Profile: cc89a173...
Unless we change course immediately, large parts of the Middle East and the Indian subcontinent will become uninhabitable for humans (along with many plant and animal species) within only a few decades.
Hundreds of millions of people — potentially billions — will be forced to migrate. Or die.
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Iraq, with its population of about 43 million, is one of the hottest places on Earth. Matters are made worse as power shortages mean that people have to rely on generators to keep their cooling systems on during the heat.
Extreme temperatures and a lack of electrical power are a deadly combination, and one that is being felt across Iraq.
The country is one of the world’s most vulnerable to climate change, faced with scorching heatwaves, reduced rainfall, water scarcity, and desertification.
Last weekend in Iraq, a nationwide power outage caused by an accidental fire at a power station in the southern province of Basra led to the almost total collapse of the country’s power grid on Saturday afternoon, adding to the suffering of many across the southern and central regions of Iraq.
On Wednesday, Baghdad recorded a high of 49C (120F) and in Basra temperatures went beyond 51C (123F); the hottest city in the world this week, according to the monitoring group Hot Cities.
The temperature across several Iraqi governorates including Maysan, Dhi Qar, Muthanna, Diwaniyah, and Najaf, in the southern part of the country also exceeded 50C (122F), according to the Iraqi Meteorological Organisation.
“Iraq is facing three perfect storms in the next decade,” said Azzam Alwalsh, environmental expert and founder of Nature Iraq. “Yet decision makers are not even aware of the abyss facing us, let alone thinking about solutions and the time needed to implement them.”
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FULL STORY -- https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/8/4/extreme-heat-hits-iraq-as-temperatures-exceed-50-degrees-celsius
#Iraq #Environment #Climate #ClimateChange #ClimateCrisis #ClimateEmergency
How it works:
⓵ Capitalists make huge profits from fossil fuels.
⓶ Burning fossil fuels causes global warming.
⓷ Global warming dries out forests.
⓸ Wildfires destroy forests at record rates.
⓹ Carbon emissions from wildfires cause even more global warming.
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Canada’s wildfires have broken yet another record — this time, for heat-trapping greenhouse gas emissions.
This year, climate change has driven Canada’s most severe wildfire season on record. Wildfires in Canada have already emitted more than double the previous record annual amount of emissions.
Greg Evans, an air pollution and public health expert at the University of Toronto, said the emissions create a “feedback loop.”
“The additional release of carbon dioxide is going to result in additional warming, which results in additional drought and additional wildfires,” Evans said.
The devastating wildfires have burned some 30 million acres this year so far, incinerating an area larger than the size of Cuba or South Korea.
Enormous plumes of smoke have choked the air in Canada and neighboring United States, affecting more than 100 million people and at times disrupting flights and forcing the cancellation of outdoor events.
Besides warming the planet, wildfire emissions are also impacting human health. Evans said wildfires make people more susceptible to asthma attacks or heart attacks. He added long-term exposure to the smoke can also make people more vulnerable during periods of poor air quality in the future.
Evans added emissions, like the planet-warming gases from these wildfires, stick around in the atmosphere for 40 years.
“It’s so critical to start taking action now to turn it around,” Evans said. “This is something that our grandchildren will inherit. It's not like we can turn it off and it will all get better.”
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STORY 1 -- https://www.nationalobserver.com/2023/08/04/news/canadas-wildfire-emissions-smash-another-record
#Environment #Climate #ClimateChange #ClimateCrisis #Capitalism #CO2 #Emissions #Pyrocene
The latest map, 749 fires burning out of control!
We are in a #ClimateEmergency. So why do our "leaders" go on with Business As Usual?
Because capitalism.
How it works:
⓵ Capitalists make huge profits from fossil fuels.
⓶ Burning fossil fuels causes global warming.
⓷ Global warming dries out forests.
⓸ Wildfires destroy forests at record rates.
⓹ Carbon emissions from wildfires cause even more global warming.
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Canada’s wildfires have broken yet another record — this time, for heat-trapping greenhouse gas emissions.
This year, climate change has driven Canada’s most severe wildfire season on record. Wildfires in Canada have already emitted more than double the previous record annual amount of emissions.
Greg Evans, an air pollution and public health expert at the University of Toronto, said the emissions create a “feedback loop.”
“The additional release of carbon dioxide is going to result in additional warming, which results in additional drought and additional wildfires,” Evans said.
The devastating wildfires have burned some 30 million acres this year so far, incinerating an area larger than the size of Cuba or South Korea.
