Hello there, welcome to North Carolina where it is 75 degrees in the middle of November. People continuously think it's hilarious or that it’s just a coincidence that it is constantly warm outside. Because of this, it is no surprise that the topic of climate change is still a huge issue in today’s society. Climate change (or global warming, as some would say) has been a topic of discussion for decades but for some reason, the problem keeps getting worse. I recently watched the documentary Before the Flood, with Leonardo DiCaprio, which helped me to understand why what’s happening in our world is still happening.
Leo states in his film, “Try to have a conversation with anyone about climate change - people just tune out” and this is the sad truth. People don’t want to hear about climate change because a lot of them don’t believe it, nor do they want to believe that it’s as devastating as it is. People don’t want to hear that they have taken our planet for granted and in a sense, absolutely destroyed it. America is the largest contributor to climate change with the amount of fossil fuels we are using daily. Coal, oil, and natural gas are the nation's three largest contributors that are doing the most damage; right now, our nation cannot run without these unless we make a change to use more solar energy.
From the movie, there are a few points that I picked out that I thought were extremely important to understand. First, in 2040, we will be able to sail right over the North Pole as there will be no sea ice left. Now, be mindful, the North Pole is currently the air conditioning for the entire northern hemisphere. Second, if our temperatures stay rising the way they have for the past decade, Greenland in its entirety will just disappear. Instead of being a white surface, it is becoming a dark surface that is essentially becoming a heater instead of a cooler. Third, India received half of the year’s rainfall in just five hours this past year, which completely destroyed thousands of farmers' crops. Fourth and finally, in the last thirty years, fifty percent of the world's coral has been lost due to climate change and change in sea levels/temperatures.
The issue is that people aren’t listening because most of it isn’t affecting them just yet. People also aren’t listening because politics seem to be skewing the ideas of climate change to make it seem like something that isn’t important or isn’t real. However, science doesn’t seem to be wrong, especially when showing the statistics and graphs of the change in our climate over the years; “the ice is melting, the Earth is warming and the sea level is rising: these are facts.”
So what do we do to save the planet? Well, on a large scale, scientists said in the film that “If we stopped burning fossil fuels right now, the planet would continue to warm for a few years, then it would start to cool again and everything would slowly go back into place.” As for the smaller scale, Leo reminds us in the film that we are “in the stage before the flood.” He also tells us that it is up to us to watch what we consume: watch how much cow and meat we eat, watch how much palm tree oil we buy and make sure we are using recyclable products. He also tells us to use our voices to spread the word about fossil fuels and politics, and to vote for leaders who will make a change and prevent the continuation of climate change and the burning of dangerously unclean fossil fuels. “It is up to all of us.”
If you haven't already, please go watch the documentary Before the Flood by Leonardo DiCaprio. It is available on Hulu, iTunes, YouTube and many other sites.
