the Voice of
The Communist League of Revolutionary Workers–Internationalist
“The emancipation of the working class will only be achieved by the working class itself.”
— Karl Marx
Jun 6, 2022
The world recorded a new peak for carbon dioxide in the atmosphere this May, of 421 parts per million. Carbon dioxide is the main gas that traps the sun’s heat in the atmosphere, leading to global warming. Up until the late 19th century, the level in the atmosphere consistently peaked around 280 parts per million. By burning tons upon tons of coal, oil and natural gas over the last century and a half, humans have driven up carbon dioxide in the atmosphere by about 50%. The last time it was as high as it is now was 4 million years ago, scientists say.
More carbon dioxide in the atmosphere has pushed average world temperature to about two degrees Fahrenheit higher than it would have been.
2021 saw the biggest amount of carbon dioxide poured into the atmosphere ever: 36.3 billion tons. The media always try to put this on us: that working people drive too much, eat too much, consume too much. But we working people have nothing to do with deciding how this society is organized right now. It is the capitalist class that runs this society at the world scale. It is the capitalist class which has done practically nothing to keep humanity from driving off of a climate cliff, even as more and more evidence floods in that screams of the need to reverse direction NOW.
The drive for profit will destroy this world—until the working class takes the wheel and slams on the brakes.