If unified national and international commitment could achieve monumental progress during crises like the world wars, a similar level of coordinated mobilization is required today. A wartime economic restructuring transitions society at emergency speed off fossil fuels through massive investments, just transition programs, and an enduring rationing of carbon pollution. Government mandates modernize infrastructure, transportation, manufacturing and agriculture along renewable lines while stimulating sustainable jobs and industries.
International cooperation leverages strengths and resources, from research collaborations to emissions pacts holding all nations accountable. Wealthy emitters aid economic transition of frontline nations suffering first from weather extremes. A progressive carbon fee program funds mitigation efforts while incentivizing structural economic changes. Grants assist vulnerable communities relocating from rising seas and intensifying natural disasters.
Prioritizing collectivity and justice transforms sacrifices into liberating progress for all humankind. With science as the commanding general, nonviolent civil disobedience compels stubborn political systems to catalyze transformations long stalled by obstructionism and misinformation. But societal will aligned behind solutions offers hope where bleakness once prevailed.
The problem being, of course, that conservatives and capitalism are ruining everything. Just look at how we fared at COVID. If we can’t get the entire population to stay at home and wear masks to protect themselves against a global pandemic, how the heck are we supposed to get them to stay at home and wear masks to protect themselves against climate change?
Well, that’s exactly what the quote says. The fact that so many people turn to people like him, despite them having nothing to do with reality, shows us that real scientists and thinkers are evidently not reaching out to people in a receptive way. Thus, getting people to realize the dangers of man made climate change cannot be done solely with information and scienetific clout, because those who deny it are not in denial due to factual reasons.
Peterson is just a great example of that: if millions of people are more inclined to listen to a confused man (to put it mildly) ramble incoherently about everything and anything, rather than people who are specialized and know what they’re talking about, we’re going about it the wrong way. If we’re ever going to get the vast majority to realize what climate change is, we need a new approach, and the discovery of that approach could stem from understanding why someone who has nothing of value to say can become so influential.
Whether these people that follow them are desperate, stupid, confused, angry or something else is worth asking only insofar as we can derermine why they feel that their problems are addressed by clowns like Peterson. Because, at least in my experience, people who deny climate change get outright angry when you try to convince them otherwise. Even if you mind your own business, some people get triggered by the fact that I carry empty plastic bottles to a recycling container rather than throwing them in the general garbadge bin. It’s obviousy not a factual disagreement, but an emotional one. That’s why they were addressed as “desperate”, and not “stupid”.