Do you remember the sky the color of the apocalypse, the smog covering Montreal, entire communities evacuated in disaster, the authorities urging the population to stay indoors, especially not to move too much, the cancellation of Ironman from Mont-Tremblant less than an hour from the start because, all the same, these athletes are not Really supermen?
I know it hasn’t even been a month. But admit that we are losing track of climatic cataclysms. Since the ravages of forest fires in northern Quebec, we have been treated to floods, landslides, tornadoes, torrential rains, the hottest day ever recorded on the planet…
And the summer has only just begun. Get ready, scientists warn, because it’s going to get hot. Literally.
I know very well, too, that we will not listen to them. Not enough, anyway. The end of the orange world at the end of June is already forgotten. Already, here we are back to regular programming. We prefer to talk about the rain and especially the good weather, as if there were no danger in the house.
As if times weren’t completely crazy.
It’s the “new normal,” say climate scientists. There will be more and more extreme weather events. And they will be more and more violent. We haven’t seen anything yet.
The problem is that we already feel like we’ve seen too much. It’s a bit like the shootings in the United States. In the past, each killing caused an immense shock. Not anymore. These mass killings have become the new normal. We are desensitized. Blasé, even. How many deaths? Were there children? No ? Oh well, it’s not that bad, then…
Do you find me cynical? Don’t tell me you haven’t lost count, too. It’s a perfectly human reflex: we adapt to adversity. Eventually, you become comfortably numb, like in the Pink Floyd song. This applies to killings as well as climatic disasters.
In the movie An inconvenient truth Al Gore, the former vice-president of the United States, told the fable of this frog, cushy in a pan of cold water which is heated slowly. Little by little, the poor batrachian grows numb, without realizing the mortal danger that awaits him.
“Our collective nervous system is like the nervous system of this frog,” said Al Gore. It takes a sudden jolt, sometimes, for us to become aware of danger. If it seems gradual—even though it actually happens quickly—we are able to sit still without responding, without reacting. »
An inconvenient truth came out in 2006. At the time, the water was still lukewarm. Seventeen years later, it is boiling hot. The metaphorical frog is not only scalded; it is scorched at the bottom of the pan.
The year 2023, it seems, will be the hottest ever. And it won’t be the fault of El Niño, whatever Plume Latraverse sings. Finally, not only. Of course, this climatic phenomenon will contribute to the problem. Its hot breath, combined with the junk spit out from our chimneys and our exhaust pipes, will cook the planet like never before. The extreme heat will in turn cause a cascade of climate disasters across the world.
It’s already started too well. In the southern United States, “heat domes” are roasting entire cities, like in a kind of convection oven. China is opening up old air-raid shelters to allow its people to escape a new enemy: the unrelenting heat. India is closing schools to save children from being swept away by a monstrous monsoon.
Temperature records are shattered all over the world. I’m telling you, we’re losing track. We go numb. It reminds me of this RBO sketch, in which Yves P. Pelletier, parodying Sophie Thibault, announces to TVA: “We’re going to international news. Four seconds of pure chaos follow, before quickly returning to the fake news anchor: “Phew. Back home. »
Like distant conflicts, climatic disasters collide in a furious maelstrom. Except that now we can no longer just turn off the TV and act as if we were not concerned. We can no longer insist on the melting of glaciers or on a more or less hypothetical threat.
Climate change is happening here, now.
More than ever, we have both feet in it.
Our heads will adapt; they are already adapting. Our infrastructure, too, but it will take longer.
The problem is that we are running out of time. We must not only urgently adapt our communities, but also do everything possible to change the course of things, starting now, before the cataclysm becomes even more cataclysmic.
The time for compromises is over. Our governments can no longer promise to both cut emissions and build pipelines.
“To be consistent, we would ideally stop approving new fossil fuel exploitation projects,” wrote Marc-André Viau, director of government relations at Équiterre, in our Debates section this week.1. I’m afraid we refuse to do this, in the name of common sense.
Even if it no longer makes sense, what is happening before our eyes.