Climate change plus greed
Arwa Mahdawi on the fires and women and Musk:
On Wednesday, for example, Musk took some time out from obsessively tweeting about whether the US should “liberate” Britain to proclaim that the Los Angeles fire department (LAFD) “prioritized DEI over saving lives and homes”. He has continued to post spurious claims about diversity initiatives (for example, “DEI means people DIE”) for days now, along with posts insinuating that if LAFD’s fire chief weren’t a woman, then things would be very different.
If only no one were a woman. You know? Wouldn’t that be great? Male competence replacing female incompetence everywhere? Imagine the efficiency, the inspiration, the superhuman strength.
There are, to be clear, various nuanced issues that have contributed to the wildfires spreading with the ferocity that they have. But the climate crisis is clearly a major factor. According to one 2021 study, climate change has been the main driver of the increase in fire weather in the western United States. Greed and hubris are other factors: speculators keep building houses in areas that are prone to flooding and wildfires. There’s a much-cited essay from 1995 by urban theorist Mike Davis called The Case for Letting Malibu Burn that later became a chapter in a book called Ecology of Fear. In it, Davis argues that spending millions saving homes in areas never meant for neighborhoods and power lines is not just foolish, but a waste of public resources.
Malibu and Pacific Palisades feature houses built on the beach; not just near the beach but on it. Little monopolies on beach and ocean. I consider that terrible urban planning even before fires and droughts come into it; I don’t think there should be any monopolies on beaches and oceans and other large bodies of water.
“I’m infamous for suggesting that the broader public should not have to pay a cent to protect or rebuild mansions on sites that will inevitably burn every 20 or 25 years,” Davis told the LA Times in 2018, when the Woolsey fire broke out in Malibu. “My opinion hasn’t changed.”
So now it’s every seven years. Or five, or two, or just non-stop.
Yes, but…
Males are clearly superior to females in every area, but certain tasks are beneath their dignity, and only detract from their time doing truly important things. Women need to be kept around in limited capacity to make sandwiches, run vacuum cleaners, and change diapers…even though men are well known to be better at those tasks than women. /s
This is one thing that the Australian colonies got right, and from the very beginning. There are a few private offshore islands, but no private beaches on the mainland. Free and open access for all of the human species: female, male, transwhatever; even the odd knuckle-walking politician.
But no dogs; officially.
And not just private beaches; private beaches that erode. Then the owners put up jetties or groins, which cause increased erosion for their neighbors, who erect their own jetties or groins, and so on it goes, down the beach, with everyone crapping on everyone else, and by the time you get to the end of the private beaches, well, the wild area will just erode, because all the sand has been prevented from arriving there in a natural progression.
Nothing we do is without consequences.