Fuck Paradise

LISTENING: to non-stop Paramore
FEELING: so fucking annoyed
SEEING: the fall sun set painstakingly early

In her book "Hope in the Dark," beloved writer Rebecca Solnit writes: "I think victories must be temporary or incomplete; what kind of humanity would survive paradise? ... For paradise does not require of us courage, selflessness, creativity, passion: paradise in all accounts is passive, is sedative, and if you read carefully, soulless."

I don't want paradise anymore. I'm sick of the illusion. I want to see the world for what it is. Life on this planet shouldn't feel like a fucking vacation. It should be work. We should be constantly growing and building and improving ourselves and our communities — and not materially but spiritually and emotionally. I live in New York City, one of the few places that have always felt like a sort of paradise for my various peoples: queer folks, Latines, and immigrants. Well, paradise is fading.

The return of Donald Trump to the White House — and specifically the Latine voters who helped put him in power — has me fearful. It also has me angry. Right here in New York, there's been a rightward shift. My Queens neighborhood remained blue, luckily, but Democrats did lose voters.

This is a bad sign for people who care about and/or are affected by climate change.

Welcome to Possibilities, a creative climate newsletter on the possibilities that lie where crisis meets community. I’m Yessenia Funes, and the atmosphere doesn't care about your votes — it reacts only to the greenhouse gases our leaders continue to emit without guilt.

Behind this political climate, there's been a wave of Really Weird Shit.

Exhibit A: I went out dancing Friday to shake off the stress (as I hope we all are!!) and stepped outside only to smell smoke. It smelled like campfire smoke. A bushfire had broken out in Brooklyn's Prospect Park. I know, WEIRD. New York isn't the only place on the East Coast burning these days. If you read my newsletter a few weeks ago, you'll recall I dove into wildfires in New Jersey, too. As I write this, most of the wildfires burning in the U.S. that the National Interagency Fire Center is tracking are on the East Coast.

This isn't normal, fam!!!!

It's not just the East Coast feeding this wave of Really Weird Shit, though. For the first time in recorded history, four tropical storms are twisting away at the same time in the Pacific near the Philippines.

Like I said: This isn't normal!!

I wonder how the climate justice movement will morph and shift as the weather and land begin to transform in unpredictable ways. We know from the previous four years of Trump that the national climate movement will likely refocus to do what it can locally. I'm already hearing organizers discuss that shift.

But what does local activism look like when a whole region is ablaze? What do coalitions look like? I don't know the answers yet, but I'm curious to dig in and begin mapping out what the next four years will look like on the ground.

I'd love to hear from you all and the stories you want to read from me the next year. 2025 is around the corner, and I need to enter with some priorities. Is there a certain type of story you miss from me? I know I haven't done as much science writing lately. Or disaster coverage. Let me know what you all want to see, and I will do my hardest to prioritize those topics in the coming months.

If you're a climate or environmental journalist hoping to tap into mental health resources amid the muck, also holla at me. I'm working closely with the Climate Psychology Alliance of North America, the Metcalf Institute, and the Solutions Journalism Network to do this work. That will be a major priority come 2025.

We can't keep doing this work if we're not well. And I know many of us aren't right now. 🌀

Rest in Power

While we can't say for certain that climate change led to these specific weather events (we need attribution studies for that), we do know that the Earth's rising temperatures are already creating more disasters like these.

These awful wildfires along the New York-New Jersey border resulted in the death of Dariel Vasquez, an 18-year-old who was working to clear trees and shrubs.

A winter storm last week killed at least two people in New Mexico.

Rain-induced landslides have killed at least 12 people in Cameroon.

Currently Reading

For those craving more about the wildfires and drought in the Northeast, Frida Garza has a must-read for Grist on how farmers are being affected.

I get really bummed out when I read about fossil fuel companies trying to get marginalized folks on their team. This piece from Hilary Beaumont for Floodlight looks at how southwestern Native groups are getting bought out to support liquid natural gas.

Natalie Shure at The Intercept on the President Bernie Sanders that never was: "For all his monstrousness, Trump tapped into a justified sense of disillusionment with the system and managed to convince some of its biggest victims — nearly half of the poorest voting bracket picked him — that he was on their side. Of course he isn’t! But only Sanders has built the credibility to claim as much from the broader left, by spending decades consistently fighting doggedly for the working class."

Speaking of how much the Democrats suck, Taylor Lorez has a new User Mag edition out on the left's failure to cultivate (and invest in) their own media personas the way the right has.

I looooove the work of Lylla Younes, who wrote an important story for Grist on how hurricanes are influencing the politics of voters in Louisiana. Read everything she writes!

If you can't tell, I am obsessed with Grist. I miss reading Eve Andrews there. Luckily, she's got a new article for Mother Jones on East Palestine, Ohio, and how our leaders keep forgetting them.

On a lighter note, COP29 kicks off this week. I enjoyed this Guardian story on the sex hotel where some delegates have had to stay.

Poetry

we think we know what the end will be
chaos, car crashes, calamity
but the end will not arrive in flames
it will smell like pine wood
as the leaves crunch beneath our feet

we'll return to a land we abandoned
we won't accept defeat
we'll carry on in the brush
as we escape to begin anew

the end will not burn us
it'll save us from all we thought we knew

-ylf-

I'm heading to Seattle this weekend, so I'll be writing from there next week. Let's hope the vibes are better on the West Coast. 🥴

- Yessenia xx