‘The message is one of hopelessness. No matter what you do, the planet is doomed’.
A couple weeks ago, the Los Angeles Times published an essay by Rosanna Xia entitled “To fix climate anxiety (and also climate change), we first have to fix individualism.” She expressed her deep anxiety and outright grief over climate change to the point where she was “questioning whether I could ever justify bringing my own children into this world” and that she “can’t help but feel like we’re just counting down the days to our own extinction.”
Ms. Xia isn’t the only one experiencing eco-anxiety and questioning parenthood. Jade S. Sasser, an associate professor in the Department of Gender & Sexuality Studies at UC Riverside, conducts research “exploring the relationships between reproductive justice, women’s health, and climate change.” She, too, is plagued by the morality of having children, and hosts the podcast “Climate Anxiety and the Kid Question.”
I can’t fathom the depths of despair these women must feel to pen such words. As therapy, Xia recommends “climate empathy.” She writes, “Acknowledging the emotional toll on people beyond yourself can be an opportunity to listen and support one another. Embracing our feelings – and then finding others who also want to turn their fear into action – can be the missing spark to much-needed social and environmental healing.”