#104 - Smoke And The City

It turns out that New York City looks bonkers when it’s engulfed in wildfire smoke.

The air isn’t safe to breathe.

It’s not just wood burning. It’s homes, electronics, plastics. Evaporated into particles too small for our nose hairs to filter.

Apparently, I’m being lightly poisoned, which explains the headache.

It turns out, we have a primal aversion to seeing a blood-red sun in the sky. Our bodies know it’s dangerous even before our minds can comprehend why.

The curtains are drawn and I’m sitting inside, feeling a torn sense of guilt over whether or not I should be purchasing the air purifier online—someone will have to bring it to me, and I’ll be further subjecting them to the outdoors.

The guilt, the shame, the dread.

It’s all rolling into one.

The people walking by are few, and most are masked. It’s uncanny to feel that the New York of Spring 2020 may have never truly gone away. There was so much happening so quickly and it all felt surreal, but I’ll never forget the way the government mobilized to make sure restaurants opened back up for delivery.

Everything was suddenly on the menu, because it turns out, the city runs on Seamless.

Is that what will urge the mayor and governor to do more? Yesterday they didn’t issue any guidance on air quality until 11:30pm. Eric Adams doesn’t care about schools or the children inside of them, he cares about corporate real-estate and his cronies making their corrupt cash via shady government contracts.

We’re having a respiratory crisis, after we’ve had an ongoing respiratory crisis, and all I can think about is the bunk HVAC systems that the city paid a slimy contractor for and locked themselves into a ten-year contract but left the problem unsolved.

We don’t have healthcare in a country that will continue to struggle to breathe.

And somehow today I’ve seen people engage in the oppression olympics, bemoaning the lack of attention their poor air quality gets instead of helping everyone being actively radicalized point their anger towards those who deserve it.

Fight the real enemy.

You know, anyone who believes that market-based individualistic solutions can save us.

When humanity expires from the earth, there will be no one to sell oil to. And every day I struggle to comprehend how that fact does not seem to dissuade people who are purported to be the smartest guys in the room.

They’re accelerating the car and acting as if there is no need to brace for impact.

And instead of getting mad at the drivers, we’re all fighting over whose injuries are worse in the backseat.

People from LA wouldn’t survive a British heatwave.

Oh, now we get mainstream coverage of wildfires? Ask someone on the West Coast how to handle it because we’re practically pros 💅

Why why why is this the gut reaction? And even if it’s first thought, why is it worth tweeting? What commiseration are they hoping for? Why are we release-valving at each other rather than the politicians who do absolutely nothing to help us transition to green energy, to regulate companies so that low-waste is not up to individuals (who have the time & money to engage with it), why is there no government-subsidized options for masks, for air purifiers, for healthcare??

What will it take for solidarity to take precedence over pettiness? I am begging, truly pleading, for people to move beyond the “what about me” reaction to the mass climate crisis. To any cause they’re passionate about honestly!! It’s okay to be annoyed privately but we need to stop bringing this shit into public spaces! I want allies, I want more of them, I want them from wherever I can get them, I want recently radicalized people, I want full-swing leftists and the moderates who believe that the only way to get some change is to come in at the most radical position and compromise from there.

Everyone who is willing to show up for the cause gets a seat at the table.

It takes all types. It’s going to take all of us, and being mad that people are now on the boat rather than being glad there are more hands on deck is silly. It’s silly and it’s childish and I need organizers to be better. That’s it! I’m done with it. Be adults. Lead better. Understand that part of organizing is emotional discipline and show up as an example.

I’m scared. I don’t know where to put my energy, so I’m doing the thing I want others not to and spending my energy getting mad at regular-degulars rather than those in power who caused this problem and refuse to offer solutions.

Because the powerlessness I feel is manufactured.

"We're an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you're studying that reality -- judiciously, as you will -- we'll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that's how things will sort out. We're history's actors . . . and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do."

Karl Rove, New York Times 2004

There were no weapons of mass destruction, but they acted like there were. So the reality was created, and the actions of the military were sanctioned by the powers that be, and it ultimately never mattered that we never found WMDs in Iraq.

We went to war anyway. Their version of reality was the one we were all forced to live in.

The deregulation of the Bush era was a continuation of the Reagan administration’s practices. The lack of urgency to move away from fossil fuels at that time may just may have been influenced by the fact that Dick Cheney was on the board of Halliburton.

Do you think uh, he may have been personally enriched? Do we maybe like want to call him a war profiteer?

Karl Rove has never atoned for his crimes against humanity.

Henry Kissinger just celebrated his 100th birthday.

We’re still suffering under their bullshit because the regulations never came back, and we’ve continued to allow corporate maleficence to fester unchecked for decades.

Two major insurance companies no longer offer policies for homeowners in California. Are we going to make regulations about discriminatory practices or is that decision going to be chalked up to “good business sense”? Because I think it’s more like “a fucking horrific response to an increasingly fraught situation”.

I stayed inside today with the curtains drawn to try and lessen the eerie feeling of the orange sky, but it still lit up the kitchen with a menacingly warm glow. I taped up all the cracks, I put extra water out for the cats, I budgeted an air purifier into this month’s expenses.

Companies are not going to save us. Late-stage capitalism feels like a death cult. (Probably because it is.)

We’re going to have to save each other. We’re going to have to learn how to care about people who we may not like, who may have not adequately acknowledged our suffering. We’re going to have to push, hold people accountable, demand change. And we’re going to have to do it over and over again, even when disheartened.

There is no such thing as endless growth if there is a dwindling population living in an increasingly hostile environment.

I’m scared, but not hopeless. I’m scared and attempting to stay in that emotion rather than project anger just because it’s easier to control. I am in distress. My body does not like the reality it is being presented with.

At the end of the day, the reality is the rain, the sky, the moon we share.

The earth is the one in control.

Everything happening effects all of us, some just may be able to afford to ignore it a little longer.

They can try and tell us differently, but as long as we’re willing to look out the window, to hold our hand out and feel the rain, we can collectively overcome the lies and work towards actual solutions.

Not just individualistic ones, even! Collective action. Regulatory-focused progress.

For all of us.

Together.

Articles mentioned:

List of Eric Adams Allies Hired to High-Paid Government Posts Keeps Growing - The City

NYC Schools Bought Weaker Air Purifiers. Now Underventilated Campuses Are More Prone To COVID Cases - Gothamist

Allstate Is No Longer Offering New Policies in California - New York Times

Faith, Certainty and the Presidency of George W. Bush - New York Times