Everyone, Even Skeptics, Have Climate Anxiety Or Something

That’s right, man-caused climate change skeptics, even you have climate anxiety

In US, climate anxiety churns up psychological storm

In the melting Arctic, communities are racing to maintain their way of life. In the rising Pacific, residents are sounding alarm bells. And in Rhode Island, Kate Schapira and her husband are not having a baby.

Fears about climate change are prompting worldwide action, but one knock-on effect in the United States is mounting anxiety about everything from plastics to class-based environmental disparities.

Schapira, a 40-year-old senior lecturer in the English department at Brown University, is addressing that unease in a number of ways. (snip)

So in 2014, Schapira started setting up a “climate anxiety” booth in public spaces, such as farmers’ markets. It’s a bit like Lucy’s psychiatry stall from the beloved comic “Peanuts.”

“Climate anxiety counseling, 5 cents. The doctor is in,” the booth’s sign reads, welcoming passersby in Providence to talk about their fears.

Yup, they’re all nuts. Or is it “we’re all nuts”?

For Lise Van Susteren, a Washington-based psychiatrist who has been studying the mental health impacts of climate change for 15 years, refusal to recognize the potential hazards is common for “people who are trying to deny that they too are vulnerable.”

“I actually have no hesitation in saying that on some level, I believe that everyone now has some climate anxiety,” Van Susteren said.