What will it take for us to act on climate change? An appeal to our own self-interest | Opinion
“The time has come,” the Walrus said, “to talk of many things:
Of shoes and ships and sealing-wax —
Of cabbages — and kings —
And why the sea is boiling hot —
And whether pigs have wings.”
- ”The Walrus and The Carpenter,” by Lewis Carroll
Opinion
When I first read Carroll’s line “the sea is boiling hot” from his famous poem, I imagined a hot tub near the ocean. I never thought about it literally — never thought it would be our warming ocean or our beloved Maui burning to the ground.
I wonder whether Carroll was thinking about climate change when he wrote this piece.
Climate change models appeared in The American Journal of Science in 1856, and “The Walrus and The Carpenter” was published in 1871. The journal contains information about experiments conducted by Eunice Newton Foote, an American scientist who foretold of climate change when she proved that carbonic acid placed in glass tubes would warm when exposed to sunlight. Her experiments led her to correctly predict that the Industrial Revolution would result in warmer temperatures, and negative impacts on our Earth.
Whether it was Carroll or Newton Foote talking about climate change more than 167 years ago, the ocean is now “boiling,” and the damage to the coral reefs and marine life is undeniable.
Why are we not crying out to the heavens, weeping about this devastation? Why are we not demanding immediate enactment of policies to slow the devastation? Why aren’t we begging our neighbors to make small, climate-friendly changes in their lifestyles? Is it easier to ignore if it isn’t your own or your loved ones’ loss of life and limb?
‘I roll my belly over it’
For the past 15 years, my husband and I have snorkeled the same reef on the Big Island of Hawaii. What got my attention and called me to action was recognizing that the reef I love has more dead spots than ever before, making it look like a coral boneyard. Beyond that, we are no longer observing entire genus of fish that I noted on my snorkel maps from earliest trips.
On a recent trip to the Big Island, I had a revelation about what it might take to get the average person’s attention. This past May, a friend and I watched as tourists stood on coral, tromped through tide pools and destroyed the young kelp necessary to a sea turtle’s diet. When I asked one of them to avoid destroying the young kelp and algae by instead using the designated entrance and egress just a few feet away, she responded, “I didn’t step on it, I roll my belly over it to get into the water.” Then I watched her damage the young kelp further as she rolled her belly over it, all the while believing she wasn’t doing harm.
A few days later, I noticed a tourist emerging from an undesignated exit, bloody and banged up from bumping against the coral (and likely damaging it). I mentioned to another group of novice snorkelers that their vacation wouldn’t get ruined from an injury and an expensive trip to urgent care if they simply used the proper entrance to the sea. Unlike the woman who had rationalized rolling over the coral, these tourists thanked me and entered the water without injuring themselves or the marine life. Another group who heard my spiel asked me to clarify how to get in and out without harming themselves. That’s when my friend and I realized it works better to appeal to a person’s self-interest versus nature’s. We felt we had cracked the code.
The problem belongs to all of us
I’m no different. One very early morning as the bright moon and twinkling stars called to me through my sleep, I realized that I, too, am more concerned about this particular Hawaiian ecosystem because it’s so close to my heart. Climate change is remote, for the most part removed from our day-to-day. It’s painful to hold the complexity, destruction and devastation — until it impacted the reef that makes my heart happy and my soul rest easy.
The sea is boiling hot; my reef will be impacted; fish, dolphins and whales will be harmed. Those people who live on island nations have long known this emergency was here and have sounded the alarm with ferocity, but until now it was their problem, not ours.
But it is our problem, and it’s our responsibility to take action. Taking action means understanding our impact when we buy fast fashion, take that cruise on the mega ocean liner and refuse to enact a nationwide plastic ban. Those things may seem too little and too late as we face the hottest days and summer on record. But long overdue change begins individually and collectively as we demand immediate policy to avoid more irreparable harm.
It is time to ignore and marginalize the climate deniers — those same folks and corporations that profit from the status quo and are invested in oil and gas. They have derailed the health of our planet long enough. Our voices must be louder than their profits!
How much more bloodied, banged up and economically impacted do we all need to be to enact real and meaningful policy today to staunch the devastation of climate change in the middle of our climate emergency?
We can start by joining Green Peace or the Last Chance Alliance; writing to Gov. Gavin Newsom and President Joe Biden, urging them to declare a climate emergency and end fossil fuel permits. Join the National Day of Action on September 17 in Sacramento; make a public comment in support of our Chumash Heritage National Marine Sanctuary; join the SLO Beaver Brigade; ask the Atascadero City Council to deny a permit to store RVs in the Salinas River floodplain, which damages fragile habitat; and research the Dana Reserve Project and decide if the developers’ profit is worth the environmental impact, then email your thoughts to the Board of Supervisors.
Small local actions are the way to create long-term impact.
Dona Hare Price is a local activist, avid snorkeler and writer.
