When Did We Stop Caring?

Every year, there’s a new round of climate change negotiations. Another meeting where we fail to set emissions that will prevent catastrophic climate change. And the global community seems to care less about nothing happening. Doha, Qatar – where the latest talks are – still has a civil society presence, but many of us are simply feeding the climate change monster. The inspiring few cannot outweigh the apathy of many.

Three years ago, these weren’t the only people that cared though – the world cared. Copenhagen was huge; there were over a hundred world leaders present, it dominated the media coverage and people truly believed that ‘Hopenhagen’ would save the planet.

The significance of Copenhagen is still evident today, with people divided about whether it was a success or failure. Maybe it was a success in that there was a last minute deal. But, really, we all know that it was a meeting of world leaders who failed to come up with an adequate – let alone inspiring – agreement.

It could have been a failure that energised people to demand more, not less; and it could have increased the urgency with which we demanded a solution. But it was all too hard and slowly climate change disappeared from the everyday agenda.

Even if we don’t want to hear stories about our planet dying, we don’t need to tell that story as the science will. The science reminds us that even if we can frame minimal targets as success stories, they won’t be enough to keep up below two degrees of warming. In the closing plenary of the Kyoto discussions today, Bolivia reminded us that “our low level of ambition does not in any way correspond to the science.”

The sad thing is that the woefully inadequate targets have already impacted those less able to act, such as Nauru and the Philippines. It’s time for the developed world to be reminded that it’s not doing enough and it clearly doesn’t care anymore.

In countries like Australia, press coverage over whether our books will add up in the next budget ignores the extent to which we are burning the books of countries like Philippines, or sinking them to be more precise.

There is no economy for a country underwater.

I am yet to hear the Australian people state that wiping countries off the world map is okay, as long as it meant we got to increase our wages by one percent. I haven’t heard that, but that is what’s happening.

We say that domestic economics are more important. The moment we stopped caring what our governments were doing on climate change was the same moment we stopped caring about countries that were drowning or our planet, which is dying.

When we say nothing, we tacitly approve the decision to do nothing.

The lack of press in Doha is indicative of just how little we care. The fact that nothing is happening is somehow not newsworthy.

I came to Doha, with The Verb, to provide a comedic angle on what is happening. But the more I see that nothing is happening, the harder I find it to laugh. Nothing is funny about watching this process let down the countries most vulnerable to climate change.

As the Philippines asked, “If not us, then who? If not now, then when? If not here, then where?”

By Jeremiah Brown, photo by Laura Owsianka.