Am I My Planet's Keeper?: Cooperating in the Midst of a Mass Extinction

By Johnny Townsend

Global Warming. Climate Change. Climate Crisis. Climate Emergency. Whatever label we use, we are facing one of the greatest challenges to the survival of life as we know it.

But while addressing greenhouse gases is perhaps our most urgent need, it's not our only task. We must also address t

• Language: English
• Publisher: Johnny Townsend
• Release date: Jun 19, 2023
• ISBN: 9781961525153

Johnny Townsend

A climate crisis immigrant who relocated from New Orleans to Seattle in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, Johnny Townsend wrote the first account of the UpStairs Lounge fire, an attack on a French Quarter gay bar which killed 32 people in 1973. He was an associate producer for the documentary Upstairs Inferno, for the sci-fi film Time Helmet, and for the short Flirting, with Possibilities. His books include Please Evacuate, Racism by Proxy, and Wake Up and Smell the Missionaries. His novel, Orgy at the STD Clinic, set entirely on public transit, details political extremism, climate upheaval, and anti-maskers in the midst of a pandemic.

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Contents

Repetition Is the Greatest Teacher

Treating a Critically Ill Climate

Superstition Is Leading Us Toward Extinction

Can We Stop the Asteroid Heading for Earth?

One Million Elephants in Miami

I’m Two Days Older Than You, So I’m Always Right

Drawing a Line in the Tar Sands

A Treatment Plan for Stage 3 Climate Cancer

Bracing Ourselves for Climate Combat

Missing the Forest for the (Dead) Trees

Fossil Fuels Anonymous

Let’s Put a Brake on Traffic Pollution

Climate Change Deniers Are Committing Mass Murder-Suicide

Palliative Care for Humanity

Dead Mankind Walking

Grab What We Can and Run

Chicken Little: One if by Land, Two if by Sea

What Have You Got Against a Stable Climate?

Retrofitting Notre Dame

Is Recycling Dinosaurs Cost Effective?

An Air Freshener for the Outhouse

Environmental Serial Killers

Murderers of Old Men

God Himself Couldn’t Burn This Planet…But Human Hubris Can

Organic Water, Clean Natural Gas, and Giftwrapped Garbage

Climate Crisis Threatens the Mormon Church

If Climate Change Is Real but Not Caused by Human Activity, Don’t We Still Need to Address It?

Our Climate Loan Has Come Due

Öl Macht Frei

The Climate Crisis Is World War III

My Mother’s Forced Abortion and Sterilization

Dinosaurs Building the World’s Largest Magnet

Let’s Wear Shorts to Church!

Make Earth Great Again

What if the Apocalypse Started and No One Cared?

Drunks Don’t Make the Rules Against Drunk Driving

What the Titanic Teaches Us About the Climate Crisis

Mormons Must Divest from Fossil Fuels

Choosing Luxury over Climate Solutions

Problem Deniers vs. Problem Solvers

Cutting Off Our Climate to Spite Our Civilization

The Answer to Climate Denial Can Be Found in Porn

Where Will I Go to Escape Climate Disaster Next Time?

The LDS Church Should Create Solar and Wind Farms

I Hope They Call Me on a Thermal Mission

We Can’t Eliminate Our Impact on Climate, but We Can Lessen It

Let’s Stop Digging Our Own Graves

I’m My Own Grandchild

Every Newscast Must Discuss Climate

Climate Inaction in Action

Let’s Celebrate Higher Gas Prices

Football Has Fans, Religion Exists, and Climate Change Is Real, Too

A Gastric Bypass for Global Warming

I’m Spending My Children’s Inheritance

This Isn’t the New Normal. These Are the Good Old Days

Successful Citizens Are the Key to a Successful Nation

Books by Johnny Townsend

What Readers Have Said

Repetition Is the Greatest Teacher

When we talk about global warming, those on the left are often afraid of doing it the wrong way. We worry the term global warming has lost its meaning, so we start saying climate change instead. Then we move on to climate crisis. That starts to feel weak after a while, so we try out climate emergency. And then climate breakdown.

There’s nothing inherently wrong with this approach. But sometimes, I fear those on the left try too hard to be different and original. Those on the right have perfected repetition as a powerful tool. It annoys the rest of us, but it works.

If you say fake news seven thousand times, people believe it. If you use woke in a pejorative way eight thousand times, even those who used to feel it a great descriptor start feeling defensive. If you say an election was stolen nine thousand times, you get people riled up enough to riot. If you call people groomers ten thousand times, you get people to start making laws against those you’ve targeted.

Folks in AA hear the same messages week after week, year after year. Repetition is a good teacher.

