You are right Henry. I got on this bandwagon about three years ago when I started to write fictional books on climate change. I have two daughters and two young granddaughters. I am a member of Artic Circle https://www.thearcticcycle.org. I am a strong believer that the arts can effect the visceral reaction that will make us elect politicians who put climate change first.
As Bill McGibben founder of 350.org has said we have the facts now we need the policies. The docu-drama Climate Change:The Facts is excellent, however my belief is that we must go from town to town, city to city, country to country to show in graphic terms exactly what will happen in each place as the earth warms. It is such a large and diverse subject that flooding in Bangladesh and forest fires in California don’t for instance viscerally impact those who live in Ohio, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Iowa, Florida and Illinois, and thus cause them to vote for politicians who will make policies that alleviate global climate change.
I am British, and I have lived in the US for years and I know that this country because of it’s global political weight must take a lead in the climate change fight. The States I have named above weigh in heavily on our elections, so it is the people who live in those areas that must understand first hand how climate change will affect their towns and cities.
Asking them to take part in climate change action just won’t work unless we say to them Ohio’s climate is changing in these ways. Here is a description of what will(not may)happen below.
Most of the state has warmed by about one degree (F) in the last century. Floods are becoming more frequent, and ice cover on the Great Lakes is forming later or melting sooner. In the coming decades as the earth warms both in the lower and upper atmospheres, both because of increased C02 emissions and geo-engineering, to 2, 3 and 4 degrees celsius, the state will become extremely hot, which will harm public health in urban areas and people will need to live for the most part inside or underground. In addition at a 2 degree warming towards which we are now rapidly heading, you will be exposed to many harmful, deadly viruses released from the perma frost as well as mosquito and tick borne diseases. Because of frequent droughts and demands for food in other parts of the world food will also become expensive and often difficult to get. At 5 and 6 degrees civilization as we know it will collapse, and if you are lucky, you will be living in a cave as we did thousands of years ago.
If this information (which is sadly no longer science fiction and is relayed clearly in my book of that genre, theburningyears.squarespace.com)is conveyed by responsible educators to high school students of voting age, and to college age students all over the world, I believe they will be affected in the same way as you were when you saw the BBC’s docu-drama, and will vote as they should. The Uninhabitable Earth:Life After Global Warming by David Wallace-Wells for instance should be required reading in high schools and universities.
I believe it is encumbent upon all politicians whether they be Republican or Democrat, Conservative or Labor to address this issue in their platforms, and if they don’t then they shouldn’t get our vote. You are right when you say: “Our headlong rush towards the utter collapse of the world we know can be stopped through political will alone.” It’s our only chance and we need to act now before it’s too late to stop the worst effects, and to plan sufficienetly for them.
