I remember when the terror of climate change first sank in for me in early 2008, and the seemingly stable world I thought I knew suddenly became a much more scary place. Everyday actions took on life or death consequences. For a while I was paralyzed by this fear, but as I moved forward into action and community, I began to feel empowered and equipped for this dangerous world.

This year a similar kind of fear took hold of our whole society. For many people, even a hug or a handshake can seem terrifying right now. Just today I listened to someone describe the sense of panic she felt when someone approached her without a mask. We have been taking necessary steps to protect each other from a very real danger, and at the same time, we have also been practicing being afraid of each other. As climate activists should know well at this point, even when the danger is very real, we still can’t allow ourselves to get lost in our own fear. Thinking out of fear too often makes us feel small and inclined toward dogmatism.

At some point, likely in the coming year, we will get past this pandemic. But there is no guarantee we will get past the fear. After 9/11, rights and freedoms were sacrificed in the name of one scary threat, and they never came back. Whether it’s the mass tracking of movements through cell phones or just the practice of seeing a person’s face as a sign of danger, we cannot allow this fear to become normalized.