Disclaimer: Uncommon Sense is where I think out loud. The views here are my own โ they don’t represent any organization, board, or business I’m affiliated with. Personal opinions, offered to be argued with.
๐ช๐ต๐ฒ๐ป ๐ฑ๐ถ๐ฑ ๐๐ฒ ๐ฑ๐ฒ๐ฐ๐ถ๐ฑ๐ฒ ๐๐ต๐ฎ๐ ๐ฐ๐ฎ๐ฟ๐ถ๐ป๐ด ๐๐ฎ๐ ๐๐ต๐ฒ ๐๐ต๐ถ๐ป๐ด ๐๐ผ ๐บ๐ผ๐ฐ๐ธ?
Somewhere along the way, “gives a shit about something bigger than himself” became an insult. Caring about animals, about the planet, about the voiceless โ it got filed under soft, naive, tree-hugger, virtue-signaler โ and a whole lot of people started treating basic decency like it’s a character flaw.
Think about how backwards that is. We’ve built a culture where the person who stops for the injured animal, who actually gives a damn that species are vanishing and the planet is visibly wounded in a dozen ways โ that’s the one who gets the eye-roll. Not the person too self-absorbed to care. The one who tried.
๐๐ฒ๐ ๐บ๐ฒ ๐ฏ๐ฒ ๐ฑ๐ฒ๐ฎ๐ฑ ๐ฐ๐น๐ฒ๐ฎ๐ฟ ๐ฎ๐ฏ๐ผ๐๐ ๐๐ต๐ผ ๐’๐บ ๐ก๐ข๐ง ๐๐ฎ๐น๐ธ๐ถ๐ป๐ด ๐๐ผ.
I’m not talking to the people keeping the lights on. I’ve got friends in energy, in the pipelines, in mining โ especially here in Alberta โ and they work damn hard, they provide, they keep the infrastructure this whole country runs on standing up. Fossil fuels power the world we actually live in right now. That’s not up for debate and I’m not going to pretend otherwise.
You can work that job. You can be proud of it. You can even think a lot of the climate conversation is hijacked, over-politicized, and drowning in weaponized nonsense โ and you’d have company, because plenty of it is, ๐ฃ๐ถ๐ต ๐ฏ๐ฐ๐ฏ๐ฆ ๐ฐ๐ง ๐ต๐ฉ๐ข๐ต ๐จ๐ช๐ท๐ฆ๐ด ๐บ๐ฐ๐ถ ๐ข ๐ญ๐ช๐ค๐ฆ๐ฏ๐ด๐ฆ ๐ต๐ฐ ๐ฃ๐ฆ ๐ข ๐ฑ๐ณ๐ช๐ค๐ฌ ๐ข๐ฃ๐ฐ๐ถ๐ต ๐ช๐ต.
There is a difference โ a canyon of a difference โ between “I disagree with the policy” and “let me talk down to anyone who cares about the world as if they’re stupid.” One is a debate. The other is just contempt dressed up as toughness. And it’s become so normalized that people do it without even flinching.
Here’s the truth of it: it costs you nothing to respect someone for giving a damn. Nothing. You don’t have to agree with them. You don’t have to join them. You just have to not be the person who makes caring feel like a weakness โ because when you do that, you’re not being a realist or a straight-shooter. You’re just teaching everyone around you that the safe move is to feel nothing at all and a world full of people who’ve learned to feel nothing is exactly how you end up with the wounded planet in the first place.
So no. I won’t apologize for caring, and I sure as hell won’t stay quiet while people who care get treated like the problem.
