How to Re-Make the Climate-Change Horror Movie as a Rom-Com

Summary

---

Podcast Summary: "How to Re-Make the Climate-Change Horror Movie as a Rom-Com"

Pablo Torre Finds Out — October 4, 2024
Host: Pablo Torre | Guest: Dr. Ayana Elizabeth Johnson

---

Overview of the Episode

In this episode, Pablo Torre explores a fresh and unconventional approach to climate change: reimagining it not as a horror movie, but as a romantic comedy—complete with humor, pop culture references, and actionable optimism. With Dr. Ayana Elizabeth Johnson, marine biologist and climate communicator, they unpack how the climate narrative can shift from fear and guilt to stories that engage, inspire, and bring people together.

---

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Nature's Wild Sex Lives and Climate Change

[00:06–03:47]

• The episode begins on a playful, eyebrow-raising note, discussing how climate change even affects animal mating— from elephants’ reproductive challenges due to drought to lobsters’ “golden shower” rituals complicated by warming ocean waters.
• Quote: “How can we expect African elephants to effectively erect and artfully insert their 50-pound penises in the conditions of chronic drought that we've created for them?” — Perrin Ireland [00:06]
• Dr. Johnson explains that making climate change tangible—even through comedic, sex-ed-style skits—can break through apathy and motivate action.
• Quote: "Whatever motivates us to get it together and act on climate, I'm here for it." — Ayana Elizabeth Johnson [03:12]

2. The Culture vs. The Science

[03:47–09:12]

• Torrential hurricanes and presidential debates highlight public awareness, but measurable progress lags.
• Dr. Johnson argues that facts and guilt haven't driven sufficient action: “If the facts were enough, we would have dealt with this.” [06:47]
• The fossil fuel lobby's cultural influence is immense; thus, “We need to win the culture.” [07:08]
• Torre links this to “big tents” in US life—if sports and pop icons unite Americans, surely the planet can too.

3. The Power – and Dangers – of Language

[09:12–11:18]

• The phrase “carbon footprint” was BP PR spin to place the onus on individuals. Dr. Johnson and Torre note that focusing on individual responsibility distracts from systemic change.
• Quote: “This is a collective problem... Individualization of it all... has really slowed us down.” — Ayana Elizabeth Johnson [08:52]
• The choice of “climate change” (vs. “global warming”) is another PR move to soften perception. “People are less scared of climate change because it just sounds like, yeah, shit happens." — Johnson [09:56]

4. Visioning a Climate-Positive Future

[11:18–16:49]

• The hosts draw sports metaphors: “The Earth often feels like a team that is trading away all of its draft picks… the win-now Phoenix Suns going all in… and losing spectacularly.” — Pablo Torre [11:26]
• But: “About 75% of the infrastructure that's gonna be in place here on Earth in 2050 has yet to be built.” — Torre [11:54]. The future is still unwritten.
• Dr. Johnson lauds “Black Panther” as a pop culture vision of a sustainable world.
• Hollywood tends to make climate movies as horrors or disaster flicks. Johnson argues for rom-coms—stories where climate change solutions are normalized backdrops, not just existential threats.
• Quote: “Give me some climate rom coms… the meet-cute at the composting facility.” — Ayana Elizabeth Johnson [15:52]

5. Culture Drives Policy: The Scully Effect

[16:49–18:59]

• Torre describes “the Scully Effect,” where two-thirds of women in STEM cite Dana Scully, an X-Files character, as inspiration, not infomercials or dread.
• Pop culture characters in films inspire real-world solutions and career choices.

6. Who Controls the Purse Strings? Systemic Change and Divestment

[19:00–24:07]

• Fossil fuel companies and the banks that fund them are at the heart of the problem. The top US banks have channeled $1.5 trillion into fossil fuel industries post-Paris Agreement.
• Policy change—like ending fossil fuel subsidies—and personal finance (divesting from fossil-funding banks, greening retirement investments) are crucial.
• Quote: “We just stop funding the bad stuff and start really funding the good stuff.” — Johnson [19:42]

Resource Recommendations:

• bankforgood.org
• greenportfolio.com

7. Corporate and Sports Influence on Climate

[24:07–25:10]

• Companies like Patagonia are “trying to get it right,” but they need larger players to follow for real impact.
• Sports brands (Nike, Adidas, etc.) can set sustainability trends, given their cultural reach.

8. Earth vs. Mars – Why Invest Here?

[25:30–28:47]

• An onstage mock game show pitted “Team Earth” vs. “Team Mars,” lampooning the fantasy of interplanetary escape as a distraction from saving Earth.
• Earth's unique habitability and biodiversity far outshine any Mars “dream.” “We have everyone we love here... delicious food... even with climate change, [Earth's] temperature is much better than any other planet.” — Johnson [27:14]

9. Local Lenses: Fisheries, Regulation, and Community

[28:48–31:43]

• Johnson shares insights from working with Caribbean fishers: blame for ecosystem decline is often misdirected solely at them instead of broader systemic polluters.
• Fishermen see cruise ships, pollution, and foreign industrial boats as key threats, and are open to regulation as part of a holistic solution rather than scapegoated as the cause.

10. Defining Success: The Best Possible Future

[31:43–33:17]

• “It's not like we’re solving climate change; we’re trying to just create the best possible future in that spectrum of options.” — Johnson [31:50]
• Incremental improvements (e.g., 3°F vs. 5°F warming) matter immensely in real-world impacts.

