The Editor,
In his recent letter (“Must find another way,” Sept. 2 to 15), Mr. Castilho again provides us with an overview of the dismal state of the planet, omitting only its slow and perilous drift toward the blazing sun, which one day will put to rest universal human misery and all utopian promises of redemption. He refers to a strong grassroots campaign that will counter the corporate “narrative” and the capitalist system that underlies the current “global climate emergency,” which he purports we are facing. The mainstream science narrative, upon which he bases his appeal for mobilization, however, disregards a broad spectrum of possible climatic scenarios, which shows us that the science is not settled and that narratives can be misleading. Of the scores of predictive models in play, Canada has chosen the one forecasting the highest rate of atmospheric warming. Most others show this trend to be an overestimation of the “climate disaster.” In reference to his statistics on CO2 levels and their deleterious impact upon the atmosphere, a survey of geological history reveals that higher atmospheric temperatures in fact precede increased CO2 levels. Marching forward, then, the preferred narrative of the Green New Deal will not alter this and will only lend support to our nation’s leadership in its destruction of this country’s natural resources industry and its further increasing an ineffective carbon tax (the most recent hike occurring on April 1 during a period of massive job loss). Perhaps this is the anti-capitalist salvation that Mr. Castilho envisions — a nation brought to its knees economically, coinciding with the grinding down of the population through ever higher taxation. We have enough potential wealth from the energy sector to afford a drastic tax reduction while maintaining a high standard of living as well as a clean environment, which we have succeeded at thus far, since Canada’s contribution to global greenhouse gas emissions is a mere 1.6 per cent (if we want to work up this angle of the climate narrative). Lastly, Mr. Castilho should direct his attention to the continued use of Facebook and Zoom meetings, both carried out on electronic devices that use metals that have been obtained largely through slave labour and environmental devastation in the pursuit of capital. This too shall pass, but in the meantime we must find another way.
Mike Scapillato
Chelsea, QC