We must make the 1% pay for the earth's destruction.

Where I live, summer has left the ground parched. It’s been a dry season with few deluges. But when storms come, they come with violence and unpredictability because the earth is in riot against our dominion over it. At the beginning of June, a tornado ripped passed my apartment which is not the norm in my part of the country. It tore trees from the earth like a hand pulling up carrots from a garden. My neighbourhood was without power for thirty-six hours because of downed power lines. My neighbours and I sweltered from the summer heat in our apartment units that without electricity were as forlorn as kipping down in a cement storage room where excess furniture is kept.

Once power was restored; we quickly forgot what we had witnessed. Daily life resumed for us; underneath steely blue skies that made the air dusty from an arid sun that hung long into the day. When evening came; the heat of the day was replaced by a curtain of darkness wrapped in a heavy humidity that made sleep uncomfortable for those without air conditioning in their bedrooms like me.

But today, the rains returned. It will rain tomorrow and the next day and then it will stop. After that, the sun will come again with a sooty heat that evaporates the memory of when the air was cool, refreshing, and hopeful.

I’ve lived through summer, autumn, winter, and spring fifty-eight times. This summer is not normal, and we shouldn't make it the norm. Europe and large parts of North America are on fire. But because it wasn’t caused by shell fire from Vladimir Putin, we are non-pulsed about it. Shit happens, as they say.

What was long predicted by scientists has come to pass. We are in a spiral towards the destruction of our environment.

But capitalism has conditioned us to deny what we see before our eyes because it upsets the smooth running of our economy that the wealthy have indoctrinated us to believe is more fragile than our ecosystem.

So, like blood spat up from the lungs of a heavy smoker who then denies this might be a sign of disease, humanity denies we have made the earth sick. Instead of coming to terms with our destructive ways, we buy indulgences like medieval people bought indulgences to stave off time in purgatory. The indulgences we now buy, aren’t for our immortal souls but the longevity of the planet. So we invest in carbon caps or electric cars and pretend to ourselves that by doing this it is the beginning of the end of the climate emergency without curtailing our need to consume disposable goods. As a species, we are that person who orders a diet soda to accompany a 2500 calorie meal thinking this is dieting.

Airport runways are melting in England from unprecedented heat, and still, people want to get away on holiday. Much of Europe is on fire, including large parts of France, Spain and Portugal are burning like it's a portal to hell. North America, including its artic regions, is on fire. Yet while much of the planet smoulders or is is famine; we complain about the price of fuel because it hinders our ability to live, work and play with impunity.

The Colorado River titanic water flow has shrunk, leaving the reservoirs needed to feed the agricultural industry of California as waterless as the Aral Sea. Dust storms in Montana blow with the same lethal harshness as the dust bowl storms of the dirty thirties. And yet, we lament the price of fruit that is fresh but trucked from thousands of kilometres away to arrive at our table in a cost effective manner.

Our earth is on palliative care, and the ones to blame are not you or me because we are merely replaceable cogs in the machinery that profits the entitled. It’s the 1%, the politicians who serve them and the news media that enables their message of “Don’t worry be happy.” The thing is, you can not be happy. You must stop being happy or even attempting to pursue happiness outside of love and friendship because if you don't do something now to stop the Climate Emergency, the lives of your children and grandchildren will be brutish and short. It’s time to get angry and not be bought off with slogans of "net zero" or "sustainable" because capitalism as we know it is unstainable for our survival as a species.