11. Sports and the Tangible Effects of Climate

[33:17–35:22]

• Changing climate already impacts sports events—Olympics with extreme heat, altered rules and breaks, diminishing sites for Winter Olympics, outdoor air pollution.
• “One benefit to confronting the climate crisis: we could just play more sports.” — Johnson [35:24]

12. Political Stakes and the 2024 Election

[35:46–39:42]

• Johnson details Trump’s direct offers to fossil fuel executives and the rollback of 100+ regulations during his presidency.
• Quote: “He is selling federal policy to the highest bidder, which is so disgusting and so dangerous.” — Johnson [36:18]
• The US is “the Michael Jordan of emitting” (Torre [38:24]), and its leadership still matters globally.
• Johnson credits Kamala Harris for her legacy of climate advocacy, from prosecuting fossil fuel companies to being a decisive vote on the Inflation Reduction Act.

13. Effective Messaging: Love and Future Generations

[40:29–41:32]

• Johnson reveals that love for future generations tests as twelve times more effective than facts or fear in motivating action.
• Quote: “It’s not fear versus hope. It’s love for the people who will actually inherit this thing.” — Pablo Torre [41:15]
• The conversation comes full circle with a memorable (and hilariously explicit) call to allow lobsters, and indeed future generations, to “find love in peace.” [41:52]

---

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “Whatever motivates us to get it together and act on climate, I’m here for it.” — Ayana Elizabeth Johnson [03:12]
• “We need to win the culture.” — Johnson [07:08]
• “This is a collective problem... individualization... has really slowed us down.” — Johnson [08:52]
• “People are less scared of climate change because it just sounds like, yeah, shit happens.” — Johnson [09:56]
• “The Earth often feels like a team that is trading away all its draft picks… the win-now Phoenix Suns going all in… and losing spectacularly.” — Torre [11:26]
• “Give me some climate rom coms—the meet-cute at the composting facility.” — Johnson [15:52]
• “We have everyone we love here... delicious food... even with climate change, [Earth's] temperature is much better than any other planet.” — Johnson [27:14]
• “We’re not solving the problem of climate change; we’re trying to just create the best possible future.” — Johnson [31:50]
• “It's not fear versus hope. It's love for the people who will actually inherit this thing.” — Torre [41:15]
• “Wouldn’t it be great if this lobster could pee on another lobster? In peace.” — Pablo Torre [41:52]

---

Timestamps for Important Segments

• 00:06–03:47: Sex lives of animals, climate variety show, using comedy for climate education
• 03:47–09:12: Hurricanes, politics, culture wars, the limits of fact-based persuasion
• 09:12–11:18: Power of language, PR strategies, shifting narrative from personal “footprint” to systemic reform
• 11:18–16:49: Infrastructure yet to be built, visioning positive futures, pop culture’s potential
• 16:49–18:59: The Scully Effect, aspirational storytelling
• 19:00–24:07: Trillions in fossil finance, actionable personal divestment
• 24:07–25:10: Corporate and sports world potential for outsized influence
• 25:30–28:47: Earth vs. Mars comedy bit; why saving Earth matters
• 28:48–31:43: Fisheries, human factors, and fairness in policy
• 31:43–33:17: Redefining success — “best possible future,” every degree matters
• 33:17–35:22: Climate realities impacting sports and activity
• 35:46–39:42: 2024 election, political leadership, US global impact
• 40:29–41:32: What messaging actually works—love for the future

---

Conclusion

This episode makes the case that the stories we tell about climate define our willingness to act. By shifting toward hope, humor, and love—for each other, for future generations, for even horny lobsters—Dr. Ayana Elizabeth Johnson and Pablo Torre argue we can build broad, joyful coalitions that inspire real change, moving beyond stale doom-and-gloom narratives. And maybe, just maybe, make a good rom-com along the way.

---

Transcript

[Pablo Torre]

Welcome to Pablo Torre Finds Out. I am Pablo Torre, and today we're going to find out what this sound is.

[Perrin Ireland]

How can we expect African elephants to effectively erect and artfully insert their 50 pound penises in the conditions of chronic drought that we've created for them?

[Pablo Torre]

Right after this ad.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

You're listening to Giraffe Kings Network.

[Pablo Torre]

I was taking my notes in the audience at the Brooklyn Museum at this big kickoff event for you and your new book. And I looked back at it this morning, the morning after, and I was like, lobster plus golden showers. Can you explain why I'm not the perv for just unilaterally demanding that we.

[Host/Interviewer (possibly Pablo Torre or another host)]

Talk about this for a sec?

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

There is no better place to start this conversation. So Perrin Ireland is this incredible illustrator writer, but on Instagram, what she's known for is explaining the sex lives of different species while Hula Hooping in, like, graphic detail. And like, nature is freaky.

[Perrin Ireland]

Today on Thirsty Science, the magical sea cucumber anus. Sea cucumbers use their buttholes when they're reproducing and they need more oxygen because they're consuming a lot of energy. They use their butthole to breathe.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

When I was trying to put together this variety show, I was like, I really need you to do, like, a climate version of this, right?

[Pablo Torre]

Red dress, hula hoop, explain to us.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

How climate change is up, the sex lives of other species, and how it's our job to address the climate crisis so they can just all peace.

[Pablo Torre]

Right? Right. How are we up there, ex?

[Perrin Ireland]

When a lady lobster is interested in a male lobster for reproductive purposes, she lingers outside his den and urinates all over her out of her face. If he's interested in the pheromones she's producing, she invites him inside. She sheds her exoskeleton, offers him her tender flesh. He clambers atop her, inseminates her, and they go their merry separate ways. But the Gulf of Maine, where these lobsters live, is warming 99% faster than most of the world's oceans now, isn't it? So, Brooklyn, how do you expect lobsters to find love when lady lobsters are in deep channels further and further off the coast and male lobsters are staying in the Gulf of Maine, how shall the sacred ancient rite of the golden shower persist?