Enormous plumes of smoke have choked the air in Canada and neighboring United States, affecting more than 100 million people and at times disrupting flights and forcing the cancellation of outdoor events.
Besides warming the planet, wildfire emissions are also impacting human health. Evans said wildfires make people more susceptible to asthma attacks or heart attacks. He added long-term exposure to the smoke can also make people more vulnerable during periods of poor air quality in the future.
Evans added emissions, like the planet-warming gases from these wildfires, stick around in the atmosphere for 40 years.
“It’s so critical to start taking action now to turn it around,” Evans said. “This is something that our grandchildren will inherit. It's not like we can turn it off and it will all get better.”
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STORY 1 -- https://www.nationalobserver.com/2023/08/04/news/canadas-wildfire-emissions-smash-another-record
#Environment #Climate #ClimateChange #ClimateCrisis #Capitalism #CO2 #Emissions #Pyrocene
I’d like to express my gratitude to these companies for allowing me to use their logos.
Q: “What’s on TV tonight?”
A: “Same old, same old.”
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It's time for another week of BUSINESS AS USUAL, a co-production of your conservative *and* liberal political parties, sponsored this time by Shell, Toyota, and the U.S. military-industrial complex.
🎶 "Keep driving, keep flying, keep shopping, keep buying!
We've got this, everything's fine." 🎶 😃
#Environment #Climate #ClimateChange #ClimateCrisis #ClimateEmergency #Capitalism #BusinessAsUsual
nostr:npub17ep4t9q28g3j7g34xdxz3p2cu7cg8cs6wwuqdh3ztttmr5erfkhsdkae5f nostr:npub1jf9sz2j8537gd5z5x2fjrj5aqrhpwnc9h6dpg07gwqmd72xtffkqcj936x
Yes, humans have screwed up before, many times. But never on a global scale!
nostr:npub1qzc8ejmflltq5uuwmvurfcfd4l96t6np6c8fzgj9l2rdfheadydshtyetl nostr:npub1rv0uaxv2drkn0j5s07jh7gztnex7przdehr9zphv5svc8c5dxsdsqwyhy3
It's not just Ukraine, she's campist across the board, an apologist for the worst tyrants like Assad.
Those of us who are anarchist do not like her because she has made her position on anarchists clear by insulting us and accusing us of being CIA or state dept stooges.
Sure she says some things that are correct, but her problems are very serious and disqualifying IMO and no way is the rest of her stuff special or valuable enough to be worth it, especially when there are so many other excellent sources to get the same messages from but with deeper understanding, more solid foundations and without the toxic campist baggage.
Caitoz is nothing but a self-promoting brand IMO.
BTW she was also adamant that the Jan 6 thing was a huge nothing, absolutely not a coup attempt, this was all just the empire blowing smoke up our asses.
I even went with that for a while myself, but the evidence that is emerging sure seems to paint a different picture.
She's a mess. I respect and appreciate you greatly nostr:npub1qzc8ejmflltq5uuwmvurfcfd4l96t6np6c8fzgj9l2rdfheadydshtyetl so I continue to follow and support you, but in many cases I will just block anyone boosting her.
I get that it can be hard to accept some of what I'm saying if you haven't seen it for yourself. I'm not on twitter anymore and can't find all this stuff to show you but these are things I experienced with her personally before she finally blocked me. I used to be a huge fan of hers also.
nostr:npub1k4f8uusq737u7pvve52ydk783c4kf542vzee66dznzs4j3qplqkqyqhjgz Coming from you, that certainly does give me pause. Personally I have not noticed any of the disqualifying positions you say she has taken -- but I will keep a close watch. Thanks for the feedback.
A bit different from what I usually post, but wow, this is such an astonishing story. Hurray for #science!
"Bizarre-Looking Colossus Whale May Have Been Heaviest Animal Ever"
#Paleontology
A lot of people here seem to not like Caitlin Johnstone (nostr:npub1rv0uaxv2drkn0j5s07jh7gztnex7przdehr9zphv5svc8c5dxsdsqwyhy3) very much. I suppose that’s mainly because she has such a skeptical view about NATO’s involvement in the Russia/Ukraine conflict.
I don’t agree with everything she says, but then I can’t think of a single person I would agree with 100% of the time.
Anyway, here is something she wrote recently that lays out exactly where she stands on numerous important issues.
https://caitlinjohnstone.com.au/2023/08/02/where-i-stand-issue-by-issue/
#Politics #War #Environment #Climate
🥵 It's hot as hell in South America, in the Middle East, in Southern Europe, in China and Southeast Asia, and in much of North America — so many heat waves, and so many heat deaths, it's almost impossible to keep track.
