Colorful Parachutes

How to inhabit the ends of the world?

ACT 1

After a fire in the Amazon Rainforest devastates a nearby town, a politician during his election campaign period travels to the site to show his support and comfort to those affected along with other prominent community members.

POLITICIAN – Welcome everyone, I would like to start by sharing my deepest sympathies with your community after the tragic events that have unfolded. Even so, I’m happy to say that “our Amazon remains practically untouched, we are one of the countries that most protects the environment. Sadly at this time of year, the dry climate and winds favor spontaneous fires”, (1) so we will work towards forest management and be better in the future.

ACTIVIST – Practically untouched?? Better forest management?? Politicians always ignore the real problems. “It’s like my house is burning down and you say that I forgot to turn the oven off, how am I going to turn off the oven? It is important to put out the oven, but it is necessary to understand above all that there is a fire in the house.” (2) The fire is burning in all parts of the rainforest, and the Amazon acts as the lungs of the earth, we need to save it, not let it burn!

POLITICIAN – The forest is fine and “it’s a fallacy to say that the Amazon is a heritage of humanity and a mistake to say that the Amazon, OUR forest, is the lungs of the world.” (3)

Many common community members are present at the meeting to listen to the resolutions for their concerns, and a child in attendance that is curious about her future decides to speak up.

CHILD – So wait… why ARE these fires even happening? Did we do something wrong?

SCIENTIST – Well, the forest fires are a direct consequence of unprecedented high temperatures, driven by the undeniable impact of greenhouse gas emissions from human activities. “The overwhelming majority (97%) of scientists agree that global warming is real, and that it is largely caused by human activity.” (4)

POLITICIAN – Now, now, let’s not jump to conclusions “I’m not a believer in man-made global warming. It could be warming, and it’s going to start to cool at some point. But the problem we have and all of the things that we’re doing to solve that problem, I don’t think in any major fashion exists.” (5)

PRIEST – “The care of creation is not just something God spoke of at the beginning of history; he entrusts it to each of us as part of his plan” (6)

ACTIVIST – Guys! Listen to the scientist, he is right, and we have to speak the truth, “the climate crisis is no longer an abstract future or a news article about a far-off country. It’s here – it’s now”. (7)

Child looks scared and confused

POLITICIAN – Listen kid, don’t let these people scare you, “according to the satellite data, there has been no significant global warming for the past 18 years, Those are the data. Global-warming alarmists don’t like this data. They are inconvenient to their narrative. But facts and evidence matter.” (8)

ACTIVIST –That’s a lie! “I believe that the climate crisis is also a crisis of the information which is not disseminated as it should be.” (9) Good good, “while we as humanity are arguing and distancing ourselves from nature, a bunch of “smart” corporations are taking over the Earth…” (10)

PHILOSOPHER – Good good, “while we as humanity are arguing and distancing ourselves from nature, a bunch of “smart” corporations are taking over the Earth…” (10)

SCIENTIST – Everyone, this isn’t a matter of politics or belief my friends, but facts! It’s imperative that we act swiftly to reduce our carbon footprint and confront the climate crisis that’s unfolding before our eyes! Our data is proof of it! “Information on the (anthropic) causes and (catastrophic) consequences of the planetary crisis have accumulated at a speedy rate, mobilizing popular perception as well as academic reflection.” (11)

CHILD – Okay, but what do we do now?? Everything has burned, we have nothing left! My world is ending! What should I do?

POLITICIAN – Kid.. (he takes a big breath and smiles) we are handling it. The rainforest as a natural resource is just as important as the lives of our citizens and we will clean it up and sustain it, don’t worry.

PHILOSPHER – “Natural resource for whom? What do you need to sustain? The idea of ??us, humans, detaching ourselves from the earth, living in a civilizational abstraction, is absurd!” (12)

PRIEST – My children, let’s have faith! The divine spirit of humans has existed long before earth and will exist long after.

ACTIVIST – People, please, “we have been alienating ourselves from this organism we are part of, called Earth, and we have started to think that it is one thing and we are another: the Earth and humanity.” (13) We are one, not separate.

PHILOSOPHER – But let me ask you this: “if there have been other configurations of the Earth, even without us here, why are you so attached to this portrait with us here? Our attachment to a fixed idea of ??the Earth’s landscape and humanity as we know it is the deepest mark of the Anthropocene…” (14)

As the fight continues, the child leaves frustrated by the lack of answers and action. No one notices she is gone.

ACTIVIST – OMG! “We’ve had public discourse about global warming for over 40 years, no one has measured the top solutions to climate change, until now.” (15) We live in this world! It’s the only one we have and at least some of us want to keep living in it!

