The climate crisis and all the evil in the world drives me to despair, The world will continue to be absurd, but you, with all your passion, can still make your corner of it more bearable Guardian Phileppa Perry Jun 24 2024  The question........I am finding it ever more difficult to be in this nasty world. Everything that I cherish is being destroyed and there is nowhere to go to find solace. I’ve always loved nature – but when I go for a walk now, I see every ash tree dying, I hear the loss of birdsong, I see how few insects there are. When I read the news, I just cannot comprehend how cruel humans are able to be, racism, misogyny, religious hate, cruelty to animals… The list is endless.I work in climate change and am having to pretend every day that there is still a chance we can prevent catastrophic climate change. I find it ever harder to be around people who don’t get just how bad things are. I don’t have kids and am single. I can’t talk to my family about it because they are rightwing, wealthy climate sceptics. They patronise me (despite the fact I’m nearly 60 and a chief executive). If I look to the future, I imagine how difficult it is going to be when food supplies are more affected by environmental crisis. People fought over toilet rolls during Covid – multiply that by 100 and apply it to food.I don’t want to face all this horribleness on my own. I’ve had lots of chances at relationships, but don’t want fear of the future to be the basis of one. In the meantime, I am trying to keep a lid on it, trying to dissociate my feelings, pretending all the bad stuff isn’t happening. When what I really want to do is scream my head off at everyone. Planet Earth is so beautiful, so incredible, I cry with the pain of what we are doing to it and to each other. How am I supposed to remain feeling in this fucked up world?

Philippa’s answer...... In his novel Candide, or Optimism, first published in 1759, Voltaire tells us of a young man who experiences a great deal of hardship and suffering. Using Candide’s experiences, Voltaire critiques the overly optimistic philosophy of the time. Like Candide, you too speak of a world marred by destruction and cruelty, and you are not mistaken. Although the forms of absurdity may change, the essence remains: human folly and suffering. Candide’s master is Pangloss who argues that “All is for the best in the best of all possible worlds,” of which Voltaire takes a dim view. You, like Candide, are not comforted by this hollow optimism. The death of nature, the cruelty of men, increasingly extreme weather, these are not trifles to be dismissed with the wave of a philosophical hand. I cannot offer you the false balm of easy answers. What I can offer, however, is this: the world has ever been thus.........read on    https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2024/nov/24/the-climate-crisis-and-all-the-evil-in-the-world-drives-me-to-despair