Even as LA Burns, Most of Us Are Not 'There' Yet on Climate

Can I admit something to you? Gotta say... I feel embarrassed about this. Perhaps even ashamed.

Okay, here goes: Yes, when I read, see, or hear accounts of what is happening in Los Angeles right now, I do experience empathy and sadness and compassion. And—oh yeah—also a healthy dose of heartbreak and rage about the torrents of disinformation that, these days, automatically mushroom around any event of any significance, especially if climate change is involved.

But—and here's the confession part—I am guessing that my primary reaction, the one about which I feel shame, is based upon this: I'm not there.

In other words, since it's not myself (or any of my loved ones) who is being directly and viscerally and financially impacted, my reactions of empathy occur (literally and figuratively) at a distance. Sure, I'll experience these feelings for a while, especially as I am taking in information or pictures about the situation, but then most of that will quickly evaporate as I go about my day. My at-a-distance reactions almost never move me to take direct and impactful and lasting action, because... I'm not there.

And so my primary reaction is a mixture of relief and (here comes the shame part) some level of indifference.

I'm not proud of this. But there it is.

Right now, there are obviously many thousands of people in Los Angeles who are "there." Right there. Exactly there. They are directly experiencing one of the scientifically understood symptoms of a fossil fuel-supercharged, heating planet.

It's an April day in 2001 and I sit across from the chief of hepatology of Thomas Jefferson Hospital in Philadelphia as he shares the conclusions of various diagnostic procedures brought on by some recent health difficulties.

"David, you have a disease called Primary Sclerosing Cholangitis (PSC), which is a progressive narrowing of the bile ducts."

Hmm. Okay. That doesn't sound all that bad, right? Okay, I'm not even sure what bile ducts do or where they are located, but...

"So," the doc continues, "What it comes down to is that you will eventually need a liver transplant, and there's nothing we can do to prevent that."

Shock. Utter shock. You see, I wasn't feeling any symptoms of this disease, this PSC. None at all. I'd been dealing with an unrelated medical matter and labs revealed that something was off with my liver numbers and further investigation revealed the PSC.

It took me about a month to get over the shock of my diagnosis. And then... well... I just got on with living my life mostly as if nothing had changed. Since I had no symptoms (they would begin to kick in about three years down the road—fatigue, itching, jaundice) and could do nothing to prevent the disease progression, it was as if I didn't have a disease at all.

I wasn't "there" yet.

Back to Los Angeles. Full Disclosure: I know much more about climate change than the average person. I researched it intensively and wrote 15 published articles back in 2012-2015. Then... I mostly gave up writing about it. Why? Because it gradually became apparent that mere information—no matter how compellingly or creatively expressed—was NOT going to move most people to take significant action.

Why? Because most people would not be "there" for years and decades to come? Sure, climate change would become more and more symptomatic, but the Earth is a big place. An increasingly occurring wildfire here or there, a superstorm here or there, a superdrought here or there, still ends up leaving the vast majority of folks not being obviously and viscerally impacted.

I mean... at least at first.

January, 2006. Dr. Susan Althoff—one of three surgeons who performed the liver transplant—shoots me a steely look: "David, we WILL get you through this."

I am laying on my bed in the liver-transplant wing of the University of Pennsylvania Hospital. My youngest brother is also in this wing since, about a week before, he donated half of his liver to me (It's called a Live Donor Transplant).

So now I've got a new half-a-liver (which, incredibly, will grow to a 100% liver in about a month's time, as will my brother's remaining half-a-liver). The problem is that my body has so far rejected my new liver. This is not particularly uncommon. Suddenly, there is a huge hunk of "foreign" tissue inside of me, and my body's immune system is trying to eject it. There are drugs for this, which I am now taking and will be taking for the rest of my life.

But these drugs are being overwhelmed, and so they put me on the next protocol—high dose steroids. And—wheeeeee!—the steroids DO give me drug-induced diabetes but are not enough to turn the tide. Dr. Althoff has just entered to give me that piece of bad news. I am beyond exhausted and respond with some expression of despair and hopelessness.

Dr. Althoff responds with that steely look (see above) and explains: "We have one more protocol called OKT-3 (when they bring out the letters-and-numbers meds, you know it's serious). We've only used it three times in the last year. You'll know it's working if you get a high fever and start to feel really, really sick."

Twelve hours later, I am shivering under a special, ice-filled blanket. I have a high fever and feel quite sick, wrecked even. The OKT-3 is apparently working.

Finally, I am "there." Boy-oh-boy, am I there. Right there. Exactly there. Everything else in the world disappears. Every single thing other than wanting this to stop and wanting to get better and feel better. I would do anything.

Right now, there are obviously many thousands of people in Los Angeles who are "there." Right there. Exactly there. They are directly experiencing one of the scientifically understood symptoms of a fossil fuel-supercharged, heating planet. Most of them, I am sure, would do anything to make it stop and to make things better.

Even the ones who—subject to the unceasing and enormously financed propaganda of fossil fuel corporations and the governments and political parties that they have purchased—have denied the reality of human-caused climate change (as well as the ones—let us not forget—who blandly "believe" it, but have placed it way down on the list of concerns) will be less likely to dismiss the scientific reports that will be published finding that the intensity of these fires was 20% or 40% or 75% more likely to have happened due to the inexorably heating planet. These reports will be coming. This is certain.

Because—just like me under that ice blanket—they are finally "there," their nervous systems violated and assaulted. Their world turned upside down.

I am forever grateful to my brother. Yes, my situation was serious. But I was only one person. And I was willing to go along with the science. And I only needed one other person (with a compatible blood-type!!) to step up. And, lastly, as my fatigue increased and my weight melted away and my eyes and skin turned yellow, I was brought at least partially "there" and became willing to undergo fairly extreme and grueling duress to set things right.

But when it comes to setting things right climate-wise, there are 8.2 billion of us. Most are ceaselessly occupied trying to make ends meet. Many are swayed by the flat-out disinformation campaigns of those wishing to keep things as they are. Most—though this ratio will gradually swing the other way—are not yet nearly "there" in terms of direct-and-undeniable climate impacts.

This is a stark brew.

Things can get stark under the ice blanket or the thousand-and-one other grueling demands of major surgery and recovery (I needed a follow-up surgery in 2010 which was—I kid you not—at least 200% more difficult than the transplant. Once things are allowed to go a great degree out-of-balance, it becomes much more likely that unforeseen complications and collapses will ensue.)

I could have died during my transplant in 2006. I very nearly did die in the 2010 surgery.

Some people have died in the LA fires. The body count continues to grow. Many, many more have lost now-uninsurable homes, cars, pets, etc. The "stark brew" cited above all but assures that millions more people will die before anything close to enough "there-ness" occurs throughout the populace to prompt enough people to stand for change—even the grueling and deeply inconvenient change that is demanded by the physics of Earth.

I wish it were different. So do many people whom I know.

But it isn't different.