In Denial Around Climate Deniers

It’s come to my attention this year that, in addition to driving a zero emission vehicle, one of the single biggest ways an individual can cut down on contributing to greenhouse gas emissions is to eliminate unnecessary airplane trips.  I find myself angry about this growing understanding.  Why I gotta be the first generation of empty nesters with enough money to do so that doesn’t get to jet around the world seeing all the places that I haven’t seen?  And please don’t tell me to Greta Thunberg my way across the world.  I do not like anything at all about boats.  When I was 14 I took a luxury cruise with my family from North America to Poland and when I was 18 I took a luxury cruise of the Greek and Turkish Islands.  On both I spent all time at sea in my stateroom vomiting.  And, yes, I know that Greta Thunberg was on a wind-powered vessel not a dirty cruise ship.  I’m just saying, I have never liked boats of any kind since then (except kayaks and canoes and no, not using them to cross the world).

I have been absolutely fine with everything else.  I have happily driven smaller vehicles.  I co-own an electric hybrid vehicle.  I recycle.  I reduce.  I reuse.  I am now accustomed to thermostat levels that most Americans would find obscenely hot or cold.  But the prospect of air travel being removed from me literally brings up so much frustration and anger that today I actually felt for a minute the possibility of becoming a climate denier.  It was just this absolute tantrum that waved over me, you are NOT preventing me from visiting Africa or Asia!  You are NOT going consign me to northern California.  Oh.  Hell.  No.

And then it hit me: I have felt this before.  This is familiar.  I felt this when I had to give up chocolate chip cookies because I can’t eat them in a controlled fashion.  I felt this when I had to start consciously scheduling nights and days where I didn’t work or try to do anything because otherwise I hyper-scheduled every last minute.  I felt this when I had to start tracking every expense because otherwise I was weird and vague with money.  Every single one of those things was impossible for me at first.  Every single one of those changes was infuriating.  Every single one those seemed and still seem terribly unfair.  And the only way I was able to make those decisions was by my coming out of denial and being willing to see and experience the price I was paying by overeating, overworking and vagueness with money.  

And then it further hit me:  I had never actually seen any connection between my own denial of overdoing and climate deniers’ denial.  I never even noticed they were the same word.  Moreover, I have also had people in my life who seem to be complete denial about their drinking, their behavior, their mental illness.  And when they deny their conditions, I get angry and I get manipulative.  I try everything to get them to change from coaxing, nagging, education and manipulation to anger, shame and blame.    And each time I have been absolutely 100% sure that they are the problem.  I am the one that is right.  I am the one that has got my act together.  I am the one that knows what to do.  They have their heads so far up their, um, elbows that they can’t or won’t admit the truth or do anything to change.

This litany above is designed to sound familiar.  This whole reaction is exactly how I feel about climate deniers.  Yet, I’ve learned that exactly NONE of those tactics work to help addicts get out of denial.  Interventions seldom work either.  The only thing that ever seems to help is if the self-righteous people who are angry at the addicts take care of themselves, clean up their side of the street and get out of the addicts’ faces and oh, yeah, stop insulating the addicts from the consequences of their actions (or inaction).

I’m literally not all sure how this all applies to climate deniers except that I’m sure it does.  I’m sure that one of the single things we can force our policymakers to do is to make the cost of all fossil fuel burning choices reflect the true cost to our human habitat.  If, when I looked on Travelocity, instead of a roundtrip airfare to Nairobi of $600 I see one that costs $6000 maybe I’ll get a lot more interested in a trip to Crater Lake (which is a short drive away from where I live).  But please don’t drive up the cost of chocolate chips in retaliation.