As a writer, I’m afraid of repetition. I don’t want my work to sound monotonous. I don’t want a new piece to sound like old material.

So you’ll find in this collection a mixed bag. I simply can’t resist trying new approaches to persuade people to action, yet the message is pretty much the same every time. We’re in a crisis and must do something, anything we can think of, to start addressing the problem immediately, not ten or twenty or thirty years from now.

And the only way we can do that successfully is if we also address the multiple other issues holding people back. Some of those obstacles include various aspects of human nature but most are the direct result of capitalism, which puts profit, often short-term profit, above everything else.

Because those on the right have successfully vilified socialism by repeating misinformation and because those on the right, as well as corporate Democrats and most religious leaders we may have known growing up, have repeatedly championed capitalism as God’s economic policy, it’s difficult for us to escape all that repetition.

We must get over both our indoctrination and our fears if we want any chance at mitigating the catastrophic changes ahead.

And I’ll say so in these pages, over and over and over again. Hopefully, some of these essays will speak to you personally. I also hope you’ll find pieces you think will speak to your friends and family who still need a push to accept reality.

Please, consider writing some op-eds and letters to the editor yourself. Or working in a field that allows you many hours a week finding solutions. And doing anything else you think might help.

Treating a Critically Ill Climate

Virtually all moderate Democratic politicians accept donations from fossil fuel corporations. Then they seem, oddly enough, to have a difficult time voting for a ban on fracking or new oil pipelines. We need fossil fuels until someone develops renewables to an extent allowing us to gradually switch over. We can’t do anything drastic that would disturb the economy. We must be smart.

If someone had a case of bacterial meningitis, though, they wouldn’t say, You know, I have a big presentation coming up in a few weeks. I’m too busy right now preparing for it. And the deal will fall through completely if I’m not there to handle this. I won’t get that promotion I’ve been working for. I’ll just take a couple of vitamins and power through until a more convenient time to address this life-or-death illness.

If someone is diagnosed with melanoma, they wouldn’t say, I suppose this might be serious, if you want to be melodramatic about it. But I’ve been planning that trip to the beach for months. It would really disappoint the kids if we didn’t go. I'll just start drinking some orange juice now and worry about setting an appointment with the oncologist when we get back.

To be fair, some people do make these kinds of decisions. But I think the medical literature will show things don’t usually turn out well for them. And to be fair, all too often things don’t turn out so good even for those who are sensible enough to take immediate action.

But at least they stand a chance.

When my husband developed liver cancer, he was devastated. He wanted to start chemotherapy right away. But the doctor said there was no chemotherapy for his type of cancer. My husband wanted radiation treatment. But the doctor said there was no radiation treatment for his type of cancer. My husband wanted surgery. But the doctor said that because of the location of the tumor, there was no surgery for his type of cancer. My husband wanted a liver transplant. But the doctor said he wasn’t a good candidate to be added to the waiting list.

Why won’t they help me? he asked me over and over in despair.

My husband died three months after his diagnosis without ever having undergone any treatment at all. To be sure, treatment would have been devastating to our personal economy. But you know what? So was his dying. Losing the house was the smallest of my problems as the one left behind.

It’s quite possible the climate is too ill for us to be able to cure it. And it’s likely that some portion of the human species will survive the calamities coming our way in any event, even if billions die. Maybe trying to slow down and reverse global warming is like a deluded patient taking snake oil to cure their ALS. We’re just kidding ourselves to think there’s anything we can do.

But unless we’re ready to accept that our fate is the complete eradication of life as we know it, we need to do more than say, Our goal is to reduce carbon emissions 40% by the year 2050. Our cancer will be Stage 4 by then.

I understand that denial is a real, psychological reaction to devastating news. But if we want to survive, we need to get some counseling, deal with reality, and start our treatment. Someone who weighs 400 pounds isn’t going to return to a healthy weight by making one extra lap to the mailbox and back.

It’s time for drastic action on climate if we are to save ourselves.

Superstition Is Leading Us Toward Extinction

Humans are an intelligent, rational species. We build upon existing knowledge to understand ourselves and the world around us. This trait has allowed us to overcome almost every obstacle and reign as the dominant species on the planet. So why haven’t we been able to incorporate the science around greenhouse gases into our collective consciousness and adjust our behavior accordingly?

In addition to being highly rational creatures, it seems, we’re also highly irrational.

Smart, intelligent people will throw a pinch of salt over their shoulder. We’ll avoid walking under a ladder, change direction if a black cat crosses our path. We worry that if we break a mirror, we’ll have seven years bad luck. We believe in Santa Claus and the Tooth Fairy.

