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Just like many other climate justice activists, I often — and it’s happening more and more — shake my head in frustration when I consider just how perilous our climate crisis is. And yet there is not more concern or action to stop it.

At this point I’m pretty sure the scientists are correct that we’ve stepped over the line of no return when it comes to being able to reverse the damage we have done to the planet. We won’t be able to maintain a global temperature increase kept to a minimum forecast of 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels, and we will reach worst-case projections of 4.8 C by the end of the century.

We as citizens of Mother Earth have completely — and in an act of ultimate self-sabotage — messed up our planet.

It’s funny how I used “our” as a term of possession because if understood to denote a relationship between humans, climate change is “our” collective human race problem and yet the anti-globalization movement made it clear almost 20 years ago that roughly 10 per cent of the world’s population consumes roughly 90 per cent of the world’s resources.

And yet since it is not just humans who live on this planet but an incredible array of biodiversity, the use of “our” isn’t really the truth. It’s not the truth because we act like human beings are the only beings that matter.

Now in the Christendom, the Bible gives us all the holy justifications we need, with the whole “The Earth Was Created As Our Playroom,” where we can use make-believe to pretend that we have not just condemned “us” to an existence where it will become harder and harder to breathe “our” air, drink “our” water and eat the food that “we” grow from “our” soil. Hallelujah!

I recently came across a 2013 article outlining our climate holocaust and I reflect upon it in horror. A mere three years ago and one Fort McMurray mega-fire ago — and that isn’t even the only town in Canada that faces annihilation as a byproduct of climate change — we knew we were doomed.

The 2013 Nature, Science and PNAS (Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences) report is the first of its kind to integrate all prior scientific research in order to project approximately when climate change will produce permanent catastrophic consequences.

Like I mentioned above, we may have already passed the point of no return when it comes to being able to reverse the damage that climate change has caused. Too late, we’re already snuggly, tucked into the handbasket that will take us to hell.

If anyone has read the book (or…sigh, watched the movie) Children of Men, the concept of climate refugee will soon enter the news on a regular basis, as Canada and other G-20 nations will likely be shielded from the climactic beginning of the end. Our nation doesn’t risk returning to the sea from where it has risen like the poor island nations of the Pacific Ocean.

The report reveals that the tropics will be in serious trouble around the year 2020, and North America and Western Europe by roughly 2047. 2020 is four years from now, but at least it’s not “us” in trouble so soon. We’ve got a nail-biting 20 more years to throw at the problem.

According to this study, the tropics, which are the near-equatorial region of this planet that’s almost 100 per cent impoverished, and that has thus contributed virtually nothing to global warming, will begin the period of permanent catastrophe starting in approximately 2020; but the (cooler) moderate-latitude countries, such as in North America and Europe, will begin this catastrophic period in or around 2047.

Permanent catastrophe.

Now before people like Donald Trump persuade you to toss this left-wing propaganda report aside, let me remind you to remind them that publications like Nature, Science and PNAS (Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences) have the distinction of being tied as the world’s three most prestigious scientific journals so it’s extremely difficult for the best climate change deniers to criticize.

And believe me, this is important.

It’s pretty sad actually that climate change deniers get as much traction as they get, but for our sake, at least Canada has pretty much shed itself of our Trump-types.

With all the anger and cynicism the United States is going through right now with their federal election, I’m not even sure how left-wing activists in the States can make sense of it all?

Similar to Alberta, the U.S. has the state of California, that is going through a serious period of drought and forest fires, but on a larger scale than that of Fort McMurray.

And the thought that we can only expect more “climate catastrophes” in our future should seriously concern North America long after the campaigning has ended and elections won.

Add on the fact that “we” are the source for this “climate catastrophe” makes me seriously doubt “our” capacity to survive as a species, and as a planet.

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Krystalline Kraus

krystalline kraus is an intrepid explorer and reporter from Toronto, Canada. A veteran activist and journalist for rabble.ca, she needs no aviator goggles, gas mask or red cape but proceeds fearlessly...