Love in the Time of Climate Change by Brian Adams Read Free Book Online Page A

love to chat but I’ve got places to go and things to do. Let me give you a hint, bro. You know those three things you’d love to do? Stop global warming? No more extinctions? End poverty?’
    â€œâ€˜Whoa, dude,’ I cried. ‘You could read my mind?’
    â€œâ€˜I’m a genie,’ she said. ‘I can do all sorts of cool shit.’”
    The students laughed again, still transfixed.
    â€œâ€˜Believe it or not, I can grant you one wish that will take care of not just those three wishes but a hell of a lot more as well!’
    â€œâ€˜Tell me, oh wise one,’ I said, attempting to bow my head but hitting it instead on the steering wheel.
    â€œâ€˜It’s a simple wish,’ said the genie. ‘A very simple wish. It’s cheap. It’s easy. And it’s totally doable. Just wish for everyone, every time, to simply use one of these!’”
    My speaker reached into the brass lamp and, with a dramatic flair, pulled out a Trojan Maxima condom. With one smooth motion he unwrapped it with his teeth, and waved it above his head.
    â€œâ€˜Use this every time you humans do the deed, and your problems will be solved! Global warming, extinction, poverty.
Poof!
Gone. Agreed?’
    â€œâ€˜Agreed!’ I shouted.
    â€œâ€˜Thanks again, darling! Good luck saving the world. I gotta run.’ The genie kissed me on the cheek and—
poof!
—she was gone.
    â€œEnd of story.”
    My students gave him a thunderous round of applause.
    Mr. Condom put down the brass lamp and turned serious.
    â€œNo environmental problem—not climate change, not species extinction, not poverty—will be solved without addressing the birth mother of them all: the human population explosion.”
    He then launched into a population PowerPoint—irreverent, funny, hard hitting.
    It started off brutal. After all, cataclysmic, exponential growth rates are not an easy pill to swallow. Seven-plus billion of us on the planet. Seventy-plus million new us coming on board each year. Those countries and regions of the world most stressed and least able to handle it were the ones getting hammered with the greatest increases in population. Those people struggling the most, barely getting by, hungry and desperate and already driven to despair, were the ones having the most children.
    He led us to the abyss, had us peer into the yawning chasm, and then gently guided us back.
    â€œI am not a two-point-plan man, preaching gloom and doom. Your professor and I share the same mantra: ‘Better to be an optimist and a fool, than a pessimist and right.’ However, I am quite convinced that I can actually be three of those four.
    â€œI know I’m a fool. I am confident I have done a more than adequate job of convincing you of that today.
    â€œI know I’m an optimist. I wake up every day knowing that things will get better. The world is a beautiful place and I do believe it will stay that way no matter how much we humans attempt to screw it up.
    â€œAnd I am entirely arrogant enough to honestly, truly, deeply believe that I, like your professor, am right.”
    I basked in the glory of being singled out by him.
    He pointed to dramatic reductions in developing countries’ birthrates over the last few decades. He correlatedthe rise of maternal health programs, reduction of infant mortality, and increased access to education, particularly among girls and women, with profound reductions in population growth. He charted a realistic path toward zero and even negative growth. His optimism was compelling and contagious.
    An hour and a quarter had flown by. It was close to the end of class. Mr. Condom exited out of his PowerPoint, then turned and faced my students.
    â€œHow many of you plan on having sex tonight?” he asked, dramatically pausing for just a moment to chuckle at the stunned looks. “Don’t answer that. Although I encourage you to do so. It is