[Pablo Torre]

This is not what I think people expect when they show up at an event about the future of the climate.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

Well, it was called Climate Variety show, and I take variety, like, very seriously.

[Perrin Ireland]

How can we expect African elephants to effectively erect and artfully insert their 50 pound penises in the conditions of chronic drought that we've created for them.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

You know, whatever motivates us to get it together and act on climate, I'm here for it.

[Pablo Torre]

Yeah, for me, it turned out an NC17 as it was framed. Climate event is right up the alley of Pablo Torre Fazo.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

There we go. We got you in.

[Host/Interviewer (possibly Pablo Torre or another host)]

All right, so it has been one hell of a week for the climate here on planet Earth. Hurricane Helene just carved a terrifying 500 mile path from Florida's Gulf coast up to the Appalachian Mountains in Virginia and into the top of Tuesday's vice presidential debate.

[News Anchor]

Let's turn now to Hurricane Helene. The storm could become one of the deadliest on record. More than 160 people are dead and hundreds more are missing. Scientists say climate change makes these hurricanes rising larger, stronger and more deadly because of the historic rainfall. Senator Vance, According to CBS News polling, 7 in 10Americans and more than 60% of Republicans under the age of 45 favor the U.S. taking steps to try and reduce climate change. Senator, what responsibility would the Trump administration have to try and reduce the impact of climate change? I'll give you two minutes.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

Sure.

[Host/Interviewer (possibly Pablo Torre or another host)]

So first of all, let's, let's start with the hurricane. Because the reality of this kind of climate change discussion, the hushed tones, the appropriate seriousness and the futility, is that we have all seen this movie before. We have, and nothing's really changed. And so what I wanted to do here was talk to an expert who believes that we absolutely should take climate change seriously, but also take ourselves somewhat less. So Dr. Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson was the co host of the aforementioned Brooklyn Climate Variety show, the co founder of the.

[Pablo Torre]

Urban Ocean Lab, a non profit think.

[Host/Interviewer (possibly Pablo Torre or another host)]

Tank, a marine biologist, a policy expert, and the author of the new New York Times bestseller what if We Get It? Visions of Climate Futures. But maybe most importantly for our purposes, Ayanna is also that person that people tend to approach while they're out late at a party, maybe a little drunk with a burning question.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

So it's like late at night at a party and people come up and they're like, so how are we? And I'm like, oh, oh, hi. You've had a few drinks and now you're worried about the future of life on Earth?

[Pablo Torre]

Yes.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

And I'm just like, I don't know, are you gonn or not? This is like the absolute curse of the group project. You know, you can only carry so many people along with you on a group project and like 8 billion humans, like no one can carry that.

[Interviewer/Panelist]

Right.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

I mean, we're pretty. But we do still have this range of possible futures, and wouldn't it be great to have one of the better ones? And can we stop, please, pretending that it's this binary between apocalypse and paradise? Yes.

[Pablo Torre]

When did it become clear that the implicit guilt of reality was not going to be enough of a prod to action here?

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

Well, I mean, we've had the science on climate change for decades, Right. So, like, if the facts were enough, if the sort of, like, guilt and concern were enough, we would have dealt with this.

[Interviewer/Panelist]

Right.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

But to overcome the intense, you know, lobbying power of the fossil fuel industry.

[Pablo Torre]

Yes.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

And all the politicians they have in their pockets and the banks that are financing it.

[Interviewer/Panelist]

All right.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

We're going to need to win the culture. Culture war.

[Pablo Torre]

Culture war being the preferred terrain for climate science denialists. It raised a parallel thought for me as somebody who covers sports and thinks about culture war, because there are only so many, I call them, like, you know, big tents left in American life. Sports being a monocultural one, the NFL, Taylor Swift. I talk about this stuff ad nauseam on the show. It occurred to me that an even bigger tent is the actual planet.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

Also, like, we shouldn't be fighting about this. We should be collaborating about this, you know, and I feel like it's only in the last decade or two that we've. This issue has become polarized.

[Pablo Torre]

So the vocabulary around all of this is also fascinating to me because I try to be a student of when and how we are being spun by very clever people who know maybe sometimes better than we like to admit, how to communicate to a broad audience.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

Yeah.

[Host/Interviewer (possibly Pablo Torre or another host)]

So even the choice of the word.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

Carbon footprint, the term carbon footprint was actually a marketing campaign that Ogilvy PR firm did for bp. Ogilvy was the PR company that came up with this campaign to basically say, let's put the blame on individuals and call it your individual carbon footprint and say it's your responsibility to lower it while we keep selling you this stuff. Of course, we should all be doing everything we can as individuals. I don't want to, like, diminish the importance of that. But so many times we don't have the choices we need as individuals because these things are things we don't have control over.

[Interviewer/Panelist]

Right.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

Like if you live in an apartment in New York City, you don't get to decide where your energy comes from when you turn on the light switch. Like, this is a collective problem. So this individualization of it all, instead of thinking about this as like a community, societal Challenge, I think, is just like, really slowed us down.

[Pablo Torre]

Yeah, the acceptance of the terms of the debate in literal senses.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

And people feel so guilty.

[Pablo Torre]

Again, I think of like the death tax versus the estate tax. This thing that Frank Luntz, famous pollster, helped Newt Gingrich realize.

[Frank Luntz]

Tax. And when people challenge it. I have a simple question, John. What triggers this tax? What event triggers this tax when it's applied?

