A perfect (and perfectly scary) title from Jessica Wildfire (@npub1ecfk...f3cp) — "If a Cactus Can't Survive This, Neither Can You" ____________________________ You might’ve seen recent headlines about saguaro cacti keeling over in Arizona after spending nearly a month above 110° Fahrenheit (43°C). Not even a week later, The Washington Post ran this absurd story: “Your body can build up tolerance to heat. Here’s how.” I’m not linking to it. That’s how bad it is. It’s not just getting a little hotter. It’s getting so hot that saguaro cacti are deflating in the desert. They evolved roughly 20,000 years ago. They’ve spent millennia adapting to a hot desert environment. They live up to 200 years in the hottest, driest environments on the planet. These cactuses are saying, “I can’t take it anymore,” and sagging over dead. And we’re being told we can adapt. I got curious about what temperature the human body can actually withstand, and it’s somewhere around 108°F (42°C). That’s when your proteins start to denature. A wet bulb temperature beyond 95°F (35°C) can kill a person in about six hours. No amount of heat tolerance can save anyone from that. It strikes me as just a little ridiculous that out here in reality, parts of the world are becoming absolutely uninhabitable, and wellness writers are just now telling us to start building up our heat tolerance. It feels like we’re being prepared and conditioned to start blaming heat deaths on someone’s “low heat tolerance,” as if it’s just another precondition that helps them rationalize indifference in the face of mass death. ____________________________ FULL ARTICLE -- https://jessicawildfire.substack.com/p/if-a-cactus-cant-survive-this-neither #Arizona #Environment #Climate #ClimateChange #ClimateCrisis #ClimateEmergency

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. __________________ 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.” __________________ FULL STORY --

Al Jazeera

Extreme heat hits Iraq, as temperatures exceed 50 degrees Celsius

Higher temperatures combine with Iraq's other problems to create a 'perfect storm'.

#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. _________________________ 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.” _________________________ STORY 1 -- https://www.nationalobserver.com/2023/08/04/news/canadas-wildfire-emissions-smash-another-record STORY 2 -- https://12ft.io/proxy?q=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.rawstory.com%2Fcanada-wildfire-smoke-smashes-emission-record-monitor%2F #Environment #Climate #ClimateChange #ClimateCrisis #Capitalism #CO2 #Emissions #Pyrocene

Q: “What’s on TV tonight?” A: “Same old, same old.” ____________________ 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

#SilentSunday

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"

Scientific American

Bizarre-Looking Colossus Whale May Have Been Heaviest Animal Ever (Sorry, Blue Whales)

“I’ve never seen anything like it,” says a paleontologist not involved in the discovery of a 40-million-year-old fossilized whale

#Paleontology

A lot of people here seem to not like Caitlin Johnstone (@npub1rv0u...yhy3) 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.

Where I Stand, Issue By Issue – Caitlin Johnstone

#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... _______________________ 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. _______________________ There is much more in the full article, and I urge you to read the whole thing. FULL ARTICLE --

The Economy is Going to Break

Better Now Than Later

#Environment #Climate #ClimateChange #ClimateCrisis #ClimateEmergency #Degrowth

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. __________________________ 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. __________________________ FULL ARTICLE --

We’re Taught About Liberal And Conservative Bias In Media, But Not US Empire Bias – Caitlin Johnstone

#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. 🙄 __________________________ 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. __________________________ FULL REPORT --

ICAN

Wasted: 2022 Global Nuclear Weapons Spending

ICAN’s definitive report on nuclear weapons spending shows how nine countries spent $82.9 billion on nuclear weapons, of which the private sector...

#USA #Politics #War

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 --

Global Fight to End Fossil Fuels

Global Fight to End Fossil Fuels – September 2023

This September, people on every continent will join the largest-ever globally coordinated action to demand that governments end fossil fuels. Join us.

#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... _________________________________ "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. _________________________________ FULL ESSAY -- https://indica.medium.com/why-renewables-wont-end-environmental-destruction-2c3ee480705e #Environment #Climate #ClimateChange #Colonialism #Capitalism #Pollution

I try not to exaggerate or engage in hyperbole. I’m not attempting to scare anyone just for fun. I’m simply presenting what I have learned and telling you what some very smart people think about it. Climate scientists are terrified. So am I, and you should be too. As Greta Thunberg said, in 2019: “I don’t want you to be hopeful. I want you to panic. I want you to feel the fear I feel every day. And then I want you to ACT.” It’s time for action. We need immediate system change. No more half measures, no more Business As Usual. Dreams of futuristic technologies are irrelevant at this point, and voting can't make enough of a difference. The solution? Organize a massive long-term general strike and demand an end to fossil fuels. If the capitalist governments won't agree to that, then they must be removed. We can offer them an easy way out — if they're willing to take it — or we can do it the hard way. SEE ALSO —

Climate Justice Social

Bread and Circuses (@breadandcircuses@climatejustice.social)

Attached: 1 image Here’s my dream… After the shocking climatic events of recent weeks and months — all the terrible heat waves, the fires ...

#Environment #Climate #ClimateChange #ClimateCrisis #ClimateEmergency #ClimateAction #ClimateJustice

Capitalism, as a system, doesn't do well at all in anticipating problems or preparing for crises. That's not how it works. The only goal of capitalism is creating profits for capitalists, thereby increasing their capital. Short-term, immediate gains. That's all that matters. So, when the things you expect to find at the store suddenly begin disappearing off the shelves, and no one has an answer for when they'll be back, now you'll know why. #Politics #Capitalism

There is no precedent for what is happening now in Canada. The ongoing forest fires are obliterating all previous records. No matter which chart or graph you look at below, the message they send is shocking and alarming. ___________________________ Canadian wildfires have burned more than 10 million hectares (24.7 million acres) this year, a record-breaking figure that has surpassed scientists' most pessimistic predictions, government data showed Saturday. The prior all-time high occurred in 1989, when 7.3 million hectares were burned over the course of an entire year, according to national figures from the Canadian Interagency Forest Fire Centre (CIFFC). The area burned this year, in just six and a half months, is roughly equivalent to the size of Portugal or Iceland. ___________________________ FULL STORY -- https://phys.org/news/2023-07-canada-wildfires-mn-hectares-year.html SEE ALSO --

World Socialist Web Site

Extent of record-breaking Canadian wildfire season continues to grow

The 2023 fire season, which is expected to continue to rage from Quebec to British Columbia to the far North for at least two more months, is being...

#Canada #Forest #Wildfires #Environment #Climate #ClimateChange #ClimateCrisis #ClimateEmergency

#SilentSunday #Nature #Photography