🔥 Forest fires are STILL out of control in Canada, sending *double* the previous record amounts of CO2 emissions into the atmosphere.
☀️ But that's not all we have to worry about. Because climate chaos also will destabilize our economies, disrupt food chains, cause crop failures, and more.
Our Mastodon friend Geoffrey Deihl, aka Sane Thinker (@gdeihl), has some strong words about what we must expect, and what actions we should be prepared to take...
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These heat waves, droughts, and floods are destroying agriculture. If agriculture fails at scale, and it will if we stay on this path, societies will crash, massive inflation will rise, and hundreds of millions of people will migrate to escape death only to find closed borders.
Infrastructure will break, including hospitals, medical care, and medicines. Riots, military law, and governmental collapses will be in the daily news, if our power is on to see it. This is how the economy is going to break if we don’t act.
This situation was foreseen 50 years ago by the oil industry. Exxon funded its own scientists to perform studies that predicted the crisis we’re in today with remarkable accuracy. Exxon's executives chose to minimize and hide this information, and our congress, bought by oil, couldn’t be bothered to look closer.
We also have a compromised, corporate owned mainstream press that wallows in routine sins of omission, and a murderous lack of urgency in reporting on the #ClimateEmergency. Finally, they’re forced to give it coverage, because the planet is thrashing before our eyes. What they won’t do, however, is tell you how to change the outcome.
We live in a world that is now controlled by a handful of insatiable billionaires. They become richer by impoverishing the rest of us, and raping the Earth. They and our politicians are not going to save us. They are either oblivious to the destruction they are causing, don’t care, or have determined the only way to save the planet is to depopulate it. We have to save ourselves. The fastest way to do this, perhaps the only way, is to deprive them of money. We need to slow this economy down to a crawl, or be complicit in watching our world burn and drown.
It is time to sick out, protest, strike and walk out. I know it’s hard, I know it’s scary, I know it involves risk, but if enough of us do it, we can’t all be fired. We will gain the upper hand. It’s the only way. We can either sacrifice now, or sacrifice everything later, and it appears later is here.
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There is much more in the full article, and I urge you to read the whole thing.
FULL ARTICLE -- https://geoffreydeihl.substack.com/p/the-economy-is-going-to-break
#Environment #Climate #ClimateChange #ClimateCrisis #ClimateEmergency #Degrowth
nostr:npub1jf3jn740u7htzmp0uzg857cth5tmh0zmfxm2tlf5y7jp6hgqfmjs55dfcf As much as I favor the idea of degrowth and a pivot toward genuine climate justice, it's very hard to imagine a world in which the Global North voluntarily gives up its status at the top of the pyramid. That seems to be the default response for a large majority of citizens/consumers, along with 95% of politicians and certainly 100% of oligarchs.
The news you see on TV or online is not really the news, or at least not all the news. It's whatever the owners of our society want you to *think* is super important to hear about and get all excited or upset about.
And that's so you won't ask questions about all the other stuff that REALLY matters.
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What relatively few westerners are aware of is that the entirety of mainstream western media — both liberal and conservative — are so biased in favor of the US and its empire-like global sphere of influence that they are almost worthless for forming an accurate understanding of what’s happening in the world.
Every foreign policy agenda of the US and its allies is reliably facilitated by the western media, because the western media do not exist primarily to report the news, they exist primarily to administer propaganda.
The New York Times has supported every war the US has waged. Western mass media focus overwhelmingly on foreign protests against governments the United States dislikes while paying far less attention to widespread protests against US-aligned governments. The only time Trump was universally showered with praise by the mass media was when he bombed Syria, while the only time Biden has been universally slammed by the mass media was when he withdrew from Afghanistan.
Kids aren’t being taught about this type of bias in school. Websites like AllSides and Media Bias/Fact Check, set up to help improve “media literacy” and teach people about media biases, focus only on biases of ideological partisanship, *not* international conflicts and foreign policy.
This is entirely by design. The whole push to promote "media literacy" and improve online information has never actually been about training people to see and understand the biases of media outlets, it's been about training people *not* to see and understand them. At least not where it matters.
And this is because foreign policy is so immensely consequential. Those who run the empire don't care whether women can have an abortion or whether marginalized groups are abused by police, so they're happy for the biases of their propaganda organs to be highlighted on such matters and for everyone to pour all their energy into debating them.
