Almost 90% of Americans are avoiding climate change activism.
Recent research
shows that at least 40% of Americans are concerned or even alarmed
about global warming, But only 13% say they have called their elected
officials or joined an activist group. One question on many minds is,
despite saying they are alarmed and concerned, why aren’t the other 87%
of Americans demanding policy changes that would curb greenhouse gases?
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| Photo by Glenn Fay |
Apathy
It
is easy to attribute climate activism avoidance to apathy. By
definition, apathy is indifference, lack of interest, concern, or
enthusiasm. That would seem to explain it. Yet the same survey,
done by YPCC shows that 29% say they are indeed concerned about global
warming. If they are concerned then that would mean that they shouldn’t
be apathetic. Maybe they are concerned and they behave as if they are
apathetic because something else is going on.
Per Espen Stoknes, in his book, What We Think About When we try not to Think About Global Warming,
says that a lot of people are depressed about climate destabilization
and environmental damage. Apathy can be one symptom of depression and
maybe people are concerned and alarmed but depressed about it and
therefore act apathetic.
The Bystander Effect
Another
well-known phenomenon in psychology describes the diffusion of
responsibility that occurs with large groups of people, called “the bystander effect”.
The theory goes, when something bad happens, the larger the number of
people that are present, the less likely an individual is to take action
in an emergency.
In
the bystander effect scenario, we could be bystanders to the slow
heating of the earth’s atmosphere and systematic climate
destabilization, but most of us assume someone else will surely take
care of it. After all, the Chinese are still building coal-burning power
plants. And if we do take action many of us believe we have little
power to have an impact. The logic goes, others who do have more
responsibility than us will surely take action. In this way, the
majority of concerned and alarmed Americans stand by and assume someone
else will take action.
Carbon Addiction
There
is a third and more nefarious reason that concerned and alarmed
Americans might not be taking action. And this reason is not something
very many people are talking about. And the reason is that admitting it
might reflect poorly on our morals. This third possible reason is that
we are “carbon-addicts” and we are afraid that taking action might result in changing our lifestyles and identities.
How
can we possibly become climate activists when we know, deep down
inside, that it will threaten our supersized American consumption and
the affluence of our resource-rich lifestyles? Will it threaten our
personal attractiveness, our commodity culture, driving SUVs, flying
around the world regularly, enjoying our carnivorous eating habits,
shopping sprees, plentiful water, and unlimited energy that we have
worked so hard to enjoy ? Especially when our egos and identities are
built on those markers of our success?
In
short — we can’t. So we create plausible deniability. It’s much easier
to ignore it, to be skeptical, to not have time, and to find excuses
instead of taking action. Climate activist avoidance is driven by all
three of these reasons. But that’s not all.
Dynamic Conservatism
Did you ever notice how slow big institutions and corporations are to change? In the 1970’s MIT professor Donald Schon coined the term “dynamic conservatism”
to describe how organizations inherently fight to avoid change. Dynamic
conservatism in our government and society is reinforced by a
marketplace that saturates our habitual lifestyles with our
preoccupation with cars, consumption, meat-based diets, development, and
all of the things that lead to more carbon in the atmosphere.
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| Photo by Glenn Fay |
When
political contributions and subsidies are added to the equation, the
deck is stacked in favor of continued fossil fuel production and
pollution. Schon suggested that learning, reflection, and perceptual
change is needed to overcome dynamic conservatism. But the U.S. shows no
signs of becoming a learning-oriented society now or any time in the
future.
Sustained Leadership
Even
if the vast majority of Americans became alarmed about climate change
and realized they are like the frog in a beaker of water slowly heating
up on a hot plate, our government leaders are heavily influenced by
fossil fuel companies and big money.
According to Forbes, we spend more on fossil fuel subsidies ($5.2 trillion a year) than we do on education. We don’t have the “sustained leadership” to make courageous changes in energy policy.
Sure,
there are bright spots with some Green New Deal advocates and states
taking the lead on renewables, local food production, planting trees,
saving energy, and other fronts. We have students holding climate strikes and threatening to vote green in a few years.
But
even if the next presidential administration and all of the countries
around the world were to immediately take action on decarbonization, it
would only be temporary until the next pro-fossil fuel oriented leaders
come into power and reverse those changes. We are kidding ourselves to
think that the green sea change is stable and consistent enough to
actually result in a sustained period of enormous policy changes that
would lead to significant decarbonization.
So
no matter how encouraging the pockets of increasing climate awareness
look, the reality is that our leaders and most of us will continue to be
addicted to the idea of free or relatively cheap carbon-dumping in the
atmosphere, regardless of the planetary consequences.
Should
we give up on climate action? Absolutely not. Even though serious
climate change mitigation may be impossible, anything we can do to
decarbonize and avoid a runaway greenhouse effect depicted by the most
hellish IPCC scenarios is a step in the right direction.
We
can turn around apathy by promoting the opportunity for a prosperous
green economy, our improved health, plentiful food, water, and military
security. We can model civic responsibility, coach and cajole people to
upend the bystander effect in order to inspire bystanders to pitch in.
We can strive for and promote a learning society and attempt to elect
leaders who will fight to reduce carbon in the air.
But
it’s a much harder, maybe impossible sell to convince someone living in
relative affluence and slack, who has a mindset rooted in hard work,
prosperity, and entitled consumption that they need to actively fight
the institutions that made their lifestyle possible, rather than enjoy
what they think they so richly deserve.
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