BY MARK Y.A. DAVIES
Corporations are not going to save us. Politicians are not going to save us. Judges are not going to save us. Philanthropists are not going to save us. Preachers are not going to save us. Scientists are not going to save us. Celebrities are not going to save us. Universities are not going to save us. Technology alone is not going to save us. The hand of God is not going to save us.
We are the only people who are going to save us from the climate chaos we are creating, and by we I mean a mass movement of revolutionary proportions for systemic transformation that will radically alter our relations to each other and the planet and lead us to forever see nature as our community rather than simply a commodity to exploit.
Our climate scientists are warning us that the next 10 years are our last opportunity to avoid the worst of the worst case scenarios in relation to climate change. Let’s not be the worst generation that lets a livable climate slip through our fingers. May the powerful forces of love, empathy, and justice create in us a new heart that will not allow us to sit idly by while we hurl ourselves towards a future of horrific suffering in an unlivable climate.
We have it in us to do this, but will we find the courage and the spirit to give our lives for the very life of human civilization itself and the wellbeing of all life? What will motivate us to finally respond to the greatest existential threat to ever face humanity and our ecological community?
It is going to take more than changing out light bulbs, carpooling, and programming the thermostat. It will require a revolution of agriculture, transportation, energy, and industry. It will require a transformation of our economic and political systems to make right all that we have done wrong to our one world house over the past three centuries, and we must be willing to give our whole lives to this effort so that our earth might flourish and humanity might not perish. Only we can save us.
– Mark Y.A. Davies is the Wimberly Professor of Social and Ecological Ethics and director of the World House Institute for Social and Ecological Responsibility at Oklahoma City University. Click here for more of his essays.