[Host/Interviewer (possibly Pablo Torre or another host)]

Your death.

[Frank Luntz]

Exactly. And that ends the debate.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

Frank Lunds also did the shift from global warming to climate change.

[Pablo Torre]

I was gonna ask his group about that. What did that do? What are we. What should we be framing this as when it comes to those very terms?

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

So global warming as a term is accurate, and climate change is also accurate, but people are less scared of climate change because it just sounds like, yeah, shit happens. You know, things change.

[Pablo Torre]

We're all changing.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

Change is good. But yeah, I mean, that was the shift in that term, based on his, like, focus groups, that we would have less societal pressure on government to do something about it if we just called it change instead of warming.

[Pablo Torre]

Right, right. It's a parallel again to like pro life, as.

[Host/Interviewer (possibly Pablo Torre or another host)]

As.

[Pablo Torre]

Again the default, like, who's anti life? It's just amazing to me how effective it is when you have to speak the language that someone else has set up for you.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

I do clearly think constantly about word choice, and I'm always kind of trying to find new and, yeah, more welcoming ways to. To talk about this stuff. So would be glad for any tips, any sports analogies or metaphors I could maybe be deploying here.

[Pablo Torre]

Oh, that's a good.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

I'm. I'm really glad to have your help.

[Host/Interviewer (possibly Pablo Torre or another host)]

So.

[Pablo Torre]

I love a metaphor. Everybody who's ever listened to this show knows this. It's kind of a weakness, honestly.

[Host/Interviewer (possibly Pablo Torre or another host)]

And it does occur to me that the Earth often feels like a team that is trading away all of its.

[Pablo Torre]

Draft picks and effectively over its future.

[Host/Interviewer (possibly Pablo Torre or another host)]

As if the world is ending anyway. We're basically the win now. Phoenix Suns going all in on Kevin Durant and Bradley Beal and losing spectacularly.

[Pablo Torre]

While, you know, the actual sun is.

[Host/Interviewer (possibly Pablo Torre or another host)]

Putting all of us on the hot.

[Pablo Torre]

Seat, as it were.

[Host/Interviewer (possibly Pablo Torre or another host)]

But there is also another way of seeing our future, Another relevant statistic, which reading Ayanna's book first opened my eyes to. Because as of today, about 75% of the infrastructure that's gonna be in place here on Earth in 2050 has yet to be built. Meaning that we do still have a real chance to physically construct a very different kind of home for ourselves. That future has not yet been decided. We could make it something beautiful, something artistically inspiring, instead of foregone and dystopian. But what we don't do nearly enough of as a pop cultural exercise is even begin to imagine what that could look like.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

One of the best examples we have in popular culture of climate futurism, of a society in which we have just deployed the solutions that we have on renewable energy and conserving and protecting nature and green buildings, et cetera, is Black Panther. We are home. Powered by Vibranium. You have green buildings and trolleys in the city, magnetic trains. Yeah. You have lush green landscapes with forests and rolling green hills and, you know, herds of animals. And then like, wham, you're in the city. There's no urban sprawl. There's no stupid suburbs.

[Interviewer/Panelist]

Right.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

There's not a bunch of, like, twisty concrete highways. It's gorgeous.

[Pablo Torre]

So how to market this, how to present it to people? You mentioned already movies and film. And by the way, it reminds me of a thing that I found out in your book, which is that Adam McKay, excellent, of course, director of Don't look up and the Big Short and Anchorman, all this stuff. What Adam says is that he is not allowed to talk about climate change at home because, you know, you don't want to be Debbie Downer.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

Yeah.

[Pablo Torre]

And so if the movie guy is like, okay, time to figure out how to. How to cinematically present this stuff. I think about the ways in which climate has been presented in Hollywood. The Day After Tomorrow, which I remember watching stoned in a movie theater and being like, oh, they're doing the thing where they're anthropomorphizing the cold. Like they're running away from the future in the most literalized way. They are presenting it in the most conventional, let's make climate into a monster.

[Host/Interviewer (possibly Pablo Torre or another host)]

And I feel like in your book.

[Pablo Torre]

What you're talking about is what about, like, rom coms?

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

Yes.

[Pablo Torre]

How can we expand beyond just the sci fi horror movie version of this?

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

So Adam's film, Don't Look Up, I really liked it. So I'm gonna say this not to critique him at all. I'm really grateful for his contributions to this work. I adore him. But because I think others who are listening may be able to relate to this, that, like, once you're first digging in and learning about climate change and you're learning all the terrifying possibilities and the trajectories that we're. It's so overwhelming. And you're like, holy shit, do we even have a chance. And, like, one of the inflections out of that is like a why bother? And the other one is, like, running around like, oh, my God, did you know about this?

[Pablo Torre]

Yes.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

Like, we should all be freaking out about this.

[Interviewer/Panelist]

Right.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

I feel like when we start to get Hollywood involved in this more and more, I mean, I don't think we need more documentaries. I don't think that that's going to help. But I would love more climate narratives in films. And I just really. They're not all apocalyptic because it doesn't give us something to work towards or for or imagine being a part of and rolling up our sleeves on and helping to make happen or just part of, like, the world we live. Like the context within which all of these plots are unfolding.

[Interviewer/Panelist]

Right.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

So that's why I'm like, give me some climate rom coms. Like, give me the meat queued at the composting facility. Or like, yes, Emily and compost Emily in Paris. Like, going to a city council meeting, seeing some incredibly hotel Parisian guy advocating for better bike lane design and being like, swoon. You know, like, all this stuff is happening in the real world.

