Facebook Instagram Twitter YouTube

Capitalism Is Fanning the Wildfire Flames

Capitalism-driven climate change has led to record-breaking wildfires on the West Coast.

Signý A.

September 15, 2020
Facebook Twitter Share
A mountain range with fires all along the top. The lighting is dark/gloomy, maybe it's evening but maybe the smoke is just making everything dark.
Eddiem360, Wikimedia Commons.

Tens of thousands of buildings have been destroyed and dozens of people have been killed by one of the worst wildfire outbreaks in California and Oregon history. Dozens more are still missing. Smoke from the fires covers cities from Los Angeles to Vancouver. People are wearing N95 masks not only against the coronavirus, but also against the thick smoke. The air quality has gotten so bad that it’s off the EPA’s air quality scale. An estimated 500,000 people in Oregon are on evacuation notice. Over 900,000 acres of Oregon and 3.1 million acres of California have burned. 

Berry Creek, a town in Northern California, was completely destroyed by the fires. “The school is gone, the fire department’s gone, the bar’s gone, the laundromat’s gone, the general store’s gone,” says one local resident. In the state of Washington, over 930 square miles have been burned. Areas of the state not on fire are still choking on smoke that’s blowing in from Oregon and California. At least one person has died from the fires in Washington.

Capitalism is Fueling Climate Change 

Climate change is affecting the earth more in 2020 than ever before. The increased number of tropical cyclones (four in the Atlantic at the time of publication), the coronavirus pandemic, and the extreme dry conditions and heat waves amplifying the California fire season are all effects of global warming. L.A. County blew past its temperature record, hitting 121 degrees Farenheit in one town in early September. Temperatures in the three digits have been frequent in the region lately. There may be the temptation to view the extreme devastation of 2020 as an outlier, but science indicates that these disasters will get worse. The evidence points to one particular culprit: greenhouse gas emissions.

Some people blame individual choices for climate change  — if only individuals would decide to fly less or eat less meat! While we all must do what we can to reduce our impact on the environment, the average human has nowhere near enough power to stop climate change, nor change how the economic system works. After all, global shutdowns of economic activity due to the coronavirus have likely only reduced carbon emissions by a mere five percent in 2020, showing the limits of individual actions in combating climate change. Capitalist governments subsidize the fossil fuel and big agricultural industries, making a greasy burger cheaper and more available than locally-sourced fresh fruits, vegetables, and healthy proteins. The small number of people who do have that power are driven by a relentless obsession with ever more profit.

The U.S. in particular lags even other capitalist nations in public transit and public health development, while the U.S. military is one of the world’s greatest contributors to climate change. The ruling class pushes ever-bigger houses that consume more energy to heat and cool indoor volume that is uninhabited most of the time. People are encouraged to buy multiple gas-guzzling SUVs and other excesses that are profitable to capitalists, but which no one really needs to live a healthy and fulfilling life.

The effects of capitalism on the climate continue with the corruption of the political system, where corporate interests block democratic initiatives like banning methane fracking or disposable plastic bags. Even our would-be savior from the Trump regime — the Democratic Party — has no interest in ending U.S. imperialism, meaningfully addressing the housing crisis, nor taking serious action on the climate emergency.

We already have the means to feed everyone, but much of it goes to waste. Instead of investing in sustainable mass transit, capitalism presents a steady supply of new “green” cars that keep pushing highly individualized consumption and will just shift the problem from fossil fuels to lithium and rare earth metals. Capitalism is fuelling climate change — it is incapable of providing a solution. 

Fight Capitalism With Socialism

The solution to climate change isn’t yet another new product to be sold for profit, nor is it another neoliberal attempt at “market-based” regulation that will be too little, too late. Only by restructuring the economy to meet human need — not corporate greed — while respecting the sacred land and environment that keeps us all alive can truly stop this climate nightmare. In other words, we need to fight for socialism, and for a system which is compatible with the survival of humanity and the environment, with sustainability at its core. Together, we can rebuild our global economy to put science and humanity first, and we can have both better lives and a healthier planet.

The image used in this article is licensed by its creator under a CC BY-SA 4.0 International License. No changes have been made to the image.

Facebook Twitter Share

Guest Posts

Biden speaking at a podium at COP26 in Glasgow in 2021.

Biden Won’t Stop Climate Change

Many hoped that President Biden would be America’s first “climate president,” but there’s no such thing.

M. Carlstad

May 9, 2023
The outside of First Republic Bank showing the main sign.

First Republic Bank: The Case for Public Ownership

The collapse of First Republic Bank is the latest chapter in the rolling banking crisis in the US. It demonstrates the case for public ownership of the banking system.

Michael Roberts

May 3, 2023
Sami protesters in Norway protest the construction of wind turbines on their land.

Norway: Thousands of Youth Demonstrated against “Green Colonialism”

From the end of February to the beginning of March, over a thousand youth protested against the construction of wind turbines on Sami land. This movement represents the birth of a militant, Indigenous-led environmentalist movement.

Matthew Walters

May 1, 2023

Striking Workers at the University of Michigan Are Building Powerful Solidarity

University of Michigan graduate students have been on strike for one month. While these workers have faced harsh conditions, the broad connections and class-consciousness they are developing are worth celebrating.

Ryan McCarty

April 29, 2023

MOST RECENT

Tracking, Deportations, Internment: European Countries Go on the Hunt for Migrants

On May 10, German chancellor Olaf Scholz strengthened Germany’s anti-migrant policy. This means more deportations, border patrol reinforcements, and economic agreements with sending countries. The new policy is being deployed throughout Europe.

Leo Stella

May 25, 2023

#AllthatsLeftPod: Three Years Since the George Floyd Uprising:

In this episode of the podcast, we reflect on the 2020 George Floyd uprising, which began three years ago. We discuss how to turn the energy of a mass uprising into a sustained movement, and the kind of revolutionary leadership that's required to do so.

Left Voice

May 25, 2023

Fight Capitalism, Fight for Neurodivergent Liberation

Neurodivergent and disability liberation will have to come from the overthrow of capitalism and the building of a socialist system which values different forms of human behavior and directs resources to meeting human needs.

Sam Carliner

May 23, 2023
Prof. Gail Green-Anderson of LaGuardia Community College at a rally outside Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo’s Manhattan office on Thursday.

Rekindling the Militant Spirit of CUNY’s Past

Mayor Eric Adams has announced an austerity budget that includes significant cuts to the City University of New York among other city agencies. In order to defeat these cuts, students, faculty, and other workers across the city must unite our struggles and be prepared to shut the university down.

James Dennis Hoff

May 22, 2023