#ecogrief

[hope-for-the-planet]

From the article:

A hole that opens annually in the ozone layer over Earth’s southern pole was relatively small in 2024 compared to other years. Scientists with NASA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) project the ozone layer could fully recover by 2066. During the peak of ozone depletion season from September 7 through October 13, the 2024 area of the ozone hole ranked the seventh smallest since recovery began in 1992, when the Montreal Protocol, a landmark international agreement to phase out ozone-depleting chemicals, began to take effect.

There's a reason you don't hear about the hole in the ozone layer much anymore--it's been on the mend since the global community banned ozone-depleting chemicals in 1992. Remember that it is possible for the world to come together to solve large scale environmental problems.

[reasonsforhope]

How can I stay positive regarding the wildfires?

It can be really hard in the face of so much destruction. I don't know how much anyone can specifically stay positive in the face of disasters like this -

but I can give you some thoughts about how to let hope live alongside everything else you're feeling about this, and how to avoid spiraling and remember that this is not proof that we're doomed.

Possibly relevant note lol is that I've lived my whole life in California, so suffice to say figuring out how to move forward among the consequences and destruction of massive wildfires is something I'm definitely not new to.

I remember walking to my classroom in elementary school, about 20 years ago now, and it was literally snowing ash around me. This too shall pass.

Take a few deep breaths. I know it's cliche but it's also important

Zoom out in terms of perspective: Wildfires can make the sky look apocalyptic (like I said, I have lots of experience with this!), but they are regional, and they always end. These wildfires are awful but this specific wave of fires is happening in just one country in a huge, huge world. There's far more land that isn't burning

Canada is about to get substantial international aid in fighting the wildfires - there are already 200 additional firefighters headed over from the US and France, and Canada (Quebec specifically) is also already in talks with Costa Rica, Portugal, and Chile about additional firefighters/resources. Help is on the way and these numbers really will make a big difference, and as the disaster continues (unfortunately it is uh...pretty early in fire season), more help will be sent. People are doing what they can to help, because in the face of disaster, that's what we're wired to do

There are actually MUCH better fire management plans than just about anyone is using, esp in North America but that we COULD implement and increasingly WILL going forward. A lot of the wildfire situation these days is because of the West's incredibly wrongheaded derision toward traditional Indigenous land and ecosystem management practices, including cultural prescribed burns that keep massive wildfires from happening. California in particular is already partnering with several First Nations to revive prescribed burns, to significant success. As fires continue to be terrible, more and more places will get on board with this. We can and will implement practices that will truly change our situation

Cultural burns work because, ironically, the reason for the wildfires is that "is that we've been so good at putting out every fire possible that it has led to overly dense forests and a buildup of burnable material like branches and dry vegetation" that makes wildfires much worse in a number of ways. At lower intensity, however, as with cultural burns, forest fires can actually have huge environmental benefits

Finally, every time a natural disaster happens like this, as awful and destructive as they are, it serves as a wake-up call for thousands of people and adds both ever-mounting urgency and ever-mounting evidence to the importance of fighting climate change, which really does translate into action. For a lot of people, "saving the environment" feels super distant - but you know what feels super immediate? Saving their homes from burning down (or getting flooded or otherwise destroyed, etc. etc.) In 2021, the UN ran the world's largest climate survey, across 1.2 million people and 50 nations, and almost TWO-THIRDS SAID THAT CLIMATE CHANGE IS A GLOBAL EMERGENCY THAT WE NEED TO WORK HARDER TO ADDRESS. Imagine that 10 years ago! That other third of people aside, this really is real and massive progress

Also, every time there's a big disaster like this, climate change deniers look more and more baldly ridiculous. Think about it: How often did you hear US Republicans bullshitting about climate change denial 10 years ago? And how often do you hear them doing it now? In fact, there's increasing evidence that Republicans really are shifting on climate change (mind you they're managing to do it in an obnoxiously somehow pro-fossil-fuel way, but it's still a major sea change). Some of them are literally calling for a clean energy transition, and Kevin McCarthy himself (guy in charge of the US House right now) created a task force for to a conservative climate change agenda that acknowledges climate change is real. There's now a conservative climate conference that does active lobbying and a House Conservative Climate Caucus, which somehow has SIXTY MEMBERS. Again, something that would've been unimaginable just six or seven years ago.

Every acre that the fires burn this year is an acre that's pretty guaranteed to not burn next year, for what that's worth. (And I do think it's worth mentioning, esp with such a high number of acres)

The battles are going to be hard, but I truly believe that even the ones we lose often bring us closer to winning the war.

