The effects of climate change on the environment is a controversial issue that affects the entire world. Only recently have people started becoming aware of how climate change is affecting the planet. Years of Living Dangerously, an event put on for the Living in Retirement group, is a three-part video documentary about the effects of climate change.

The Learning in Retirement group (LIR) is a learning community established to help meet the wide range of interests of the area’s growing number of retired men and women. Years of Living Dangerously covers drought, forest and fire, and global warming. It features celebrities and well-known journalists, who travel the world talking to people who are experiencing the effects of global warming.

The first part of the documentary discusses topics such as the war in Syria, having started because of a record drought—leaving many farmers and their families with no work or food, the thousands upon millions of trees destroyed in Indonesia for use of palm oil, the deforestation that accounts for the same amount of emissions of all vehicles on earth, and the large population of people in religious sects who don’t believe in climate change.

Rita Jentz (82), head of Learning in Retirement at UW-L, commented on climate change, “This documentary made me feel quite alarmed. Being older I didn’t even realize the extent of what’s happening in Syria or Indonesia. We need to figure out a way to balance the good with the bad. Mankind is killing the planet, which surprisingly is something a lot of people don’t realize.”

Jentz expands, “I’m really worried about Trump’s new head of the EPA (Environmental Protection Agency). He could really cause some damage that will affect our grandkid’s grandkids. I guess I’m lucky because I’m old enough that I don’t get to see it. I worry for our future generations and wonder if they will have a planet to live on.

Another Learning in Retirement member, John Franks (70), stated his idea of helping change our current approach, “Think about how our lives would change and how our country would change if we took the young people out of the prisons and put them towards working on the environment. It’s dumb that there are so many nonviolent offenders filling up our prison system. We could use them.”

Franks elaborates, “We need to somehow get the big corporations to start caring about this earth. They are too overcome with greed and money to see the bigger picture. We need them to wake up.”

Franks continues, “There is no correct solution when it comes to climate change. All we can do as people is our part of reducing waste and emissions as well as getting more people to realize the damage we are doing, and it won’t happen overnight.”

People have many concerns when discussing climate change and its effects on the planet.  Issues are still arising and coming into the awareness of the masses. Various people believe if there isn’t substantial action taken soon we may not have a habitable planet. Everyone has the ability to do their part in reducing climate change, we will just have to see if it’s enough.