PHILOSOPHER – Correct, “the state of the world we live in today is exactly what our recent ancestors ordered for us. We keep complaining about it, but what is the world that you are now leaving to future generations? Have you asked them if the world you are leaving is the one they want? Most of us won’t be here when this package arrives” (16), you know.

SCIENTIST – Future generations? “From a statistical point of view, the probability that our civilization survives itself is less than 10% in the most optimistic scenario. Calculations show that we have a few decades left before an irreversible collapse of our civilization. ” (17)

POLITICIAN – Come on let’s not scare the kid, “the concept of global warming was created by and for our enemies in order to make our manufacturing non-competitive.” (18) Her generation will be fine.

ACTIVIST – Wait, speaking of… where did the kid go?

The Philosopher has a look of realization on her face, and sighs

PHILOSOPHER – She went to save her world…

There is a collective silence that shocks everyone when they all realize the child is missing.

ACT 2

After a group of volunteers conduct a search for the child, they continue the conversation.

PRIEST – My children, let’s stay together and pray in His name and His divinity will help us through this tough time…

POLITICIAN – Save her world? It’s just a city, it will recover, it’s not the end of the actual world.

PHILOSOPHER – “The end of the world is a relative concept Sir, it may be translated as a brief interruption of a state of ecstatic pleasure that we, as humans, do not want to lose.” (19)

SCIENTIST – “The end of the world is a seemingly interminable topic – at least, of course, until it happens…” (20)

ACTIVIST – You know “the problem of the end of the world, is that it’s always formulated as a separation or divergence, resulting from the disappearance of one pole in the duality of world and inhabitant”. (21)

PHILOSOPHER – Exactly, “putting us in a dilemma in which it seems that the only possibility for human communities to continue to exist is at the expense of exhausting all other parts of life.” (22)

ACTIVIST – We just have to focus on taking action now!

PHILOSOPHER – Take action… But let me ask you this: “we have done nothing else in recent times other than fall. So why are we now gripped by it? Let’s take advantage of all our critical and creative capacity to build colorful parachutes! Let’s think of space not as a confined place, but as the cosmos where we can fall in colorful parachutes.” (23)

ACTIVIST – Colorful parachutes? What does that even mean? “If we’re falling in the wrong direction, why would we want to slow down? Why wouldn’t we stop and turn it around?” (24)

POLITICIAN – People, we don’t have to turn around! We are working towards an exciting direction! And “for us to have a future that’s exciting and inspiring, it has to be one where we’re a space-bearing civilization.” (25)

ACTIVIST – Are you suggesting that the future of our civilization is leaving earth?

POLITICIAN – If we need to eventually, sure.

SCIENTIST – If we are thinking about a viable future for our civilization, the latest studies show that “the only ones capable of a switch from an economical society to a sort of “cultural” society in a timely manner, may survive.” (26)

PHILOSOPHER – Shoker, the algorithms are right “The kind of zombie civilization we were summoned to be integrated (the one based on economy) do not tolerate so much pleasure, so much enjoyment of life. So they preach the end of the world as a possibility to make us give up on our own dreams. My challenge about postponing or inhabiting the end of the world is exactly that we can always tell one more story. If we can do this, we will be postponing the end.” (27)

ACTIVIST – Well that’s a really personal point of view Sir..

PHILOSOPHER – Look, “we are warned all the time about the consequences of these recent choices we have made as a society. But if we can pay attention to some vision that escapes this blindness that we are experiencing all over the world, perhaps it can open our minds to some cooperation between people, not to save others, but to save ourselves.” (28)

PRIEST – Children, listen, we are as close to God as we’ll ever be. Let’s not forget, “The environment is God’s gift to everyone, and in our use of it, we have a responsibility towards the poor, towards future generations, and towards humanity as a whole.” (29)

ACTIVIST – We..? You want to talk about responsibility?? “We have to assume that the elites understood perfectly well that the warning about the end of the world was accurate, but did not conclude from the evidence, which had become more and more indisputable over the years, that they were going to have to pay, and pay dearly, for the Earth’s turning back on itself.” (30)

PHILOSOPHER – Yes yes, we can blame one another when the end comes, “or at least, we can be able to maintain our subjectivities, our visions, our poetics about existence,” (31) like we are doing now.

ACTIVIST – And what would that solve, how is that preventing our fall??

PHILOSOPHER – Look, “we are definitely not the same, and it is wonderful to know that each one of us here is different from the other, like constellations. Having diversity, not just one humanity with the same protocol is the way of understanding that there will be multiple falls, multiple endings.” (32) We are falling, some even already did, the point is that while we do, we all can each open our own colorful parachutes, and experience our existence as it is.

One of the volunteers returns, with a concerned look on his face. They all wait for news about the missing child. He shakes his head.