Fires burn, but life always grows back.

[jerryyuan002]

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[newswireml]

Feds struggle to fill seats for employee 'ecogrief' training#Feds #struggle #fill #seats #employee #ecogrief #training

The Fish and Wildlife Service’s “ecogrief” training is more widespread than originally thought, having already been conducted in “many” of the agency’s regions, according to an internal email obtained by The Washington Times. But the agency has been struggling to fill all the seats in its upcoming round of training on Friday, with 10 of the 35 slots unclaimed as of Tuesday. “We still have some…

[sondercoach-blog]

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[hope-for-the-planet]

From the article:

Uruguay used to rely heavily on oil & gas-based power. But as the economy grew and electricity demand threatened to overtake supply from the early 2010s, it needed to add additional generating capacity, and fast. New hydro wasn’t an option as it had already made the most of that resource. To chart the way forward, the president appointed Ramón Méndez Galain, a particle physicist from the private sector, as the country’s director of energy — a position he held until 2015. In a podcast discussion with the Kleinman Center for Energy Policy, Méndez Galain said one of his primary goals was to make Uruguay less reliant on volatile imported oil & gas. The quest for energy independence made him rule out nuclear power, which would’ve require uranium imports. A decision was ultimately made to better exploit the country’s ample solar, wind, water and biomass waste resources. Because the state couldn’t fund a massive energy programme alone, it ran a series of clean power auctions, where it offered project developers 20-year contracts to sell electricity into the national grid at guaranteed rates. In just five years, $6 billion was invested in renewable energy — the equivalent of 12% of Uruguay’s GDP.

[socialorganism]

Climate Crisis refers to the response governments prepare for newly-unpersoned populations in the wake of engineered ecological disaster. It refers to the ways governments exile, imprison, and murder people affected and displaced by climate weapons. It refers to the ways governments make these programs possible, the way they pour resources into economic exploitation and counter-insurgency as global policy, and the way they manufacture consent for their rapid transition to authoritarian extremism and apartheid.

Red scares, neoliberalism, austerity, neocolonialism, surveillance, drug trafficking. Just a few ways to soften global populations up in the years between your leaders knowing they had the opportunity to weaponize the planet, and the year they would see the fruits of their ill labor. Time-buying measures for a system of domination that felt its providence was endangered by the possibility of a better world.

Climate Change is here.

Climate Crisis is rolling out.

Climate Change is the deliberate and premeditated use of the planet's systems as weapons of mass destruction against an insurgent, global population

[deblala]

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2023/02/interior-department-now-offering-ecogrief-training-employees/

[just-a-cup-of-anxietea]

HEY HEY HEY OMG. THIS IS MY JOB YOU GUYS!! WORKING WITH PEOPLE WHO FEEL STRESSED ABOUT CLIMATE STUFF!! I DO THIS!! ECOPSYCHOLOGY BABEY!!

As someone who is about to get a whole M.S. degree in this, I can say that developing a personal sense of agency, i.e. doing stuff in the realm of environmental science or ecology or whatever, is one of the best ways to manage eco-anxiety and climate grief! Also!! Climate Psychology Alliance (and many independent groups) host mourning and celebration circles around climate anxiety, which I HIGHLY recommend. (Some are in person, but I’ve only ever attended the online ones.) Sometimes the act of Doing Stuff for Research just didn’t work for my brain, and I found these group gatherings SUPER helpful for just connecting with people who felt like I did.

Climate work can be incredibly isolating, and you absolutely do not have to do it alone! As always, my PMs and asks are open for anyone who wants to chat about climate or find resources for eco-anxiety.

(I’m also a huge fan of Zooniverse and citizen science more generally! LOVE this whole post omg.)

If you're feeling anxious or depressed about the climate and want to do something to help right now, from your bed, for free...

Start helping with citizen science projects

What's a citizen science project? Basically, it's crowdsourced science. In this case, crowdsourced climate science, that you can help with!

You don't need qualifications or any training besides the slideshow at the start of a project. There are a lot of things that humans can do way better than machines can, even with only minimal training, that are vital to science - especially digitizing records and building searchable databases

Like labeling trees in aerial photos so that scientists have better datasets to use for restoration.

Or counting cells in fossilized plants to track the impacts of climate change.

Or digitizing old atmospheric data to help scientists track the warming effects of El Niño.

Or counting penguins to help scientists better protect them.

Those are all on one of the most prominent citizen science platforms, called Zooniverse, but there are a ton of others, too.

