Naomi Klein: Nathaniel… Rich, I gotta say… I loved the your piece on climate change. I was feeling all types of emotions, even screaming at one point to let out my frustrations. What I want to speak about is the monumental portion that you left out, that more people need to pay attention to…
Kate Aronoff: Of course a piece of journalism like this is at it’s highest level of prestige. Nothing is perfect.. and that goes “Losing Earth” as you tend to pay less attention too the FOSSIL FUEL companies. A country like FIJI doesn’t use any fossil fuel extraction, but are facing the ramifications of the corporations greed. There are 100 companies responsible for 71% of emissions since 1988!
Naomi Klein: You blamed humanity for the reason we didn’t safeguard our future back in the 1980’s. “All the facts were known, and nothing stood in our way, except ourselves.” Not the fossil fuel companies that sat in on EVERY MAJOR POLICY MEETING! Why weren’t they subject to discrimination when they are the biggest contributors for climate change. They are the ones heating up and burning our planet.
Kate Aronoff: “According to a 2015 study from Oxfam, the poorest half of the world’s population accounts for just 10 percent of emissions; around half stem from the richest 10 percent.” We also need to point out that getting the right information in front of the right people doesn’t always pan out. Which is showed numerous times throughout “Losing Earth.”
Naomi Klein: Rich also goes on to call the 1980’s “a favorable time” to beat climate change. More than favorable to be exact… but he is actually little confused. The 1980’s was a zenith for the neoliberal crusade , we were going to a huge upheaval of economic and social projects. In 1988 we signed our 1st free trade agreement with Canada and we were globalizing the world with Capitalism filled with free market fanaticism.
Kate Aronoff: I also want to talk about how the capitalism and free market ideology hindered the efforts of climate changes push to stardom. We had President Reagan advocate strongly for business interests with Wall Street backing it, at the same time he was paying little to none attention to climate change. He was interested in the economy; not the weather.
Naomi Klein: Overall, We are proud of you Nathaniel for bringing this all to light. If someones going to try to fight the fight; why not let it be you.
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