Enemy number one of the global environment

I read in an old National Geographic magazine (2002) that scientists had mapped human impact on the natural world and estimated that 83% of the total land surface and 98% of the areas where it is possible to grow the world’s three main crops — rice, wheat, and maize — had been directly influenced by human activities.

The sea and the sky have also been influenced but, while terrestrial interference has been, on balance, benevolent for our species, the oceans and skies have suffered degradation which now threaten the future of the planet as a habitat not only for ourselves but for all life.

Global warming reaches everywhere. It is the major threat to Earth. As long as it is not curtailed, our future is uncertain, and becomes more uncertain with every passing day. Now, we are at a dangerous juncture of history where one man, will, if given the power, reverse what efforts we have made to contain and reduce this threat that overshadows us. I refer, of course, to Donald Trump. He is widely written about, but I must express my fears in this Outdoor column.

Each year, new instances of climate extremes cost thousands of lives and billions of euro. We know carbon emissions are the problem: we are trying, belatedly, to contain the damage. At the December 2015 Paris climate conference, 195 countries agreed to the first-ever international, legally binding global climate accord. The agreement will come into force when 55 countries, jointly accounting for a minimum of 55% of global emissions, have signed up. The emissions of China , the USA, India and Russia alone reach the 55%, and all have agreed to sign — although Russia requires ‘clarifications’ — but it important to have a pact of many nations.

This is the good news. Trump is the bad news —much worse news, if he becomes president. Trump says, “We’re going to cancel the Paris agreement!” and that he will put any of Barack Obama’s environmental reforms that stand in the way of increased US wealth on the scrap-heap. By cancelling America’s commitment to reduce its 16% of global emission, he will jeopardise the treaty and America’s increased emissions will negate the reductions effected by many smaller nations.

He will be Enemy of the Global Environment No 1.

“America first!”, proclaims Trump; this means ‘Never mind the rest of the planet. Let it and its people die by drowning, crop failure, polluted air — as long as the USA and its citizens grow richer (and Donald Trump becomes god!)’.

From such pronouncements, it is clear that he has no sense of empathy with humanity as whole, only with his chosen people. It is a Trump America world, there to serve his vision. Lack of empathy is a characteristic of psychopathic personalities; they cannot see others as beings separate from themselves, and can kill without feeling. Lack of empathy is frightening in anyone: in a man-who-would-be-king and who, by manipulation of the masses, may achieve it, it is terrifying.

In wooing the adulation of the ‘true’ American people (the white working-class), Trump has instilled them with an incendiary sense of their own destiny, and of his own: to be the greatest nation on earth, ruled by the greatest leader. Ein Volk, ein Reich, ein Fuhrer!

He will say almost anything, however outrageous. Internment for Muslims and Mexicans? Possibly. The danger is that if elected, he may follow-up. He has made ‘Mexican’ a dirty word.

In clinical definitions of narcissistic personality disorder, Trump’s behaviour ticks all boxes. Even the clownish hair-piece fits. A bombastic sense of self-importance and faith in his own superiority would be risible were it not toxic, as are his fantasies of success. In achieving his aims, lying becomes routine; objective truth is for little people: there is only The Trump Truth.

A symptom of narcissistic disorder is a demand for constant admiration. He must always be right, and get total compliance from others. He cannot tolerate criticism and is overtaken by an irrational fury towards those whom he perceives as impeding his wishes.

Most dangerous of all is the narcissist’s belief that he is above the rules. His vanity blinds him to the consequences of his actions. This is the man who may have his finger on the doomsday button of irreversible environmental degradation, or nuclear holocaust.

Let us hope that the earth is saved from Trump, that he is assigned to the trashcan of history, Trump and his folie de grandeur.