When Do We Give Up?

In a recent interview (2 July 2025) the noted environmentalist David Suzuki answered one of the questions put to him with this disconcerting reply, ‘I’ve never said this before to the media, but it’s too late.’¹

Suzuki spoke in that interview of the nine Planetary Boundaries that the Stockholm Resilience Centre has been tracking since 2009. Speaking of these boundaries, Suzuki was forthright, ‘If we pass one boundary we should be shitting our pants. We’ve passed seven!’

Yes, seven out of nine. When the average global warming reached 1.55 degrees C above pre-industrial levels (thereby exceeding 1.5 degrees) the seventh planetary boundary was surpassed.

When I read Suzuki’s interview I asked myself: When do we give up?

When, like David Suzuki, do we realise it is all too late?

In 1992 the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), the first international treaty dealing with climate change did not settle on a level of warming to be heeded. Further conferences and meetings converged on 2 degrees above pre-industrial levels as a limit for a warming we should not go past. In the 2015 Paris Agreement experts concluded that even 2 degrees posed severe risks. The Alliance of Small Island States (AOSIS) and the Least Developed Countries (LDCs) lobbied for a more stringent level of 1.5 degrees of warming.

Notwithstanding the concerns and fears of those most at risk of climate change (the AOSIS and the LDCs) last year we shattered that boundary and those countries hopes.

The only two boundaries that are still within safe limits are those associated with ozone depletion (because we took serious steps to alleviate this risk in the 1980s) and aerosol pollution.

To expand on David Suzuki’s reference about ‘shitting out pants’ we could say that we are now in a pile of that shit.

And, it is too late to change.

The UN has been holding climate change conferences for decades. In 1995 the first COP (Conference of the Parties) meeting was held in Berlin. Since then we have had twenty-eight more, COP29 was held last November 2024 in Baku, Azerbaijan. The location brought howls of dismay, protest, and alarm, given that Azerbaijan is a major oil and gas producer.

COP30 is due to take place this year in an Amazonian state, in the city of Belém, Brazil. Also a site of controversy, given its location in the northern parts of the Amazon rainforest.

Thirty years of COPs. Thirty years of greater energy use. Thirty years of amplifying carbon emissions. Thirty years of increasing carbon in the atmosphere (global average carbon dioxide reached 422.7 parts per million (ppm) in the atmosphere in 2024 – 50% higher than it was before the Industrial Revolution.) Thirty years of inaction.

So, when do we give up?

When do our leaders give up flying all around the world to various COP and other climate change conferences? With little or no meaningful outcomes.

When do we stop driving our cars to protests outside parliaments, senates, and other government offices? With little or no impact upon our elected politicians.

When do we stop trying to fix things with more and more (including so-called green and sustainable) technology? In the process continuing to mine and exploit the earth.

In doing things such as these examples  we increase the energy use, we add to emissions, we get warmer.

Yes, they may be small actions, but then so too is 3.75 ppm – the difference in global average carbon dioxide in the atmosphere between 2023 and 2024.

Let me spell that out a bit more. 3.75 ppm is just 3.75 parts per 1,000,000. Or, put it another way, it is just 0.000357%. Small isn’t it? But, boy, does it make a difference.

Let’s give up doing all that shit. Let’s stop shitting out pants (thanks David Suzuki.)

But, let us not stop:

·       Loving the earth

·       Reducing consumption

·       Being kind to one another

·       Thinking of future generations

·       Caring for the other creatures upon this planet

·       Enjoying the small things.

 

Notes:

1. ‘It’s too late’: David Suzuki says the fight against climate change is lost - iPolitics accessed 8 July 2025