[Interviewer/Panelist]

Right.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

People are making decisions about how to, you know, whether and how and where to have kids based on their concerns about climate change. People are thinking about, like, what kinds of degrees they want to pursue because they're thinking about the kinds of future they're going to be graduating into.

[Interviewer/Panelist]

Right.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

Like, ignoring all of this is ignoring reality. And I feel like Hollywood's absolutely, you know, tv, you know, scripted sitcoms, etcetera, have really just had their heads in the sand on this.

[Interviewer/Panelist]

Yeah, yeah.

[Pablo Torre]

It's hard to not accidentally pun every sort of conclusion here, but I'll continue to do it.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

Okay.

[Pablo Torre]

By pointing out that, yeah, politics, policy is often downstream from culture, from entertainment.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

Absolutely.

[Pablo Torre]

And so there's another part of your book where I was like, oh, this is. This is a thing that I need to remember. It's the Scully effect. Approximately 2/3 of women in STEM during the certain period in the last 20 years cite Dana Scully from the X Files as the reason they got into STEM in the first place.

[Interviewer/Panelist]

Right.

[Pablo Torre]

The idea of I want to be that character that I admire think is cool, think is badass. It was not motivated by an infomercial for science and technology, like Back to the Future, too.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

And all these ways in which our technology was inspired by film, that our career choices can be inspired by film, too, and the kinds of things, solutions that we want to work on in society.

[Interviewer/Panelist]

Right.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

So Black Panther I think is potentially another example of that with the Shuri character who's like this brilliant young scientist.

[Interviewer/Panelist]

Right.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

Coming up with all these cool solutions.

[Shell Eco Marathon Student]

Here are your communication devices for Korea, Unlimited range. Also equipped with audio surveillance system. Check these out. Remote access Kimoyo Beats updated to interface directly with my sand table.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

And then of course, I turn around and see that actress who played that character in like a Shell Oil ad or something.

[Pablo Torre]

Yeah.

[Shell Eco Marathon Student]

Today I'm meeting four students who are involved in Shell Eco Marathon. They have to design and build ultra energy efficient vehicles. I really want to understand what it takes to be involved in the STEM movement. I call it a movement because I believe it's very powerful.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

And I was like, homegirl, this is not helping, like get the bag, but there must be a better way.

[Pablo Torre]

Counting on you. But now when you re examine her doing that through what we've just discussed, of course they, yeah, are clever enough to see that territory in this battle and claim.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

But also they are just like putting in the money.

[Interviewer/Panelist]

Right?

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

Like there's no money on the other side.

[Interviewer/Panelist]

Right?

[Pablo Torre]

Yeah.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

But the people who are most concerned about climate change, even though they know how serious it is, just like, aren't investing with the speed that we would want. They're sitting on so much money as if it's like the whole philanthropy thing, right? Where it's like you have an endowment and every year you spend like 1 to 5% of your endowment. I'm like, if you really believe that the future of life on this planet for humans in particular is as tenuous as you do, then maybe pace yourselves slightly differently. You know, like, what are you waiting for?

[Pablo Torre]

The purse strings?

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

Yeah.

[Pablo Torre]

Philanthropists, Government dollars and cents. Yeah. What are we, what are we really talking about? What, what needs to happen there?

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

Well, we just stop funding the bad stuff and start really funding the good stuff. The thing that blows my mind is the US government is still subsidizing fossil fuels to the tune of millions of dollars a day, which is wildly irrational and obviously counterproductive. Instead of really investing in this clean energy transition. And you know, banks are a big part of that too. The big banks are still funding the expansion of the fossil fuel industry. So it's one thing to blame the fossil fuel industry, but then it's like the banks that are financing them. And in the US the top four banks, JPMorgan Chase, Citibank, Wells Fargo and Bank of America have, since we all agreed we should reduce emissions, provided about $1.5 trillion of funding to fossil fuel corporations. I would argue that that is going in the wrong direction. And we should put that money into clean energy and really just embrace clean energy and energy efficiency and these different ways of getting around and appliances, et cetera, as upgrades.

[Pablo Torre]

Well, that's, that's the thing again, this language question of like, yeah, they're trying to take your gas stoves. This is being an abrogation of.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

Induction stoves are awesome. They boil water so much faster. You're not spewing like literal toxins into your home that cause asthma in kids and having leading to very poor indoor air quality.

[Interviewer/Panelist]

Right.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

Like you're breathing in natural gas in your house. It's also dangerous in terms of combustibility. Like, why would we do that unless we had a. We have better options now, right?

[Pablo Torre]

If you want the new iPhone, why don't you want the new best version of a stove?

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

Also, electric cars accelerate much better than gas cars, actually, because less of the energy goes into combustion. It can all go into forward motion.

[Pablo Torre]

But can you get those sounds? Can you get. Can you. Can we get.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

You can. Which I really don't want us to. There are electric motorcycles now with fake muffler combustion sounds.

[Pablo Torre]

And I'm like, there it is.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

Oh, the worst. Can't we just leave that in my bass too? So you're going to want to turn the volume all the way up. But I think it's important to mention that there is something that individuals can do. On the finance side, if you're saving for your retirement or you're investing your money, please think about where you're investing. Because if you don't, if you're just in some general fund for your 401k or your IRA or whatever, even just your savings account, odds are you're investing in the expansion of fossil fuels. Because so many of these banks are investing in the expansion of fossil fuels, right? Your credit card company, if it's JP Morgan Chase or Citi or bank of America or Wells Fargo, like that money is invested in fossil fuels. You give it to them to hold and then they put it out the door and invest it so they can make profits, right? And then give you back your piece of it. And so I move my money, my retirement savings, piddling though it may be, into a fund that's climate friendly. And we can all do that. It could do more good in reducing the harm you're doing to the climate than all the eating plants and riding your bike could possibly do. Because it's that bad to be financing the expansion of fossil fuels. So please, if you've Got any money in the bank at all? Bankforgood.org has some options and greenportfolio.com on the investing side that have, like a bunch of different options you can look at. But yeah, I mean, the money question, I think it's something like to reach our climate goals, we'd need to be spending $4 trillion annually on climate solutions. And let's be clear, there's like plenty of money in the world. It's just a matter of how we're allocating that.

