via Oprah Winfrey and her chief minion, Dr. Phil) has enjoyed an unpresented growth-spurt. This due to the convergence of Obama Care spending, the detrimental effects of covid, and a growing public awareness of the acceleration of America’s decline – only part of which is climate related. Random gun violence, sicko politics, inflation, and the dehumanizing effects of the ubiquitous little electronic box all play a part as well.
The logical result: we all seem to be at least a little crazy.
Nearly everyone I know is either ‘in treatment’, just ‘out of treatment’, on anti-anxiety meds, or seeing a therapist of some type…OK, dig this: in the adjoining room, the TV news just blurted out this disturbing statistic: one in five American children will go to bed hungry tonight – one in five!…Apparently the Shitstorm is unrelenting.
One in five! That shouldn’t have happened for another decade.
I saw the three million lost homes, and thought, that can’t be right! Found the Scientific American article that mentions 3 million. Turns out that 40% were able to return after evacuation in a week, but that still left 480,000 that never returned. In one year. Holy shit, never realized it was that bad.
Been hearing the distant rolling thunder for a while now, and yes, it’s getting louder.
TPTB have been a bit heavy on the circuses part of distraction, but when the bread runs short, no amount will be enough.
The last comment section was full of Oprah logic & typical American white men 100% certainty that it’s impossible for humans to go extinct – one of you said we’ve been around for a while – no we haven’t 300,000 is an evolutionary blink. I’ve read more books, articles, interviews on mass & lesser extinctions than I can recall, so I can tell who has done the work & who is desperately spewing out rationalizations – Canfeild ocean? Humans will be gone thousands of years before that. Very few terrestrial creatures over 100lbs survive mass extinctions, but y’all will be fine because the Kroger down the block is open 24/7 so it’s biologically impossible for humans to go extinct. Tell yourselves.
None of you clicked the link I left to an article in which some of the most knowledgeable biologly-extinction researchers on the planet are saying y’all don’t know what the fuk you are talking about when it comes to the threat of human extinction – Read FFS
“A loss of biodiversity and accelerating climate change in the coming decades coupled with ignorance and inaction is threatening the survival of all species, including our very own, according to the experts from institutions including Stanford University, UCLA, and Flinders University.”
“..threatening the survival of all species, including our very own, ”
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https://scitechdaily.com/experts-say-humanity-faces-a-grim-and-ghastly-future-state-of-planet-is-much-worse-than-most-people-understand/
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Which part of that do y’all not understand?
You don’t like what the experts say, so you throw out knee jerk denials. That’s what climate change deniers do when researchers say change or risk destruction, major suffering & an early death.
The biology pros say change or face destruction, major suffering a mass die-back & possible human extinction & here comes the neo deniers. No thanks.
Well at least it has been an informative visit from a MORT point of view.
“Very few terrestrial creatures over 100 lbs. survive mass extinctions.” Can’t argue with that. It’s what gave small mammals and tiny dinosaurs the edge when that big old asteroid hit way back when; less available food gives the survival advantage to smaller appetites.
Consider then, if you will, the bushmen tribes of the Kalahari. They represent the oldest continuing societies on earth, dating back 50,000 years or more. They are classic hunter-gatherers, living off the wild vegetation of their desert scrubland, and hunting small game when available. Slim pickins’ at best! So, to preserve precious resources natural selection has fashioned the bushmen to be rather diminutive in size, and thus able to live on food supplies that would starve their civilized counterparts.
Though of different stock and living under decidedly different circumstances, African pygmies, averaging a height of less than 5 feet, are able to thrive on far less food than would sustain you or I. They’ve been around for some time as well.
Mother Nature makes some interesting choices. We’ll just have to wait and see.
And as if climate change were not enough, there’s resource depletion, the recent blasted planned-demic (yes, it was all planned), and now the looming prospect of nuclear war, as witness the madness currently ravaging the Middle East and all the developments accompanying the chaos. Quite evidently there are certain people who are desperate to see the world end.
On my part I’ve almost come to acquire a certain numbness regarding all this sh*t (pardon the expletive) — which after all you can’t really do much about. Here in Singapore where I live all has been calm and quiet for decades so far. Wonder how much longer it’ll last…
Sometimes I think of the (actually kind of hilarious) ‘Hell’s Kitchen’ scherzo (3rd movement) from Vaughan Williams’ 6th Symphony. The music really conveys a sense of the madness prevailing in the world — and to think the symphony was composed during the first half of the 20th Century. It would seem not much has taken a turn for the better since then.
Hello again by the way, Mr Lewis. Hope all’s been well — the current state of the world notwithstanding. (Yes, I am something of a Jekyll-and-Hyde creature, considering I like both Confucius and skin-tight leotards. :P)
Good to hear from you again, Someone. I am deeply gratified by the number of people that are still checking in here despite my recent inattention. I will try to do better.
Can’t the Federal Reserve fix this? Fingers crossed
Nice.
Planned demic?
I ain’t believing it just because viruses and responses to viruses are so unpredictable. But then again, governments have done detestable and foolish things to their own people.