We really hate ourselves, don’t we?

Right now, in Delhi the air quality index is apocalyptic. The air is thick with a metallic stench. The streets are opaque as young and old struggle to breathe.

Forest fire? Chemical plant catastrophe? Nuclear plant meltdown?

Nope. This is yet another totally irrational self-inflicted wound. In defiance of all logic, the already polluted air has catastrophically worsened by millions of people lighting fireworks in celebration of Diwali.

This isn’t a critique of Indian culture or society. Millions in urban India refrain from bursting crackers, use safer alternatives, or advocate for bans. The current situation in Delhi is simply a microcosm of how a segment of each population around the world dismisses requests to alter their behavior as “intellectualism” that tramples on their rights.

Authorities, including doctors, in Delhi are pleading for restraint only to be met by maddening defiance. Requests to stop lighting fireworks are taken as an affront to religious freedom, motivating people to protest by lighting even more fireworks. As we’ve seen with evangelism in America, logic is often drowned out by tribalism, rejecting expertise as elitism.

When a handful of charismatic people with a pulpit lead by rejecting medical warnings as attacks on Hinduism, some members of their tribe blindly fall in line as a proclamation of their religious devotion. Indeed, a portion of the population is redlining at the suggestion their fellow citizen’s health should come before their right to burn firecrackers. Defiance becomes a test of piety.

Similar forms of tribalism have caused a resurgence of measles in North America. Apparently, 2 hours of “research” on Youtube outweighs the collective centuries of experience, research, and education across the medical community. It makes no sense, but here we are rejecting intellectualism in our own way.

Then come the whataboutisms. What about the Punjab farmers burning crop stubble? The wealthy driving SUVs? Animal sacrifices during Eid?

Anything except acknowledging that the air is lethal right now. They’d rather poison their children to score a point against an imagined enemy. Again, this draws direct parallels to political brinksmanship in the US, with each party motivated to one-up the other instead of performing their duty to their constituents.

By now the parallels to ideological infatuation of all stripes should be apparent. It is “unamerican” to be a vegan, drive a Prius, or reject consumerism. Goddammit nobody better take away my freedum to destroy this planet.

People have their “reasons”. Dogma makes it easier to close the cognitive dissonance.

Consumption is part of the Western identity. How dare you suggest someone not fly twice a year for vacation, take public transit, or be happy with what they’ve got. The effects of Western consumerism today are less tangible, with no smoke to part, but the connection to our eventual self-destruction is, by now, apparent to anyone paying attention. Most just choose to switch off the part of our brain that associates their actions with destructive outcomes. Devotion to a deity, book, or idol gives permission to do so. Worse, it herds some to outright fight to preserve those rights.

Calls by rational authority figures to alter this behavior is branded intellectualism or elitism, painted as a conspiratorial persecution and an attack on liberty.

Even those who acknowledge the destruction fail to accept accountability. Polluters point to other polluters. The West blames China, abdicating responsibility for the cumulative damage already committed. The developing world points to the West, which received a free pass since the start of the industrial revolution. So nobody really stops.

In the end, somebody pays. In Delhi it’s the residents, especially the very young and old. It’s the hospital system absorbing the damage to hearts and lungs. Globally, we all pay as weather crises explode insurance premiums or kill crops.

The individual has his fun, the economy grows GDP while the true costs of destruction are passed with utmost arrogance onto everyone else.

Best to recognize the shared guilt, lest the critique turn into another exercise in moral superiority. We have all lit our own firecrackers because we believe we have an unalienable right to do so. Whether through religious dogma or the cult of consumerism, we’ve somehow rationalized that it makes more sense to choke than create a brighter future.