Sure, we grow out of many superstitious beliefs over time, but not all of them. Most of the adults in my life still say Knock on wood so as not to tempt Fate. I see adults cross their fingers, make the sign of the cross, don their lucky shirt. They play the lottery using their lucky numbers, repeat unique rituals before a game or a job interview.

We watch Charmed and Touched by an Angel and every Harry Potter movie because part of us not only hopes there’s something greater out there but also believes on some level that magic and the supernatural are real forces, if we can only tap into them.

Many of my Mormon friends and family don’t feel the need to act on climate change because they believe Jesus will return any day now and take care of everything.

These are people who wear magic underwear every day of their adult lives.

I mean no disrespect. I used to wear them, too. I still keep a pair, thirty years after being excommunicated.

My previous partner taught at a religious university. An avowed atheist, Tom still maintained his fair share of superstitions. When he was diagnosed with liver cancer, I saw first-hand how humans cling to irrationality like a life preserver. Tom refused to write a will out of fear that doing so would jinx him.

Of course, superstition is not an effective treatment against biology, and he was dead three months later. His superstition had real-life consequences, however, if not for him, then for those around him. Since gay marriage wasn’t legal at the time, Tom’s estranged sister was legally his next of kin and inherited the house, his pension, his CDs in the bank, and everything else.

Perhaps our refusal to act on climate change won’t affect us personally very much, but it will certainly affect the billions of others left here after we die. Are our grandchildren spoiled brats, selfish for wanting to inherit a habitable world?

As a Mormon missionary in Rome, I was instructed not to dust my feet off on anyone, no matter how provoked I might be. Dusting our feet was a ritual so powerful even God couldn’t refuse to act on it and would be bound to afflict whoever we’d cursed.

As elders in the LDS Church, we held the priesthood, a mystical power that would allow us to heal the sick. My missionary companion and I blessed a member of our congregation in Sardinia, promising him a full recovery.

He was dead the next day.

My companion and I knew that if we’d only been more righteous, the man would have lived.

If faith or priesthood or other magical powers can only function on occasion, in a few isolated cases, when we’re exceptionally devoted, then relying on those as our primary tools to solve an existential crisis is not a solid plan.

Mormons are told to pray as if everything depends on God but act as if everything depends on us.

Maybe the Messiah is coming back...and maybe he isn’t. What’s clear, though, is that it’s up to us, through real, concrete, scientific measures, to take drastic action and transform our civilization to something sustainable.

Giving climate scientists and activists the Evil Eye is not good policy. So let’s use the brains evolution gave us, put aside our superstitions, and act as if the world is real, with the belief—no, the knowledge—that reality matters.

Can We Stop the Asteroid Heading for Earth?

When I heard the TED talk Greta Thunberg gave in Stockholm, I was impressed with the clarity of her vision. The Swedish high school student is leading student strikes and protests in Europe to force immediate action on climate change. Greta has Asperger syndrome, which makes her see issues in black and white. If the world is really in such imminent danger, she asked herself, why are we going about our lives as normal?

During WWII, the Allies accepted rationing and the draft and injury and death to protect our families and save our way of life. Greta was mystified at our inaction now over an existential crisis even greater. What in the world was wrong with us?

We don’t have to be on the autism spectrum ourselves to realize she’s absolutely right.

In the movie Armageddon, Bruce Willis plays a deep-sea oil driller who is sent with a team into space to prevent an asteroid from hitting the Earth. There’s no time to waste. Every imaginable resource is directed into the effort to save humanity.

Spoiler alert: Even with everyone working together, they are only able to minimize the disaster, not avoid it altogether.

Likewise, the choice we face in real life is between minimizing climate disaster down to moderate devastation or allowing it to wreak unimpeded havoc across the globe.

Placing my recyclables in the right bin, while important, isn’t going to prevent that asteroid from striking the planet. Convincing another 5% of the population to give up meat and dairy isn’t going to do the trick, either.

If we banned Agent Orange and asbestos and lead because of the danger they presented, then why can’t we ban or at least limit beef and other husbandry and agricultural products that create so much of the danger we face now?

Greta Thunberg concluded her TED talk by expressing how tired she is of people ending what little discussion exists on reducing carbon emissions by offering hope. We don’t need hope, she said. We need action.

If we’ve used up our sick leave at work and then wake up one morning with shortness of breath and chest pain, do we go to work to avoid a reprimand and the loss of a day’s pay? Or do we head to the hospital?

If we only have a part-time job and no health insurance, what do we do when our five-year-old pulls a pot of boiling spaghetti sauce off the stove and is badly burned? Do we simply decide we don’t have enough money for a visit to the ER, much less her extended treatment? Or do we address the disaster at hand and worry about the bill later, even knowing it will burden us for years?

Going on as if nothing extraordinary is