The Picture Show: How We End Climate Imperialism on Patreon

 

Editor's note: the Picture Show is a short-burst analysis feature over on my (always free to read) Patreon Blog, exploring the world of lefty YouTube videos you can enjoy in twenty-two minutes or less.

 

Green Socialism and Climate Justice

In our latest edition of In the Aggregate, I mentioned in passing that I wanted to do something a little different with my still relatively new Picture Show segment. In light of the fact that it's pretty hard to righteously analyze a good pinko YouTube video in four hundred words or less, I ultimately decided to just start a new feature entirely. Shorter, more conversational, and more opinion-based than my Film Sessions essays, I hope to publish these informal blogs semi-regularly over on my (free) Patreon; which has a platform feature designed specifically for sharing offsite videos online.

In our inaugural stand-alone Picture Show blog, we're looking at the climate legacy of colonial capitalism and the disproportionate burden in combatting climate change currently borne by the Global South. Using a short, but informative video by Our Changing Climate as a basis for discussion, I explore the important concept of Climate Debt and why reparations from the imperial core, to the hyper-exploited developing world, are a necessary feature of both positive justice and any viable plan to prevent a climate apocalypse. Finally, I offer a few thoughts on how we might pay for all this in a fair and equitable manner for the labor class in both the imperial core, and the developing world.

 

"The hard truth here is that right now, the folks suffering the most severe consequences of climate crisis, are also the folks least responsible for the problem. Take for example, the region of Sub-Saharan Africa. As our video highlights, this area contains roughly fifteen percent of the world's population, while producing only two percent of the energy-related emissions driving climate crisis. Despite this, the region is currently shouldering a massive fifty percent of global adaptation costs in the face of man-made climate chaos. Given this disparity, how should Africans feel about fancy international conferences full of fiery rhetoric about collective responsibilities?"

 

To check it out over on my Patreon Blog by clicking on the quotation block above, or the title header below:

 

The Picture Show: How We End Climate Imperialism

 

nina illingworth

Anarcho-syndicalist writer, critic, and analyst. 

You can find my work at NIDC, Can’t You Read, Media Madness and my Patreon Blog

Updates available on Twitter, Instagram, Mastodon and Facebook. 

Inquiries and requests to speak to the manager @ASNinaWrites

Chat with fellow readers online at Anarcho Nina Writes on Discord!

“It’s ok Willie; swing heil, swing heil…”

Nina-Bytes: Nobody Gets Out Unscathed

 

Editor's note: Nina-Bytes is a weekday blogging series that features short analysis and commentary on articles from around the web.

Lancet Report Warns Planetary Crisis Will Spur More Infectious Diseases, Climate Refugees

One of the more important things living through the early stages of climate catastrophe has taught me, is that most people have no real concept of what we mean when we say this is a global crisis. Oh sure, folks realize that some animals might die, and coastal property might sink below the sea, but most people seem pretty certain that somehow, they'll survive a global collapse of our biosphere just fine. As a recent report published in the Lancet (and timed to precede the 2021 United Nations Climate Change Conference in Glasgow) details however; climate crisis is already killing people far away from the "frontiers" of global warming, and it's going to kill a lot more.

As Jessica Corbett writing in Common Dreams details in this story, the report is a collaborative effort by dozens of recognized academics and UN experts, and the findings are grim. From a rise in infectious disease spread, to extreme heat, and fatal air pollution, the Lancet report makes it clear that on our current trajectory, climate change "will become the defining narrative of human health." Literally millions upon millions of lives are at stake here, and that's from knock on health effects of climate crisis alone; doctors are calling it a "code red" health situation.

Pointing to the nationalist failures in addressing the coronavirus crisis, the report's authors also note that "tackling climate change requires all countries to deliver an urgent and coordinated response." As lead author Maria Romanello says "it's time to realize that no one is safe from the effects of climate change." In a sane world, this would be understood as a rational call for socialism in the face of our collective impending global heat death. Here however, it's clearly a reference to the Glasgow conference. 

In fairness the report isn't all doom and gloom; even at this late an hour, there is still time to pull our society back from the brink. The authors note that with the current global incentive to invest in a coronavirus recovery, it is possible to spend that money on curbing carbon emissions in the name of global health. Once again, it's a great idea, for a world where guys like Joe Manchin don't need a new boat. Sadly, we're not living in that sane kind of world, so I guess we're all doomed.

nina illingworth

Anarcho-syndicalist writer, critic, and analyst. 

You can find my work at NIDC, Can’t You Read, Media Madness and my Patreon Blog

Updates available on Twitter, Instagram, Mastodon and Facebook. Podcast at “No Fugazi” on Soundcloud.

Inquiries and requests to speak to the manager @ASNinaWrites

Chat with fellow readers online at Anarcho Nina Writes on Discord!

“It’s ok Willie; swing heil, swing heil…”

Nina-Bytes: Climate Crisis, Capitalism, and Culpability

 

Editor's note: Nina-Bytes is a weekday blogging series that features short analysis and commentary on articles from around the web. This post is archival and originally appeared on October 5th, 2021 over on our Facebook page.

World's richest 1% cause double CO2 emissions of poorest 50%, says Oxfam

I don't know about you, but I'm getting mighty damn tired of hearing excuses about why "we" can't collectively come together to prevent climate catastrophe; and I'm especially getting tired of hearing it from bougie ruling class muppets who're inarguably a massive part of the problem.

You can chant "we're all on this Earth together" like a mantra if you want, but the numbers don't lie. Rich people are overwhelmingly using more of our shared resources, and releasing more carbon than the entire labor class. Poor people and indigenous farmers aren't killing the planet; seventy one percent of global greenhouse gas emissions since 1988 come from just one hundred corporations. And we know who the owners and controllers of those corporations are! Hell the one of the largest polluters on Earth is the United States military; does that sound like a "we" problem to you?

It's overwhelmingly the capitalist class that's causing the problem, and it's the capitalist class whose lust for endless and immediate profits that's preventing us from taking the steps necessary to save our planet, and with it potentially all life on Earth. The rich have already pillaged our collective future for filthy lucre, and now they (and their in pocket politicians) are refusing to pay for the ensuing fallout; a fallout that may well kill us all. 

This is absolutely not a "we" crisis, and we sure as sh*t aren't all in this together.

nina illingworth

Anarcho-syndicalist writer, critic, and analyst. 

You can find my work at NIDC, Can’t You Read, Media Madness and my Patreon Blog

Updates available on Twitter, Instagram, Mastodon and Facebook. Podcast at “No Fugazi” on Soundcloud.

Inquiries and requests to speak to the manager @ASNinaWrites

Chat with fellow readers online at Anarcho Nina Writes on Discord!

“It’s ok Willie; swing heil, swing heil…”