--

I spent a lot of time doing this when I was really badly injured and housebound, and it was so good for me to be able to HELP and DO SOMETHING, even when I was in too much pain to leave my bed. So if you are chronically ill/disabled/for whatever reason can't participate or volunteer for things in person, I highly highly recommend.

Next time you wish you could do something - anything - to help

Remember that actually, you can. And help with some science.

[jerryyuan002]

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[newswireml]

Wallowing in wokeism: Biden offers feds 'ecogrief' counseling for 'emotional' toll of climate change#Wallowing #wokeism #Biden #offers #feds #ecogrief #counseling #emotional #toll #climate #change

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is offering training to employees in Texas, Oklahoma, New Mexico, and Arizona on “ecogrief.” The psychological neologism can range in meaning from the feeling of anticipated loss to outright trauma from climate change. Reactions to the ‘ecogrief’ training ran the gamut: — “This 4-hour workshop seeks to normalize the wide range of emotional responses that…

[summersfirstsnow]

Some things about finding joy in the natural world and conservation that didn't press on bruises too painfully for me but also didn't ignore the reality of life in a climate-change ravaged world:

Underland by Robert Macfarlane isn't ecogrief specific but can help if you want to revel in what remains a bit

The Arbornaut: A Life Discovering the Eighth Continent in the Trees Above Us by Megan Bowman

Swamplands: Tundra Beavers, Quaking Bogs, and the Improbable World of Peat by Edward Struzik

Some words from some folks in environmental or environment-adjacent fields that engage head-on:

seconding Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge, and the Teachings of Plants by the inimitable Robin Wall Kimmerer: the audiobook especially is phenomenal (the author reads it herself and it's wonderful... you can hear her smiling sometimes) it helped me so much when I was struggling with environmental grief toward the end of my degree, the author brings her knowledge as a Pottawatomie woman, a botanist, and a parent to her work in a way that's just beautiful

Changing Tides: An Ecologist's Journey to Make Peace with the Anthropocene

All We Can Save: Truth, Courage, & Solutions for the Climate Crisis: edited by Ayana Elizabeth Johnson, Katharine K. Wilkinson: this is an essay collection from a variety of authors about engaging with climate grief as well as climate solutions

Hi friends.

I'm looking for suggestions on what you read, write, and do to deal with eco grief. Usually my brand is "cautious optimism, on purpose, to stave off despair." It hasn't been working lately.

Favorite authors? Favorite essays? What things make you feel less powerless and like you're watching an unequivocal, massive, total train wreck that you are also on?

[2winz2]

for Spotify wrapped: 20, 30, 40, 50 !

thank you for asking! gonna put this under a cut so I don't have to worry about being long-winded, I have too much to say about music I love

20: I adore dodie and Build a Problem was absolutely worth the wait! this is probably my favorite song from the album because it's just so catchy and so different from her usual style (which I also love, don't get me wrong) and they really knocked it out of the park. I remember having it stuck in my head when I went on a Mothers' Day hike with my moms, two days after BAP came out, and just having the best time. I get to see dodie in concert on my birthday next year and it's gonna be so much fun, especially bopping along to this

30: my url is a BDG reference, so of course I listen to The Altogether :) this song helped me survive living in the middle of nowhere for 8 months, as did the rest of this playlist:

40: I have other top artists (Hozier, Phoebe Bridgers, Lorde) who make music for the end of the world. but Adam Melchor is the only one who does it with a smile, writing songs that make me feel like finally someone gets that we're living through the apocalypse but in a chill, friendly way. I'm a climate justice activist and a young person and I'm gonna end up finishing half of my bachelor's degree in a global pandemic. so it's such a relief to have music that gently validates the burnout/anxiety/ecogrief of living through these soul-destroying times AND ALSO invigorates me to keep fighting, keep organizing, keep living through the end of the world and doing what I can to make it a tiny bit more livable. I've been deeply skeptical of pandemic art since the beginning, and I maintain that the only good examples of it so far are Inside (note that Bo Burnham did not make it anywhere into my spotify wrapped), the joke at the very end of the season 2 finale of The Other Two, and "Two Songs for Now" by Adam Melchor. although season 15 of iasip is premiering tonight so hopefully I'll be adding that to the list 👀

50: god I love this song. and the entire boygenius EP. and their cover of "Cowboy Take Me Away," which incidentally is #71 on my top 100 playlist (the original by The Chicks). the beauty of their individual voices (literal and metaphorical) on each verse. the beauty of the harmonies on the chorus. so simple, so profound, so lovely. really wish I had gotten a chance to see them in concert, I think being in the same room as this song performed live would have been an incredible spiritual experience.