Stuart Goldsmith: How I'm tackling the climate crisis through comedy
When scientists started glueing themselves to stuff, I wondered maybe if something had to give. These are people who understand how glue works after all. Not in the “ugh, sticky!” way you and I understand it, but on a molecular level. And if our inaction in the face of the climate crisis moves them such that they’re prepared to slap it onto their bare skin to adhere themselves physically to our front pages, then maybe I’d better start paying more attention.
Marine biologist and speaker Ayana Elizabeth Johnson says we all have to find our own “climate Venn diagram”: intersecting circles of something the climate needs, something we’re good at, and something we enjoy – and so here we are. Me, a 40-something dad in faded trainers, trying to apply my 20 years of comedy experience to the biggest challenge humanity has ever faced.
And before you click elsewhere on The Scotsman’s site to look for a show that won’t make you cry yourself to sleep, let me say this: all is not lost! There are some very smart people who have very good ideas on how we turn this around. We have a lot of the technological solutions, we just need the political will, and that’s where the communicators come in.
I’ve been performing at the Edinburgh Fringe for nearly 30 years, and in that time I’ve seen the range of promise that stand-up can bring to cultural conversation. From Hannah Gadsby to Fleabag to climate researcher and comedian Matt Winning’s Hot Mess, comedians are capable of redefining our internal landscape. They offer us new ways to think about things, and new possibilities for action, here more so than anywhere in the world. At the Fringe, people rewrite the lines around comedy, so where better to try to do the same with my eco dread?
If I can use my ability to “say the unsayable” fast and eloquently, and call people on our bullshit (myself included) then maybe I can contribute to the conversation instead of just feeding my ego. One of the great joys of observational comedy is getting to grips with the secret knowledge that we all lie to ourselves. We all pretend that we're more than just wriggling pink naked things that have managed to put on clothes and leave the house, and started pretending to be a society. And when you point it out in the right way, people laugh because they recognise that it’s true.
About 18 months ago I started writing jokes about the climate crisis, and took the first steps into working out what I wanted to say. Is it about oil and gas? Recycling? Carbon emissions? I realised the best first step is to tackle our personal anxiety about the climate crisis. I’m trying to explore my feeling of hopelessness in the face of climate breakdown, and how to attack that hopelessness both alone and collectively.
It also lets me and my audiences ask: What do I do? Do I have an ethical obligation to personally start dismantling the structures of the fossil fuels industry? Can I change the system? Should I pull out the PVA and start glueing myself to things?
So the show is me grappling with all of this, or as much of it as I can in 60 minutes. When I first started writing it my best friend Noel called it “brave”. Little did I realise he meant “you are going to crash and burn onstage a lot over the next year”. I’ve had walkouts for the first time in my career; I’ve had to face audiences sitting with their arms crossed, or who boo when I so much as mention Just Stop Oil or Extinction Rebellion. I was savagely heckled by a fan’s mum, who had been getting her climate news from Facebook.
Learning to make something funny out of something sad, infuriating and frightening has been some of the hardest work of my long comedy career, but after a year of trialling material in the clubs I’m happy to report that I’m getting there. The complexity is the most challenging part: I’m having to riff on things which aren’t necessarily widely known, or which are the victims of deliberate subterfuge on the part of large companies. Most people don’t know that your compostable coffee cup isn’t compostable at home in your caddy or garden, but only if it undergoes a special industrial compostable process. Which it isn’t going to, because you’re going to absent-mindedly chuck it in the bin. It’s hard enough to navigate the options – is it better to use a keep cup? What about a bamboo one? But aren’t the powdered bamboo ones actually 90% glue? And how many will I leave on the train per year? – let alone try and reach a common consensus that gets an audience on the same page!
Like many climate-conscious people, I’m worried about being a hypocrite. TV interviewers are often thrilled to bully activists by pointing out the inconsistencies between their position and their lifestyles, but aren’t we all wrapped up in the boa constrictor of the carbon economy? How naked and starving and phone-less do I have to be before I’ve purged myself of enough fossil fuel that you’ll listen to my point of view?! Are we really not allowed an opinion until we’ve recycled every possession, and woven our own trousers out of flax? The only position on the climate that’s completely free from hypocrisy is: “I wish it would burn faster, and my actions support that.”
I own two diesel vehicles. Well, one really, I’ve managed to prevent my camper van harming the climate; it won’t go anywhere due to neglect, which I’m calling a win. But can I drive my diesel car to a climate protest? On the other hand, would it really make a difference if I left it at home just for that day and got the train, then drove it again the next day? No – I say drive your car to a demo, at least you’re participating! Don’t park too close perhaps … Maybe if you actually show up, then one way or another you’ll risk changing; you might stop being inert, and you might even decide down the line to swap out your gas-guzzling car.
If on the other hand you don’t go, nothing changes and we all carry on our merry way, in this charmingly-appointed hand-basket …
Stuart Goldsmith: Spoilers, Monkey Barrel Comedy, 3.20pm, until 27 August.