What they absolutely *do* care about a great deal is the operation of the globe-spanning empire, which is held together by nonstop violence and abuse and the threat thereof.
So we are indoctrinated into supporting the US empire's agendas of war, militarism, manipulation, and resource extraction around the world, and we are trained not to look at the fact that we are being indoctrinated by sources of information who are all wildly biased in favor of that empire.
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FULL ARTICLE -- https://caitlinjohnstone.com.au/2023/07/30/were-taught-about-liberal-and-conservative-bias-in-media-but-not-us-empire-bias/
#USA #Politics #Media #Propaganda
It's a good thing I can't think of any better way that governments could spend almost a hundred billion dollars. 🙄
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In 2022, nine countries spent $82.9 billion on nuclear weapons, of which the private sector earned at least $29 billion.
The United States spent more than all of the other nuclear armed states combined, $43.7 billion.
Russia spent 22% of what the U.S. did, at $9.6 billion, and China spent just over a quarter of the U.S. total, at $11.7 billion.
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FULL REPORT -- https://www.icanw.org/wasted_2022_global_nuclear_weapons_spending
#USA #Politics #War
nostr:npub1qzc8ejmflltq5uuwmvurfcfd4l96t6np6c8fzgj9l2rdfheadydshtyetl that capitalism has managed to convince a substantial portion of the population that it is The Only Way despite it being the most damaging, degrading system within which humans have ever lived is one of the most dispiriting propaganda feats of all time
nostr:npub17l53azm7tjr03tqm4mszgnls9thk9h5asr5c0eawgkaeurg75fjse6za2f I've read both of those series and enjoyed them. But to me the one piece of fiction that really nailed what I expect to happen was "The Deluge."
Here's my review -- https://climatejustice.social/@breadandcircuses/109955486143645973
This September, millions of people around the world will take to the streets to demand a rapid, just, and equitable end to fossil fuels as world leaders gather at the UN in New York.
Will you be part of this historic event?
LEARN MORE -- https://fightfossilfuels.net/
#Climate #ClimateChange #ClimateCrisis #ClimateJustice #ClimateAction
Here are the demands being made --
This September, millions of people around the world will take to the streets to demand a rapid, just, and equitable end to fossil fuels as world leaders gather at the UN in New York.
Will you be part of this historic event?
LEARN MORE -- https://fightfossilfuels.net/
#Climate #ClimateChange #ClimateCrisis #ClimateJustice #ClimateAction
Gates, Bezos, Buffet, Musk, et al... how do they define their success?
"I earned every dollar I inherited. I worked hard for the billions I stole."
#EatTheRich #Billionaires
Here's an angry, bitter rant about colonialism by Indi Samarajiva that really resonates with me...
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"Why Renewables Won’t End Environmental Destruction"
Colonialism began with renewable energy: wind to sail across the world, solar to grow cash crops, and human blood, sweat, and tears to grow them. By this logic, you could say that early colonialism was ‘sustainable’ but it obviously wasn’t. Because the problem isn’t the energy source, it’s what you use that energy for.
Colonialism actively destroyed natural ecosystems to plant cash mono-crops. They brutally hunted land cousins for their skin and ocean cousins for their bodily oils, bringing many species to the brink of extinction, and quite a few over it. To accomplish this without energy slaves, they trafficked human slaves across the world, leaving millions at the bottom of the ocean.
Colonialism both actively and passively spread disease across the world, leading to genocidal levels of depopulation. Then of course there was the outright killing, raping, and stealing.
Most perniciously, they framed all this as ‘progress’ and ‘civilization’, which is still the frame we live in. We call this ongoing process ‘capitalism’ or ‘development’ now, but it’s the same thing — destroying the natural world to make artificial profits. The truth is that colonialism never ended. We’re still in it, just with different branding.
Today we think we can switch from ripping coal and oil out of the Earth, and just rip out lithium and copper instead. But ‘renewable’ rape does not change the fundamental raping going on. An electric bulldozer rips up the earth as much as a diesel one.
The process of exploitation might change names and change colors, but the process remains the same. Early colonialism started with renewable energy and late capitalism is ending there. There’s nothing new under the sun, not even ‘renewables’. I’ll repeat myself because history repeats. Same shit, different day.
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FULL ESSAY -- https://indica.medium.com/why-renewables-wont-end-environmental-destruction-2c3ee480705e
#Environment #Climate #ClimateChange #Colonialism #Capitalism #Pollution