An underrated enemy

Irony is that when there is need to look for energy, meaning sun and wind, world keeps looking for fossil fuel

The one singer that has sung more hit songs than any other top-notch artist in the world has not been able to earn credit for the beauty added to the music for their work. That singer is called bird. Leading pop stars such as Michael Jackson, Nicki Minaj and many others have used bird sounds in their songs. Yet, it has remained hidden in plain sight, or music, if you will. I guess it would be fair to say that the dinosaurs are still exerting their presence on earth. Their fossils fascinate the scientists, movies about them entertains our kids and adults alike, and their only survivors, namely birds, add melody to our songs 65 million years after their demise.

If these birds could talk or if we lame humans could understand their wisdom, perhaps they are talking to us that the end of times 65 million years ago wasn’t man-made but this time around, it would be. Pakistan, India, Israel, Palestine, the United States, all are focused on the enemies they have known and hated for generations.

Weather predictions have been communicated to the American public that this hurricane season is going to be highly unusual. Four possible hurricanes are confirmed with more possible. Still America is in no mood to move away from fossil fuel. Climate change being a national security threat recognised by America should have been the major focus of this presidential campaign that will kick off soon. Sadly, however, Trump having sex with a porn star has been the headlines of this society.

Just yesterday, over 6,000 people were rescued when flash floods hit northeastern India. The floods are a direct result of rising surface temperatures at sea. Western disturbances is a system of winds that originate in Hindu Kush and Himalaya mountains. They bring snow and rainfall to northern India during winter months, typically between December and March, which is when it benefits the farmers and boosts water security. Those western disturbances are now happening in June causing unprecedented problems.

Modi is no friend of the environment. India’s major energy needs are met by fossil fuel burning and has been rapidly building new coal plants. Modi likes to tap himself on the back for bringing major corporations to invest in India. That is usually blindly seen as a sign of a nation’s success but it has always meant bad news for climate action. It is the corporate greed that got our planet to warm up so much.

Over the last 2 years, more than 33 million people in Pakistan were directly affected by floods. Millions have been displaced and in urgent need of humanitarian assistance. The only Pakistani leader who understood the threat of climate change and even wanted to do something to tackle it is behind bars today. He understood how climate change was indeed the one common enemy Pakistan and India had. It is more dangerous to Pakistan and India than the two nations can be for each other. Both the countries belong to some of the most vulnerable countries to the effects of climate change.

The irony is that when there was a need to look up for energy, meaning the sun and wind, the world kept looking down in search for more and more fossil fuel. Today, when there is a genuine need to focus on the planet and its health, the world is looking up to send rockets to satisfy the same human greed that will one day convert possible other earths into furnaces as well.

The bad joke is that Pakistan and India have been trying to go into space and the moon as well. No harm in exploring space but here is a harsh reality to deal with: changing homes alone for humanity won’t bring peace, changing habits would. If humanity goes to another habitable planet in a Goldilocks zone of some other star, with the same destructive habits, it would be a deja vu all over again of the last 200 or so years.

Published in The Express Tribune, June 2^nd, 2024.

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