Tag: global climate change

The Weather In My Area Is Very Strange

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

It used to be, once upon a time, that that where I live in the United States had a certain rhythm to it. That rhythm is definitely gone now. And this is very aggravating to me because reality is very important to me since I’m bonkers. And I know what I’m experiencing is real — nature is acting is strange ways for some reason.

We need Little Green Men to help us out.

And that reason is global climate change.

And yet, whenever I bring this issue up to my family members — who I love dearly — I either get some extreme Right wing MAGA talking point or I get a shrug. They just do not, will not, address the issue at hand — we have to do something about global climate change NOW.

But because of the fucking MAGA cocksuckers who control the minds of millions of people, we’re just not going to do anything until it’s too late. Of course, if you wanted to get kind of wonky about it all, you might suggest that if we had — glup — a Second American Revolution that Blues instigated and won, then maybe we could fucking fix this particular problem.

I hate violence too much to take that option seriously though. So, I guess we’re just going to suffer. Or, more specifically, our children and grandchildren are going to suffer. I suppose AI or, I don’t know, First Contact, might somehow help us out….but barring Little Green Men landing on the front lawn of the White House….I think humanity’s goose is cooked.

The Earth Is Burning — Our Fiction Needs To Tell That Tale

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I continue to flirt with the idea of a “second creative track” of some sort. The idea I have rolling around in my mind has to do with a story about the consequences of global climate change.

It’s really hot outside.

The idea is great, but to work on it would require drawing time and energy away from the main event. But I go outside and it’s broiling hot outside to the point that I think it would help to write a story that dealt with the theme of global climate change.

Anyway. It will be interesting to see if there comes a point where I’m so broiled that it’s distracting enough that I’m willing use some of my time on the second creative track.

If I Wasn’t Writing 5 Novels About Trumplandia, I Would Be Writing A Screenplay About Global Climate Change


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Things are going really well with these five novels I’m working on. I’m still struggling with the first novel, ugh, but I do have five solid novel concepts. But in the back of my mind, I have this really, really great screenplay that is about the implications of global climate change.

I have a beginning and an ending, but there’s a huge void where the middle part should be.

And, yet, there is a part of me that always occasionally wants to use this global climate change-themed screenplay as my “second creative track.” Some of the people I’ve told the general story to were rather enthralled by what I’ve come up with.

But I love these five novels too much. Though, I will admit the practical aspects of developing and writing five novels have me stumped at the moment. Should I just focus on the first book and use it as a calling card for the other five novels, or should I make at least an attempt to do one run through through the all five novels on a first-draft basis?

At this point, I just don’t know.

The thing about this screenplay percolating in my mind is so much better than Don’t Look Up. It addresses the implications of Global Climate Change in a way that is far more clean on a storytelling basis. None of the bonkers, scrambled storytelling of Don’t Look Up that I found so grating.

Though, one element that is interesting about the characters I’ve come up with is I like how it kind of switches the gender roles of the Hero With A Thousand Faces trope we’re so used to.

Anyway.

What I think is going to happen is I’m going to really focus on the first book of this five book series, then if I get a literary agent and sell it, I’ll use that foot in the door to sell the other four novels in the series. And, then, maybe, I can figure out a way to sell my far-better interpretation of Don’t Look Up.

The Political Implications of Global Climate Change


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

It has been speculated that global climate change was responsible for the current COVID19 pandemic. If that is the case, then the argument could be made that Trump was the first political fatality of our new hotter-than-ever age.

Watch out for that last step.

If things continue the way they are currently going, there’s going to come a point when American politics is going to change in a rather dramatic fashion — potentially a lot sooner than you might think.

If a huge chunk of Florida and Louisiana simply sink into the sea, those people — voters — have to go somewhere. Imagine what happens when Miami sinks into the sea and all those voters have to find somewhere new to live. Where ever they go, they’re going to change the political dynamic once they get settled.

And, remember, a huge swath of the the Rust Belt has been depopulated over the last few decades. If things really get as hot as we fear, then, on an existential basis, it’s easy to imagine cities like Detroit, Buffalo, and other, similar places having a rush of new residents.

Given how badly we’re fucking things up, this could happen a lot sooner than you might think — it could be so soon that our apparent inevitable march into autocracy might, if not be stopped, at least slowed or the context changed a little bit.

Anyway, what do I know. All I know is, long term, we’re fucked.

The Globe Is Burning Up & We’re Lulzing It — What Is Wrong With Us?


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Sometimes, I’m ashamed of being a human. This happens a lot whenever I see some fucked up weather even occur and because of, what, politics? we ignore it. The entire fate of all 8 billion of us rests on our willingness to work together to save the planet and what are we doing?

Jack shit.

And it’s only getting worse. The conservatives in my family don’t even see a discussion of global climate change as legitimate unto itself. It’s a struggle to get them to take the issue seriously, period, full stop. But once you do pin them down, all they want to talk about is how AOC’s Green New Deal would ban the entire dairy industry because of bovine farts.

Or, they say humanity has nothing to do with any of the weird weather and it would happen no matter what.

And, if you manage to absolutely pin them down on the issue, they say, “There’s nothing we can do about it, so why worry about it, you fucking libtard.”

It’s that combination of an unwillingness to take global climate change seriously mixed with simple fatalism. It makes you wonder if there’s anything that could change such a fucked up situation.

Sadly, I can’t think of anything.

It would have to suddenly be in the vested interest of the Right elite to demand collective action on the part of the base. They would have to berate the MAGA base into submission after decades of climate change denying propaganda. It makes you wonder if any of this would change if the United States literally got too hot to live in and we all had to move to Canada.

I guess it might because then there would be blood money to be made by the invasion of Canada to fix the situation for 300 million Americans.

So, we’re fucked guys. There might be a spasm of panic on the part of the American Right at some point in the vague future, say, 50 years from now. But it will be way too late.

We’re going to burn alive. All of us.

The Earth Is Broiling & Yet It’s Still A Lulz?


by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Reality is very important to me. So when I find myself surrounded by people who are denying a concrete reality that is all around us, it makes me very angry. What sparks me thinking about this is how it’s now very clear that the earth is heating up at an alarming rate.

And, yet, because how since about the 2000 presidential election, anything to do with global climate change is seen exclusively through the prism of partisan politics. Because of the broader problem of negative polarization, people on the Right are denying empirical evidence that global climate change is real. They do everything in their power to conflate, or mitigate or rationalize out of existence the very cold hard facts that we are now confronted with on a daily basis.

Even if you pin these people down, the pretty much just throw up their arms and say, something like, “humans have nothing to do with it” or “what do you want us to do about it.”

But, really, this is an issue of these people getting so wrapped up in the immediate political future that they’re willing to embrace nihilism. So, you can tick off all these different things that we should or could do to save ourselves, because of the absolute addictive power of negative polarization people on the Right will never, ever change their point of view on this subject. To the point that we could all be forced to move to Canada, Russia and Antarctica and these people would still be complaining about the Green New Deal banning cows because of their farts.

All of this points to not only how fucked we are, but there’s a severe problem in our political system that is putting the entire existence of humanity at risk. And the one thing that would fix this problem — leadership on the Right — is just not something that is going to happen anytime soon, maybe ever.

As it stands, people on the Right are looking at global climate change exclusively through the lens of partisan politics and economics. To the point where, like I said, they’re nihilistic. They would rather own the libs than risk, in any way, figuring out a way to save humanity through the group effort of a common front.

So, I don’t know what to tell you. Get ready to broil, I guess.