As the amazon forest continues to burn, emitting carbon dioxide and destroying the lungs of the Earth, many people in western countries – white majority countries – continue to deny the unfolding climate crisis. Why is that?

Scientists admit that the primary victims of global warming are invariably going to be people living in poverty-stricken countries – where women are especially at risk. Worsening global conditions put these underprivileged classes of people at significant risk for becoming victims of starvation, natural disaster, and opportunistic imperialism.

The increasing rate of desertification in countries such as Africa is only going to accelerate as the white bourgeoisie continue to pump carbon dioxide into the atmosphere to meet the needs of our materialistic, capitalist, and privileged societies. With increasing opposition to explicit imperialist activities in the countries inhabited by people of color, whites have turned to a sort of imperialism by proxy. After all, if people are no longer able to farm in their own countries, the populations of these countries will inevitably fall victim to starvation and death; thinning the populations of people of color will increase their dependence on foreign nations, which will make it significantly easier to exploit them and steal their resources.

As if that weren’t bad enough, these underprivileged people of color are at an increased risk of falling victim to natural disaster. Scientists assert that we can expect to see an increase in catastrophic weather events that result from the increasingly volatile weather conditions generated by climate change. An increase in hurricanes, for example, will further decimate the populations of underprivileged countries and increase their dependence on privileged nations.

We already know that there is a clear correlation between poverty and war. As these desperate people become increasingly desperate, wars are likely to break out over what little food, water, and territory is left in the wake of this proxy-imperialism. White nations can then strategically exploit these nations under the guise of “foreign aid” and global policing. Let us not forget the debacle of the Iraq war, and the true capitalist-imperialist intention behind the initiation of that war. White nationalists have not changed, they have only gotten more sophisticated with their exploitation of the underprivileged.

White nationalists, with Trump as their figurehead, will continue to deny climate change because they know that they will be able to use their privilege to exploit the primary victims of its long-term effects. We must call this activity what it is: genocide. We must address the true underlying motivation for this continued denial: fascism. It’s time to end this imperialistic exploitation of people of color. It’s time to end this modern slavery.