IPCC Climate Report: Our Children’s Future and Now

Our ClimateMama Mantra: 

  • Tell the Truth
  • Actions Speak Louder Than Words
  • Don’t be Afraid

For many of us, these are lessons our parents taught us and that we are now teaching our children. When it comes to the climate emergency, how we apply this mantra is clear. We must follow it where it leads.

First, we must speak the truth.

This will be hard, and how we explain what’s happening will vary depending on the age of our children. The truth, as it relates to the climate crisis can be boiled down into 5 points:

  1. It’s real,
  2. it’s bad,
  3. it’s happening in large part because of our actions,
  4. it’s getting worse, and
  5. there ARE many things we can do to slow it down.

So, to the last point, there are an infinite number of things we can do and so much we must do to give our children a chance at a livable future and now. Scientists tell us we need systemic change and we need it quickly. For this we must demand that those who can take giant leaps do so, now. For the rest of us, we can and we must continue to move forward – whether one step or a giant leap at a time. Who you influence, who watches and then acts because of what you said or did – you may never know. But the impacts from your actions may well be what changes the world.

The latest working group report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change 6th Assessment Report (6th report since the establishment of the IPCC in 1988) released on February 28th, 2022, is yet another stark warning from world scientists that we are running out of time, that the door we are holding open is spring loaded and will slam fast behind us if we don’t take direct measures to block it.

The IPCC Working Group report  states unequivocally that:

The costs of climate change are already enormous and will accelerate. Unless emissions are cut faster than governments plan to, damages will worsen rapidly and parts of the planet will become increasingly uninhabitable.

Climate change is already killing people, destroying nature and making the world poorer. The costs have worsened over recent years.

Actions speak louder than words.

We can limit and slow down temperature rise but the only way to do this is to cut greenhouse gas emissions, this means stopping the use of fossil fuels – oil, coal and gas. We can do this.

“Unchecked carbon pollution is forcing the world’s most vulnerable on a frogmarch to destruction,” United Nations Secretary General Guterres said in a video address. “The facts are undeniable. This abdication of leadership is criminal.”

Don’t be afraid (easier said than done).

We must acknowledge our grief, our angst and our fears, and move beyond them, our children are watching, their future and now is in our hands.

 

Your Climate Mama,

Harriet

 

Truth photo:  by Brett Jordan on Unsplash

Frog photo:  by David Clode on Unsplash

Parent photo: Our Kids Climate/Parents for Future Global at COP26

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