[Pablo Torre]

Right. Which trillions are going where.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

And it's. It's government and it's private, it's corporations, it's philanthropy. I mean, there's a whole chapter in here about what corporations need to do to get it right that I co authored with Corlee Kenna, who's the head of policy and comms at Patagonia, where I'm on the board. They're trying to get it right. And it's a significant, you know, outdoor apparel company, but it's nothing like, you know, a Nike or an Adidas.

[Interviewer/Panelist]

Right.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

These big corporations that are shaping the whole market and so they can lead by example, but if no one follows them, it doesn't really make that much of a difference. So trying to evangelize and show that it can be profitable to do the.

[Pablo Torre]

Right thing again, in that overlap, maybe there's a place for sports to actually direct that monocultural funnel of money.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

Absolutely. And there's some great people I know, like, working in places like Nike trying to innovate on the sustainability front. I know some of them, I've collaborated with them.

[Interviewer/Panelist]

Right.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

But it's hard to shift a global supply chain like that. I respect the challenge of it. We've created this whole economy, supply chain culture based on fossil fuels, and now we have to shift somehow very quickly to a much more regenerative, renewable economy, a clean energy world. And we've never had to do that before as humans. So we're just like making it up as we go along. And I think we need to give each other some grace there.

[Pablo Torre]

But also, you know, also just do it.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

That was good. I like that. I'm a little slow on the sports jokes. Thank you.

[Pablo Torre]

There's another part of your work in this book and at that event, the Brooklyn Museum that did also drive home the point of we got one shot at this. I have been guilty of being enthralled by this initially, the idea of humanity being a multi planetary species. Oh, yeah, Mars.

[Host/Interviewer (possibly Pablo Torre or another host)]

We should.

[Pablo Torre]

In fact, Mars should be part of our approach. To.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

I mean, it's a cute idea is how I would describe it.

[Pablo Torre]

But now, given your journey through this, how would you describe Earth and Mars in this?

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

Yeah. We had this game show, Earth vs Mars, with Roy Wood Jr as the host. And why it's, as you know, repping Mars. And Dr. Kate Marvel, NASA climate scientist.

[Pablo Torre]

Repping Earth, real name.

[Roy Wood Jr.]

Welcome to Earth vs Mars, where we go toe to toe to see which planet steals the show. Some people say we need to go to Mars. Some people say that Earth is where it's at. We are gonna find out whether or not interplanetary gentrification is the right move.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

I think it was very clear that Earth is the best planet. The outcome of that.

[Roy Wood Jr.]

Dr. Marvel, I will start with you make the argument for us staying on Earth and not gentrifying Mars, based sol on Earth's supply of food and water. Drama, music.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

We have both of those things.

[Host/Interviewer (possibly Pablo Torre or another host)]

Sure, sure.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

I rest my case. Sure.

[Interviewer/Panelist]

All right.

[Host/Interviewer (possibly Pablo Torre or another host)]

That is a fair point.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

Yeah.

[Host/Interviewer (possibly Pablo Torre or another host)]

There is no food or water on Mars at the moment.

[Pablo Torre]

Wyatt was really dealt a bad hand.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

Yeah. I mean, he knew what he was signing up. Yeah.

[Pablo Torre]

Polling was.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

I mean, we have an atmosphere where we can breathe. We have 8 million other species. We have this incredible biodiversity. We have, like, a gorgeous ocean.

[Interviewer/Panelist]

Right.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

We have everyone we love here. We have all this delicious food here. The temperature, even with climate change, is much better than any other planet. We can actually just walk around outside with, like, normal amounts of clothing without a breathing apparatus or a spacesuit and just, like, hang out in fields of wildflowers and at the beach and like, make art and go look at it. And instead, we're like, let's take rocket ships across the void and, like, live in a weird container where the atmosphere is, like, not suitable for human life and it's, like, 100 degrees below zero. Like, why would that be an alternative to pursue?

[Pablo Torre]

Right. Let's get the people who are posting and consuming these videos on Twitter about how New York City has become a hellscape.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

Look at this. Look at how they just leave the garbage so full.

[Pablo Torre]

They would love going to the place where you would die within a month if you actually went.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

I think it's just, like, such a distraction because we also, like, really need that ingenuity and those resources spent on this planet solving the problems that exist here. Because even if we find a way for some people to go live there, like, we've got 8 billion humans on this planet. Like, we're not all going to Mars.

[Interviewer/Panelist]

Right.

[Pablo Torre]

You know, it occurs to me Also that your. Your job of marine biologist.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

Yeah, I don't actually like scuba diving count fish anymore. It's been a really long time. But I. That is.

[Pablo Torre]

But your origin story, as, as, as that. It, it. It's one of those jobs. Again, I'm were both children of the 80s. It's one of those jobs where you go around the classroom and kids would say, I would like to be a marine biologist.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

Total dream job for like, elementary school kids.

