Climate change is the long-term impact on weather patterns and climate resulting from human activities. Whether or not global warming has ever impacted you directly, it will. No matter who you are, where you live, or what you do. Global warming is worsening by the second, and everyone seems to be ignoring it. People, animals, and habitats around the world are already being significantly affected.
The Climate Clock in Times Square, New York City, is a large digital clock that displays the estimated time remaining to take action on climate change. The goal is to stay below the 1.5°C global warming threshold. We need to keep under 1.5 because it significantly reduces the most severe climate impacts. On the Climate Clock website, it lists different campaigns you can join in, ways you can donate, and spread the message of the deadline. Right now, that deadline is just under four years. Wednesday, July 21st, 2029, which is the graduation year for this year’s freshmen.
In 2014, the city government of Flint, Michigan, switched its water source to the Flint River to save money. Due to a scarcity of corrosion control, the water corroded the city’s lead pipes, causing severe health problems to the people who lived in the area.
This incident is a good example of how big corporations and governments contribute to climate change for financial profit. The government of Flint, Michigan, switched its water source from Lake Huron to the Flint River. Officials failed to implement corrosion control measures for the river water, which then further corroded the pipes it flowed through. This caused lead contamination and a health crisis. The contaminated water caused rises of lead levels in the blood of the residents, especially children. This caused brain damage, developmental issues, and more permanent health problems to the approximately 100,000 people impacted by the government’s negligence.
“Like the people in Flint, Michigan. They’re [the government] polluting all of their water, and they can light their faucets on fire? That’s ridiculous,” said Justin Sada.
The residents complained of odd tastes, smells, and discoloration of the water, but city and state officials initially told them that the water was safe to drink.
Justin Sada is a 46-year-old parent. Though it’s hard for a person like him to do anything about climate change, he feels very strongly about it.
“They need to do better by the people and the communities that they’re using their stuff. Like, they’re using their water. They’re using their land. They’re using their everything and they’re polluting everything to where people can’t live their lives, and that’s not fair. That’s not what America is supposed to be.” Justin Sada said.
The concept of global warming is stressful to everyone. But what about children? Children and young adults are the ones who have to grow up dealing with the problem, (pollution, bad air quality, rising temperatures, etc) and they aren’t even the ones who caused it.
“It makes me feel a little scared for the future, y’know?” Freshman Hunter Busby said. “I’m probably gonna die in three years.”
Students feel this way because their entire future is going to be determined by how we handle this global catastrophe. If we can’t fix this in time, the new generation will be doomed to a future where their world is slowly being destroyed by man, with no solution. This is why we have to act while we can: We have a solution now, but we won’t forever.
Busby isn’t the only child who feels this way. Junior Talea Sada, has also stated that she feels unsafe and scared.
“My life…it makes me feel kind of hopeless. A little bit. Like, there’s not gonna be many people that are gonna be fighting for the Earth, and it makes my life feel small and insignificant compared to… it just feels useless now,” Talea Sada said.
What is also unfortunate about this is that many working, average-paid people can’t do much about global warming.
“I wanna be able to do something about it,” Talea Sada said. “There’s not much one person can do, and it’s actually very limited…to…what people actually can do about it. It’s just kind of stressful, honestly.”
Justin Sada also spokeof how difficult it is for the average person to contribute. He mentioned how people who get paid on a more average level can just barely afford the necessities of food or rent now, due to inflation. There’s no money left they can use to donate.
“We already take quick showers and only wash our dishes every other day. We don’t water our lawns and do all this other stuff,” Justin Sada said. “…there’s only so much that someone that’s at the house level can do.”
What we can do as individuals is limited and seems pretty insignificant as a single action. We can limit water usage, pick up and not throw down litter, recycle, and do the basic things. It may not seem like a lot, but it really can make a difference if enough people are doing it. Picking up one piece of trash may seem useless, but if we all pick up one, that’s 8 billion pieces of trash. The big goal is working together to make a dent.
What should be done on a systemic level requires large-scale shifts in economic, political, and social systems, instead of small individual actions. Some main areas that need to change are transitioning energy and transportation infrastructure (rebuilding our transit and energy systems to rely on renewable energy), reforming economic policies, and restructuring food and land use. These things can’t be done by a single person, but can and should be done by powerful businesses and corporations.
Something else that could be done to help make an impact on global warming is not just picking up litter, but reducing the amount of microplastics littered.
An estimated 75-199 million tons of trash reside in the ocean, which is increasing by ~19-23 million tons a year. Cleaning efforts are formidable because the majority of this trash is microplastics.
Microplastics are too small to be caught with nets, unlike water bottles or gum wrappers. We don’t have an efficient way to extract microplastics from our oceans without also extracting water and aquatic wildlife with it. So for now, the only thing we can do is limit the amount that we produce and that is swept into the oceans.
It’s unfair that children are the ones who must clean up the mess.
“It’s mostly the boomer generation, like my parents, that kind of ruined anything that I can see from my level,” Justin Sada said.
Older generations are blamed for the majority of global warming because their consumption rates are much higher than those of the newer generations. According to the article “Baby boomers are the new climate change villains, study claims,” from StudyFinds, a recent study shows that older adults are responsible for the majority of greenhouse gas emissions.
“In fact, researchers from the Norwegian University of Science and Technology found that people over 60 accounted for 25 percent of emissions in 2005. However, that number jumped to 33 percent in 2015.”
The generation that experienced World War II was very resourceful, though the generation that came after, the “Baby Boomers,” isn’t.
“Today’s seniors spend more money on houses, energy consumption, and food,” it reads in the article. So, because the consequences don’t just reflect on the new elderly, today’s generation is the one that has to fix their mess. And some motivated children have actually done a lot to help.
A young activist named Greta Thunberg, who felt strongly about climate change, began protesting when she was just 15 years old and started the global “Fridays for Future” movement.
Thunberg gave a speech in 2019 at the U.N. Climate Action Summit in which she spoke about the injustice of young generations having to face alarming climate change.
“This is all wrong. I shouldn’t be up here. I should be back in school on the other side of the ocean. Yet you all come to us young people for hope. How dare you!” Thunberg said. “You have stolen my dreams and my childhood with your empty words. And yet I’m one of the lucky ones.”
Thunberg was speaking both for herself, the people, and the children of the world being affected by climate change.
“People are suffering. People are dying. Entire ecosystems are collapsing. We are in the beginning of a mass extinction, and all you can talk about is money and fairy tales of eternal economic growth.” Thunberg said.
“How dare you!”
