Climate change and global warming are real and the 20-somethings we spoke to are trying to figure out why this issue is not the one we should all be working on to fix immediately. And they do think we have the ability to truly fix this.
With science on their side, they are proud to be factually based adults. What they cannot wrap their heads around, as we talked, are the climate change deniers.
Digging deeper was a bit more nuanced.
When asked ‘what about sustainability do you think can help?’ It was a short list, we thought. To the point, but short.
It contained:
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Ending our broad reliance on oil.
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Using sustainable/renewable sources of energy.
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The complete cessation of using anything that is not from a sustainable/renewable source—from packaging to transporation—unless absolutely necessary. They all agreed that plastic is necessary for many things like medical devices, just not necessary, or wanted, for single use plastic packaging.
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Making energy efficient buildings.
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Broadening the public transportation systems across the U.S.
Despite their belief that we can fix the climate, the future is not an optimistic one. Mostly they blame a rotten system of greed by corporations, aided by those in government whose power to help fix things has been bought off by those same corporations—the ones who have brought us to the precipice of our climate disaster.
They all laugh at the Supreme Court as a judicial body that is free from corruption and see them siding with those same special interests.
The institutions have failed them.
They have failed anyone who is not worth a few hundred million or more, we would argue.
