Can I do more?

I don't think much about climate breakdown these days. It's one of those things I have little control over, so what's the point of dwelling on it?

Jenny and I do whatever we can to avoid over-consumption, atmospheric pollution, long-distance travel, global supply chains and all that, but at the end of the day there's only so much we can do as two individuals.

Our contribution to climate breakdown is miniscule. The real offenders by far are manufacturers, big corporations and the very wealthy, and they're the ones that need to drastically change their perspective and their belief that they can exploit the planet's resources indefinitely. Sadly there's little sign of their doing that.

I could spend all day obsessing about what more I can do to reverse climate breakdown, and drive myself totally neurotic with anxiety and fear and self-doubt, and it wouldn't do much for my mental health.

But the media contribute to the idea that we should all be scrutinising our every purchase and every activity and asking ourselves if there's more we could do to save the planet and curtail our selfish and extravagant spending patterns.

An entirely hypocritical stance of course, as the media do everything they can to increase our consumption levels with their pages on property, motoring, fashion, travel, home furnishings and all the rest.

Given the general head-in-the-sand attitude and lack of urgency on the part of the biggest polluters I don't see any realistic chance of climate breakdown being reversed, and we might as well prepare for the worst. Many people have already had a taste of the worst in the form of extreme weather events like floods and heatwaves.

And there are still people who deny climate breakdown is even happening.

Just be honest

It annoys me when environ-mental activists preach to us about what we should be doing to prevent climate breakdown, but ignore their own advice when it comes to their private lives.

They tell us to stop flying, stop driving, get electric cars, stop eating meat, stop burning wood, stop using fossil fuels, stop using plastic. They imply that we're not taking climate breakdown seriously, that we're clinging to all our bad habits and resisting the necessary changes.

Then what do you discover? The very same activists are jetting round the world to one climate conference after another, driving around in gas-guzzlers, tucking into giant steaks or throwing another log on the wood-burning stove.

Don't get me wrong. I'm not saying they should instantly give up all these things and revert to some kind of stone-age existence stripped of all our modern-day comforts and pleasures. That would be absurd.

What I object to is the hypocrisy, that they preach one thing while doing something quite different. That they make a show of ideological purity and integrity when in reality they're as fallible and imperfect as the rest of us. That off-stage they're wrestling with the same day-to-day dilemmas as everyone else - how do we give up all these harmful practices and still have a decent life? What would be an easy adjustment and what would be a painful sacrifice?

If they'd just admit that yes, they still fly around the world, that yes, they still have a petrol car and still drive hundreds of miles every week, I would applaud their honesty and human frailty. But pretending to be holier than thou when they know very well they're not - that really pisses me off.

Why can't they just level with us?

PS: Good example: Prince Charles flew 125 miles by helicopter to make a speech about lowering aircraft emissions (02.02.20)
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As a balance to my scathing review of Keith Richards, I would add that I love Annie Lennox, who seems far more talented and a much nicer person all round. Both her music and lyrics are a lot more interesting than the Stones'. "Diva", "Bare", and "Songs of Mass Destruction" are all brilliant albums. She also does masses of charity work for Amnesty International, Oxfam, the British Red Cross and the Burma Campaign among others. And surprise surprise, there's no misogyny.

And another thing....

So it seems there's yet another advantage we baby boomers have had over the young, which we're only now coming to appreciate.

Yes, many of us have had very fortunate lives compared to younger generations who are facing any number of challenges - tuition fees, soaring rents, soaring house prices, falling salaries, welfare cuts, a crumbling NHS and all the rest. We've done very well and we're shocked at how bad things have got for the young. We always confidently assumed their lives would be even better than ours.

And now I realise that all these years we've had another benefit that we never recognised at the time but is now becoming glaringly obvious - we never for a second worried about how our behaviour might be bad for the climate.

We happily drove thousands of miles, flew thousands of miles, ate meat every day (well, not me, I'm a vegetarian), enjoyed log and coal fires, enjoyed oil and gas central heating, and bought things that had been flown across the world. We never saw anything wrong with what we were doing. We took it all for granted.

Only in the last few years has it sunk in that we're facing a massive climate breakdown and need to radically change our lifestyles to put things right.

Suddenly I have to examine everything I do and consider if it's harmless or if I'm damaging the climate. If I'm doing damage, I have to ask myself, is it really necessary or can I do without it?

No longer can I just mindlessly follow my whims without a thought for the consequences. No longer can I casually whizz around the world, or crank up the central heating. All that innocent indulgence is a thing of the past. And something forever denied the young.