Eco-anxiety:Boon or a Curse

Someone has said, "In an underdeveloped country don't drink the water, in a developed country don't breathe the air." The topic I am writing about is the most dangerous and talked about issue these days- ‘Eco Anxiety due to global warming’. Whenever I hear about death and catastrophe due to natural disasters like wildfire, floods, droughts; I get chills in my spine.

This brings to mind the title of Alistair MacLean’s famous novel, "Fear is the Key". Fear can truly be a bilateral key to environmental issues. Hearing about climate change fills my young mind with fear and gives me horrendous thoughts about the future. I am sure this is similar for a lot of other people. Now there are two ways a person can act in this scenario. Fear may motivate you to go plant a sapling, reduce plastic and reuse paper to prevent a foreseen future, the World has seen many such great examples such as Greta Thunberg, who realized the need of the hour, but that isn't enough. If we want society to prosper we must join hands and work  together because climate change is real and it is happening, stop procrastinating, for it is the actions that we make today that affect the future. It isn't that tough, coming from the cleanest city of India I myself have seen public policy and mentality prompt achievement towards the global goals when the people united. 

But, is it okay to keep scaring everyone into achieving global goals? We need to look upon both sides of the coin, we need to imagine how a child whose mind has not even properly been molded yet would react when he hears that he may not have a future and that his family and his planet are on the brink of chaos and disarray. Not just children, such news and fear can have a very deep and negative impact on adults as well. In a survey, it was found that many participants didn’t want to have kids, because they thought the planet was on its way to ruins. Most of them were deeply disturbed looking at the visuals of wildfires and landslides in hilly areas. They described having sleepless nights and a feeling of fast approaching apocalypse hanging over them.

Eco-anxiety is both good and bad, the way we are to take it and its result is up to humanity to decide.