FLASH
Shkruar nga Stuti Mishra 
The flames that are burning Los Angeles don't want to know about politics; who or what we blame, nor what we should do. The choice is clear: we can face the multifaceted crisis and fight for a livable future at every level, or let the world burn...
California is burning again. This time in mid-January. Thousands of homes are being demolished in one of the richest regions in the world. The flames are threatening Hollywood's most monumental locations, engulfing multi-million dollar mansions and forcing the evacuation of more than 130,000 residents.
The thick smoke has turned the city's famous skyline into a dystopian haze. So far, at least 10 people have died, over 2,000 buildings have burned down and more than 330,000 people have been left without power.
Everyone you can talk to today will tell you the same thing: wildfires are part of California's identity, but these latest ones are the most catastrophic they've experienced. However, the fires that break out from time to time in Los Angeles are not just another "natural disaster".
They are, in fact, the future that climate scientists have been warning us about for decades, and that today has arrived on the doorstep of some of the world's most influential people. And why did it take us so long to take the appropriate measures?
Southern California's transition from months of record rainfall to extreme drought has created the perfect conditions for the catastrophic wildfires now ravaging Los Angeles. Add to that the powerful Santa Ana winds, and we have fires moving at an unprecedented speed and scale.
Shifts from heavy rains to prolonged drought are not an isolated event. Scientists have repeatedly warned that heat trapped in the atmosphere is making natural disasters more frequent everywhere. And the climate crisis is not only making them more frequent, but also more unpredictable, stronger and harder to prepare for globally.
In Los Angeles, fire crews faced 4 times more calls for help than normal within hours of the fire starting, using millions of gallons of water. Their infrastructure no longer fits this new reality.
These fires are not “natural disasters.” They are man-made disasters; they are fueled by policies that have allowed the uncontrolled use of fossil fuels and misinformation to cloud public understanding, phenomena that are unfortunately expected to escalate.
Even as the great fires are wreaking havoc, the denial machine continues to succeed. A quick look at the X platform owned by Elon Musk shows that for many people the blame is on "diversity hiring".
So the deliberate recruitment of individuals from underrepresented or marginalized groups to promote a more diverse and inclusive, while ignoring the voices of climate scientists. In some right-wing media, the focus of the attacks has been the first lesbian chief of the Los Angeles Fire Department.
While many actors like Mark Hamill and Steve Guttenberg kept the public informed about the evacuations, and even helped out on the ground themselves, conservative actor James Woods — whose home in the Palisades is threatened — flatly denied the role of climate change, blaming the hiring of certain communities.
Meanwhile, Donald Trump claimed that California's water regulations, which have depleted firefighters' reserves, were the main culprit. Meanwhile, local officials cited aging infrastructure and the unprecedented high demand for help as the real culprits.
Janisse Quiñones, chief engineer and head of the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power, told reporters they had "4 times the normal demand" for 15 straight hours, which reduced the water pressure.
This misinformation isn't just ignorance, it's part of a well-known playbook of climate change denial that kicks in after every disaster that hits the US. And denial isn't just about rejecting science outright, it's also about playing blame games and deliberately fomenting confusion.
And if you think this is just a California problem; then think again. The same forces that are fueling these fires - rising temperatures, extreme weather and degraded infrastructure - are changing people's lives everywhere.
Last year, for example, extreme weather cost Americans over $500 billion in damages, from back-to-back hurricanes to deadly heat waves. Crops are regularly being destroyed in the Great Plateau. Cities in the Midwest are ravaged by relentless extreme heat waves every year.
Entire cities are being wiped off the map by floods, fires and storms. And the number of people affected is immeasurable: families displaced, livelihoods destroyed and communities torn apart. But any attempt to see these events as interconnected symptoms of a planet pushed to its limits is met with criticism.
Sadly, the misinformation campaigns will only increase with Trump's return to the Oval Office. During his first term, he withdrew the US from the Paris Agreement, sabotaged environmental protections and doubled oil and gas production.
Now, his new administration is poised to sign off on the start of more fossil fuel drilling, accelerating the climate crisis. And this is exactly what scientists have warned: the longer we delay action, the more severe the consequences will become.
Denial of this phenomenon is not mere ignorance; but an active obstacle to understanding a global problem. 2024 has been confirmed as the hottest year on record, beating 2023. The fires are just the latest in a series of severe disasters the world has experienced in the past 2 years.
The flames that are burning Los Angeles don't want to know about politics; who or what we blame, nor what we should do. The choice is clear: we can face the multifaceted crisis and fight for a livable future at every level, or let the world burn./ Adapted Pamphlet from "The Independent"
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