Terribly sad - I could cry.

[FutureThroughLensOfThePast]

10,000 Emperor penguin chicks drowned due to the ice they were on melting prematurely.

Is there any hope these birds can avoid extinction?

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-66492767

I was just about to post a new thread when I found you'd already posted yesterday @FutureThroughLensOfThePast

It's hard to convey in words just how I felt when I saw this on segment on BBC news this morning when I heard that more than 90% of emperor penguin colonies are predicted to be all but extinct by the end of the century.

I would do anything to stop this, but I feel so powerless - my efforts to be sustainable are tiny in the scheme of things and are not going to protect them.

I agree. That story was just so sad and really hit home how we have ruined the planet.

I didn't see this, but thank you for sharing. It is important to keep telling these stories, despite the helplessness and despair.

I think the problem is that the more that people read these stories, the more they will feel that the damage is 'done' and that they can't make any difference. I'm getting the bus rather than driving somewhere today and that's about the limits of what I can do at present. Trying to go vegan etc. Its so hard as an individual to see what we can achieve.

I saw this the other day and can't believe there hasn't been more talk about this on here/on social media/talk shows. Everyone goes on about how much they love animals, they are against farming animals for meat, if one animal is harmed or neglected there is uproar etc. Yet 10,000 animals die (because of us) and there's nothing. It is really shocking.

@Flappyjack2507 I think it's difficult for people to comprehend. Climate change is here now, these are the earths last days. What we are going to see will be horrific. That thought alone gives me so much anxiety that I couldn't focus if I dwelled on it. It would actually make me suicidal.

I agree - @Flappyjack2507 - it seems to have gone under the radar. 10,000 chicks! 10,000

Yes I understand that feeling very well.

It's awful.
It's horrible to feel so helpless. What an individual can do is not going to make a difference while China, India, USA create the carbon they do.
Then people jetting off on holidays here there and everywhere.
I'm guilty myself of having a large family but we do try to live as sustainably as possible.

There are so many threads where it's clear that people do feel like there's no point, and they may as well not bother. I think this is almost a universal 'first hurdle' when facing the truth of the climate emergency. It feels so monumental and impossible to grasp. And it's a bit like the 'bear hunt' rhyme; you've kind of got to 'go through it' -the despair and helplessness and grief and terror- to find the path forward for how you will engage ('you' as in an inclusive collective encompassing all of us) with it and within it. It is existential.

I made a commitment not to fly several years ago - haven't flown since 2004. I don't drive - because I can't - my inability to master that lifeskill has an incidental environmental benefit. But it's not even a drop in the ocean.

But Future, it does make a difference, however small. And these commitments, such as not flying, do have a social impact, your friends, family, colleagues and people you inadvertently engage with on an online forum, reflect on your decision not to fly. I for one am grateful (broke a long non-flying streak last year to visit home country).

I agree is an absolute tragedy , but do you also know that 29 million male chicks are killed every year in the UK egg industry, yes just in the uk.
A lot of people have never sat down and thought that their daily egg started out as an egg that hatches to become an egg layer for the egg industry, lots of those chicks are male so unwanted , 29 million a year infact.

I think it's difficult for people to comprehend. Climate change is here now, these are the earths last days. What we are going to see will be horrific. That thought alone gives me so much anxiety that I couldn't focus if I dwelled on it. It would actually make me suicidal.

It's scary how fast climate change is happening, but I don't think it's the Earth's last days. It might just be the last days for humans though. The Earth got on fine without us for millions of years, and it will do the same in the future.

I don't really get the argument that climate change is here therefore there's nothing more we can do so just give up and bury our head in the sand? If we all made changes, no matter how big or small, it would help even if just a little. We don't know when humans last days on earth will be - it could be in a few decades or it could be in a millennium. Either way we've got to try. It's not too late at all.

It is indeed terrible and indefensible, but chickens are not a natural species and are not going extinct. Human activity, including turning wildlife habitat into grazing land for more and more livestock, has slashed wild animal populations by 70 percent during the last 50 years. 70 percent!! Once these penguins and other wild species are gone, they are gone forever. Because of us.

The only good thing about climate change is that, if we don't do something radical, human civilizations will cease to exist. The Earth will recover and new species will arise.

But losing Penguins would be a tragedy.

For those people who think they can't do anything to help, I am reminded of a Chinese saying:

' the man who moved the mountain began by removing one stone'

It's up to every one of us to do whatever we can, no matter how small.

The problem with that theory is that humans are an incredibly adaptable species. Current civilization may change, the human population may be reduced, but I doubt we'd go extinct.