Reconsidering Watership Down Going Into COP28
Those rabbits have a lot to teach us about the climate crisis
Two years ago, I wrote an article called Waiting for Bigwig, using the archetypal rabbits from Richard Adams’ 1972 novel Watership Down to explain the power dynamics of the climate crisis. “Watership is an ecological novel,” I said, “for it is ultimately about the ruin humans bring when they collide with a purely natural environment.”
I wrote this in late 2021, right before COP26 (the annual UN Climate Change Conference or Conference of Parties). I felt, and still do, that we have as many Fivers (people crying harm! foul!) as we need.
“…at this point, diagnosing the problem is the easy part. Anybody who doesn’t recognize it now simply does not want to hear, to know, or to understand.”
Author, Waiting For Bigwig
I was hoping that (praying that!) somebody would emerge to take leadership and direction (like Hazel), and even more, that someone strong and compelling would force the world to take action during COP26 in Glasgow, insisting that our leaders prioritize the Paris Agreement with goals of limiting global warming to well below 2°C above pre-industrial levels, shooting for a limit of 1.5°C.