[Pablo Torre]

And you are the only person I've ever met who became one.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

I don't know what that says about me. Just like, stubborn as hell or something. It's just like, you find something cool and you're like, maybe I'll be that when I grow up. But that was the first one and the one that, like, I kept coming back to in different ways. But I made this. I was, I could. Because I would say, very wise decision to study abroad in Turks and Caicos.

[Pablo Torre]

That's.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

I'm just gonna give myself a little credit there. And so I just like, spent a semester snorkeling, hanging out with fishermen, like, learning the Latin names of all these Caribbean coral species and trying to understand, like, how what would sustainable fisheries management actually look like? And so it's just so amazing to get to have that be part of my world and think about all the work I did with fishermen on different islands in the Caribbean after my PhD research and for my PhD research, just really trying to understand the human part of this. What people who spend their whole lives and have generations worth of knowledge about what these things are supposed to look like, how these ecosystems are supposed to work, and how off balance they are, how they could. I mean, my favorite question to ask fishermen is, if you could write the rules to manage fishing, what would they be?

[Pablo Torre]

What were the things they would say?

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

Oh, there are sorts of stuff that I would not have anticipated because so often the blame gets put solely on them for the decline in fish populations.

[Interviewer/Panelist]

Right.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

And I was guilty of this too. But in reality, of course, there are many different factors. Climate change being one of them, pollution being one of them. They blame cruise ships and jet skis for all the noise and pollution associated with that, scaring fish into deeper waters or further offshore. They're talking about big fishing boats from other countries coming in with big nets. They're talking about tourists with tons of sunscreen on, just like, slathered on right before they jump in the water. And then you see like, this iridescent sheen of like, oil slick on the surface. And they're like, the fish don't like that.

[Interviewer/Panelist]

Right.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

So they're seeing all these different factors and then the one policy put in place is like, we're gonn to regulate fishing. And they're like off you guys. Like, we didn't cause this by ourselves.

[Interviewer/Panelist]

Right.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

We're down to be regulated as part of the suite of solutions, but we're not down to be scapegoated as like the only problem here.

[Pablo Torre]

It's not quite that we are solving the problem of climate change. What instead are we trying to do?

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

We're trying to just create the best possible future.

[Interviewer/Panelist]

Right.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

In that spectrum of options that exist still. This perfect, this perfect world as we imagine it with like nothing changed, no pollution, that ship has sailed.

[Interviewer/Panelist]

Right.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

We also do not have to have complete apocalypse. And so how close to paradise can we get?

[Interviewer/Panelist]

Right.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

I think it's so important to actually value those increments because they are major. It's not like a tiny, like the difference between, you know, 3 degrees Fahrenheit of warming and 5 degrees Fahrenheit of warming is a huge deal.

[Interviewer/Panelist]

Right.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

We're talking about major differences in sea level rise and storms and droughts and wildfires and heat waves associated with that. You know, we have the challenge of communicating about both things that seem really, really, really big, planetary and really, really small, like a tenth of a degree. And how do those things match up and like how do we communicate about them? And my answer is I usually avoid it and just talk about the solutions. Like, okay, so we know we're in this planetary pickle. Where do we go from here? Like how do we each figure out our roles and just do this building of the future together instead of like just worrying all day about worst case scenarios.

[Pablo Torre]

It reminds me of a larger problem that we always, I think, are grappling with in politics and culture, which is how do you make your self interest feel immediate enough to act upon? And I should acknowledge that we are technically a sports show.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

Yeah, let's talk about sports.

[Pablo Torre]

I'm ready, sports fan. This is something that you want to go. Well, the whole adapt to the climate future you're describing thing.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

Yeah.

[Pablo Torre]

Because sports, we need the outdoors.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

A lot of sports happen outside. I mean, watching the Olympics this year, I mean Paris is not known for its heat waves, but it is now a place that has heat waves.

[Interviewer/Panelist]

Right.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

And it was so hot during the Olympics, like athletes were wearing ice packed vests before and after their events to just keep their core body temperature at a normal level.

[Interviewer/Panelist]

Right.

[Pablo Torre]

Not ideal. If you're the Competitor to have to do that.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

Crazy. And having to change literally the rules of the game to give people longer breaks or more water breaks. Because the human body is just not built for these kinds of climates, like extreme exertion in these temperatures and levels of humidity. And on, you know, the Winter Olympic side of things, we're talking about very few places left where you can reliably have Winter Olympics quality snow.

[Pablo Torre]

I'm not trying to watch a Winter Olympics that takes place inside of a soundstage.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

Yeah. Not as cute.

[Pablo Torre]

No.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

Yeah.

[Pablo Torre]

No, no. And I'm also not trying to watch a Summer Olympics where the river, the Seine is too dangerous for at least some of the competitors to want to actually compete in.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

And I think about air pollution associated with that too. Especially like the neighborhood I grew up in, Fort Greene didn't really used to have a lot of traffic, and now it's constant bumper to bumper traffic going by all those ball courts. And I'm just thinking about people exerting themselves breathing all in all of that pollution, which is just burning fossil fuels.

[Interviewer/Panelist]

Right.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

And so there are lots of benefits to dealing with the climate crisis. And one of them is like, we could just play more sports.

[Pablo Torre]

So when it comes to the, the political choice at hand, I do want to make this immediate. In, in the context of this election.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

Yeah.

[Pablo Torre]

In, in your mind, how compromised is Donald Trump when it comes to fossil fuel? Just actually, I, I get that he's not your preferred candidate.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

No, the reason I'm not that was my reaction was because there's a very specific thing he's done during this campaign season that shocked even me. And I have very low expectations for that man.

