ADAPTATION

While Nina, Marcus, and Benny debate the weird side effects of global warming, new roommate Finn is excited about his new job in the green tech industry.

The pizzly bear is real.

We wish we were making it up. Unfortunately, climate change has already gotten so bad that polar bears and grizzly bears -- who traditionally live hundreds of miles away from each other -- have now in rare instances migrated to share the same environment. And yes, they are cross-breeding. This is indeed a unique form of species adaptation.

Our global ecological crisis is placing our entire planet’s living systems in jeopardy. Species are going extinct in unprecedented numbers. Sea level rise threatens coastal cities from Manila to Miami. Every year brings new record high temperatures and more frequent, intense superstorms, mega-typhoons, and terrifying new extreme weather patterns that we barely have time to name.

The struggle for collective survival is not simply about competing for policy proposals, but between competing visions of the world in which we will live. Even as we hope to mitigate the worst effects of the climate crisis, we have already passed certain tipping points. Like the pizzly bear, we have to adapt. But what type of adaptation will this be? Will it be a genetically modified, tech-crazy eco-dystopia as promised by companies like GreenGos? Or will we (re)build a world of regenerative, deeply democratic local economies?

Transition is inevitable. Justice is not. We are fighting for and building a Just Transition that can wrest power from the violent chain of the market and return it to the web of life.