Who is the us in "We cause climate change"?

People who write about climate change really like to use the word we. "we could have prevented global warming in the 1980s.we emit more carbon dioxide than ever before. ""we need to put in place solutions to the climate crisis ".

This verbal tick was in effect Monday after the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change released its special report on the differences between global warming of 1.5 and 2 degrees Celsius. The IPCC has stated in unequivocal terms that climate change will threaten the lives of hundreds of millions of people in the coming decades if greenhouse gas emissions do not decrease by half in 10 years and end completely in 30. In response, a renowned climate journalist wrote on Twitter: "We have had enough time and warnings to avoid this spell, without excessive disruption, but we can now avoid it only with EXTREME disturbances. Given how much we have failed so far, it is likely that we will continue to go too slowly. "

Climate change is a global problem, the temptation to use we logic. But the problem is real: the guilty group he invokes simply does not exist. the we responsible for climate change is a fictional, distorting and dangerous construction. By hiding who is really responsible for our current and terrifying situation, we provides political coverage to people who are happy to let hundreds of millions of other people die for their own benefit or pleasure.

I mean, think about it. Who is it we? Does this include the $ 735 million that, according to the World Bank, lives on less than $ 2 a day? Does this include the estimated 5.5 billion people who, according to Oxfam, live on $ 2 to $ 10 a day? Does this include millions of people around the world (only 400,000 at the 2014 People's Climate Walk in New York) doing everything in their power to reduce their own emissions and fight the fossil fuel sector ? Does this include Bill McKibben, the former statesman of the climate movement who wrote his first book on climate change in 1989? How about Greta Thunberg, the 15-year-old girl who is currently on strike at the school in front of the Swedish Parliament to ask her government to implement policies that really end the production, the distribution and consumption of fossil fuels? Does this include indigenous peoples who have lived in harmony with their ecosystems for generations? Does this include our children?

The culprit collective we simply does not invoke to exist.

Look, I understand that the we seems real. The fossil fuel economy, for the moment, provides the structure for what people are doing on this planet. In its inclusions and exclusions, which pose the conditions for the possibility of human action, this seems total, especially from the American point of view of the middle class. But it's not total. And it is certainly not eternal. It requires active reproduction at all times: through subsidies, the construction and repair of its infrastructure, judicial procedures respecting its laws, the protection of its "property" by the army, photos Instagram claiming that its benefits will bring you joy, and so on.

Instead of thinking of climate change as something we always remember that there are millions, even billions of people on this planet who prefer to preserve civilization than to destroy it with climate change, who prefer to end the fuel-based economy fossils rather than continue. These people are not all mobilized, far from it, but they are there. Most people are good.

But also remember that there are others, some of whom lead the world, who seem willing to destroy civilization and let millions of people die for the economy based on the fossil fuels continues now. we know who these people are. we are not these people.

Also remember that there are degrees of complicity. Without structural changes paid collectively, most of us have no choice but to use fossil fuels to a certain extent. As individuals, we must do our best. But the limited choices are not comparable to the thoughtless complicity of the 10% that produce 50% of global emissions each year by taking several long-haul flights for pleasure trips, heating their house instead of putting on a sweater. and driving to replace every few years. Limited choices do not resemble the deep and shameful complicity of many print and television journalists who refuse to mention climate change even in articles on the effects of climate change already reported.

Complicit individuals and institutions should be called and encouraged to change. And the fossil fuel industry must be fought and governments that support the fossil fuel economy must be replaced. But none of us will be effective in this regard if we look at climate change as a reality. we made. Think of climate change as something that we do, instead of something we are prevented from loss, perpetuates the very ideology of the fossil fuel economy that we are trying to transform.

Climate change may well make you realize what it means to be human and what your morals are. Well. But always remember: it's a battle against the forces of destruction to save something from this terribly beautiful and quite miraculous world for your children. The fossil fuel industry and the governments that support it are literally trying to stop you from creating a world that works with safe energy. They try to maintain the fossil fuel economy. As for me and the millions of people who want to fight against climate change, I say: we are against them, and we will fight for the expensive life.