THE END

Original Post on https://readymag.com/u2228045337/4450632/

QUOTES

1. Bolsonaro, Jair. UN General Assembly Discourse, 2019.
2. Thunberg, Greta. France Inter Radio Interview (https://www.rfi.fr/en/france/20221025-thunberg-warns-the-house-is-on-fire-as-she-releases-climate-change-book), 2022.
3. Bolsonaro, Jair. UN General Assembly Discourse, 2019.
4. National Geographic Society. Weather or Climate…What’s the Difference?, 2023.
5. Dennis, Brady. Trump: ‘I’m not a big believer in man-made climate change’, 2016.
6. Pope Francis. Twitter Post from June 5th, 2013
7. Cannon, Gabrielle. The climate crisis is now’: haunting video spotlights California wildfires, 2022.
8. Cama, Timothy. Cruz blasts ‘alarmists’ at climate change hearing, 2015.
9. Thunberg, Greta. France Inter Radio Interview (https://www.rfi.fr/en/france/20221025-thunberg-warns-the-house-is-on-fire-as-she-releases-climate-change-book), 2022.
10. KRENAK, Ailton. Ideas to postpone the end of the world, 2019.
11. Brannen, Peter. The ends of the world, 2017.
12. Krenak, Ailton. Ideas to postpone the end of the world, 2019.
13. Krenak, Ailton. Ideas to postpone the end of the world, 2019.
14. Krenak, Ailton. Ideas to postpone the end of the world, 2019.
15. Hawken, Paul. The intellectual environmentalist Podcast (https://www.environmentshow.com/paul-hawken-quotes/), 2019.
16. Krenak, Ailton. Ideas to postpone the end of the world, 2019.
17. Aquino, Gerardo; Bologna, Mauro. Deforestation and world population sustainability: a quantitative analysis (https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-020-63657-6), 2020.
18. Trump, Donald. Twitter Post from November 6th, 2012.
19. Krenak, Ailton. Ideas to postpone the end of the world, 2019.
20. Brannen, Peter. The ends of the world, 2017.
21. Danowski, Déborah; De Castro, Eduardo Viveiros. Is there any world to come?, 2015.
22. Krenak, Ailton. Ideas to postpone the end of the world, 2019.
23. Krenak, Ailton. Ideas to postpone the end of the world, 2019.
24. Hawken, Paul. The intellectual environmentalist Podcast (https://www.environmentshow.com/paul-hawken-quotes/), 2019.
25. Musk, Elon. CBS This Morning Interview (https://www.cbsnews.com/news/elon-musk-on-mars-its-a-fixer-upper-of-a-planet/), 2012.
26. Aquino, Gerardo; Bologna, Mauro. Deforestation and world population sustainability: a quantitative analysis (https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-020-63657-6), 2020.
27. Krenak, Ailton. Ideas to postpone the end of the world, 2019.
28. Krenak, Ailton. Ideas to postpone the end of the world, 2019.
29. Pope Benedict XVI. Charity in Truth, 2009.
30. Latour, Bruno. Down to Earth: Politics in the New Climatic Regime, 2018.
31. Krenak, Ailton. Ideas to postpone the end of the world, 2019.
32. Krenak, Ailton. Ideas to postpone the end of the world, 2019.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

• Aquino, Gerardo; Bologna, Mauro. Deforestation and world population sustainability: a quantitative analysis (https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-020-63657-6), 2020.
• Bolsonaro, Jair. UN General Assembly Discourse, 2019.
• Brannen, Peter. The ends of the world, 2017
• Cama, Timothy. Cruz blasts ‘alarmists’ at climate change hearing, 2015
• Cannon, Gabrielle. The climate crisis is now’: haunting video spotlights California wildfires, 2022.
• Danowski, Déborah; De Castro, Eduardo Viveiros. Is there any world to come?, 2015.
• Dennis, Brady. Trump: ‘I’m not a big believer in man-made climate change’, 2016.
• Hawken, Paul. The intellectual environmentalist Podcast (https://www.environmentshow.com/paul-hawken-quotes/), 2019.
• Krenak, Ailton. Ideas to postpone the end of the world, 2019.
• Latour, Bruno. Down to Earth: Politics in the New Climatic Regime, 2018
• Musk, Elon. CBS This Morning Interview (https://www.cbsnews.com/news/elon-musk-on-mars-its-a-fixer-upper-of-a-planet/), 2012.
• National Geographic Society. Weather or Climate…What’s the Difference?, 2023.
• Pope Francis. Twitter Post from June 5th, 2013.
• Thunberg, Greta. France Inter Radio Interview (https://www.rfi.fr/en/france/20221025-thunberg-warns-the-house-is-on-fire-as-she-releases-climate-change-book), 2022
• Trump, Donald. Twitter Post from November 6th, 2012.