Letter: The fate of civilisation is, in fact, in our hands (1)

From Jill Mills, St Albans, Hertfordshire, UK

I was concerned to read your leader on the possibility of civilisational collapse (20 January, p 5). You suggest that activists saw climate change as a “golden opportunity to further a political agenda: reining in corporations, regulating free markets and imposing environmental legislation”, and that these have prematurely politicised the science and caused “pushback” from the other side. That seems to me to turn the facts upon their head. Campaigners who call for regulation are reacting to evidence of environmental destruction, not causing corporate irresponsibility. You have articles almost every week calling for governments to act to prevent climate change and suggesting it may be too late.

I am astonished that you describe “inequality, population growth and resource depletion” as bugbears of the left. These are problems widely recognised by all those who make any sort of scientific analysis of climate change, and by all involved in helping people out of poverty.

Some activists may use more “isms” than I would like, but I wouldn't describe their agenda as being contentious or divisive.