[Interviewer/Panelist]

Right.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

So he literally said to fossil fuel executives, if you donate $1 billion to my campaign, I will make sure that you get regulations lifted on your industry when I am back in the White House. And you will make like a hundred billion dollars in return. He's selling federal policy to the highest bidder, which is so disgusting and so dangerous.

[Interviewer/Panelist]

Right.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

I mean, the last time he was in the White House, he rolled back the federal agencies he, you know, was in charge of rolled back over 100 environmental regulations, Clean air, clean water, safety around fossil fuel extraction and practices, the Deepwater Horizon oil spill kind of stuff with the valves, he's like, whatever, who needs safety valves? Like those kind of regulations were rolled back as well. Took the United States out of the UN Climate agreement, which is like, we don't, we don't want to participate in this collective effort to address this crisis.

[Interviewer/Panelist]

Right.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

Appointed a literal Fossil fuel executive as the head of the State Department.

[Interviewer/Panelist]

Right.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

These are the kinds of things that we can expect him to do Again, like when people show you who they are, believe them.

[Pablo Torre]

Yeah, yeah. Rex Tillerson.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

Rex Tillerson.

[Pablo Torre]

Why?

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

That's the dude.

[Pablo Torre]

He seems nice.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

I mean there's, there's been an analysis of what could we expect as far as US Greenhouse gas emission trajectories if we have a reelection of Trump versus if we have a Harris administration and it's diverging futures. And it matters so much because the US Is not anymore the largest annual emitter of carbon pollution greenhouse gases, but it is the largest cumulative emitter in world history. We're responsible for something like a quarter of all greenhouse gas pollution. Just the United States.

[Pablo Torre]

We are the Michael Jordan of emitting.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

Greenhouse gym for going to be helpful. Yeah. But like, like, and also a lot of other countries look to us to either meet the standards we are setting or turn to us to say the US Isn't doing this, so why should we? So it actually really, really matters how we show up on the world stage. And I'm just really worried about. Yeah. What a Trump administration would mean. And I also think Harris doesn't get nearly enough credit for her leadership on climate.

[Interviewer/Panelist]

Right.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

Spanning decades of her career. I mean she has taken fossil fuel companies to court and extracted many millions of dollars in damages from them for their malpractices. Established a climate justice office when she was working in California, was, you know, one of the original signatories to the Green New Deal back when that was initially introduced, which was not immediately a popular thing to do and was the deciding vote on the Inflation Reduction act, which was signed two years ago and resulted in like $370 billion invested in climate solutions. US government really spurring something like 170,000 new clean energy jobs in the last two years because of that legislation.

[Interviewer/Panelist]

Right.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

But I do want to say that local elections also really, really matter in that climate romcom way. Like where are we having the meat cuts at the community composting facilities if we don't have city council members who are creating those?

[Interviewer/Panelist]

Right.

[Pablo Torre]

Yes.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

And the, like, the, like the cute side eye glances in the bike lane when you're stopped at the red light? Like, who is that hottie pedaling next to me? Like if you protected bike lanes.

[Pablo Torre]

Right. It happens to be local comptroller Glenn Powell who is shirtless and glistening with a sweat that can only be generated by someone who has been biking around for a very long time.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

I mean, I think there's A lot of fodder here for plots is all I'm saying.

[Pablo Torre]

You know, when it comes back around then, to any sort of lesson here about how to message this stuff.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

Yes.

[Pablo Torre]

In terms of, like, what actually does work with a broad population, what have you found out? Because the stuff that we've been trying for decades clearly has not worked.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

Love for future generations. That is the winning argument. And I have to say, I've been hearing people talk about this for a long time, like, use that messaging for so long. And as someone who knows that the problem is here and now, I'm like, why are we pretending this is a future thing? And it was just one of those things where I was just like, I don't know about all this mushy love stuff, you guys, but it's like, 12 times more effective as a message in the polling.

[Pablo Torre]

It's an echo of what we had seen from the right wing when it came to, you know, no Child Left Behind.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

Yeah.

[Pablo Torre]

When it came to, let's just hammer the idea that we are in favor of kids, that we are the ones protecting the children. And what it turns out is that, yeah, it's not fear versus hope. It's love for the people who will actually inherit this thing.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

And that's really a normal thing when you're exposed to nature to just think it's cool and so wanting to keep that around, whether that's whales or elephants or lobsters or whatever, just be like, wouldn't it be great to just not screw these other species over either?

[Interviewer/Panelist]

Right, right.

[Pablo Torre]

Wouldn't it be great if this lobster could pee on another lobster? In peace.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

In peace. And then just, like, have some hot sex and make more lobster, but, like, not too hot?

[Pablo Torre]

Well, I was gonna say.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

Yeah, I was gonna say hot sex, not hot ocean water. Let me. Let me just be really clear about that.

[Host/Interviewer (possibly Pablo Torre or another host)]

That's right.

[Pablo Torre]

Soft shell, temperate, not too hot water.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

Yep.

[Pablo Torre]

Dr. Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson, thank you for proposing a different way to, you know, get it right.

[Ayanna Elizabeth Johnson]

Thank you for having me. Pablo Let.

[Pablo Torre]

Pablo Torre finds Out is produced by Michael Antonucci, Walter Averoma, Ryan Cortez, Sam Daywig, Juan Galindo, Patrick Kim, neely Loman, Rob McCray, Rachel Miller, Howard Ethan Schreier, Carl Scott, Matt Sullivan, Chris To Manello and Juliet Warren.

[Host/Interviewer (possibly Pablo Torre or another host)]

Our studio engineering by RG Systems. Our sound design by NGW Post. Our theme song, as always, is by John Bravo.

[Pablo Torre]

And all of us will talk to you on Tuesday.