If our PM won’t tackle climate change, I guess I’ll have to

As a product of the slacker ‘90s generation, I’d rather the Earth be subsumed by rising sea levels than be told what to do, writes Darren Levin. But Prime Minister Scott Morrison has changed all that.

Like most inner-city latte sippers, I’ve been feeling pretty helpless since Scott Morrison pulled off the greatest miracle since I passed my Arts/Law degree and returned to power earlier this month.

But instead of begging Jacinda Ardern for citizenship, threatening to excise Queensland, or Face-blocking everyone who has ever disagreed with me, I committed to put my despair towards something practical.

If our returning PM isn’t going to take climate change seriously — I’m still not convinced a bloke who brings coal to parliament does — I decided last week that I would take matters into my own hands by, drum roll please, buying a KeepCup.

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Now, before you roll your eyes, it’s worth knowing this is a big deal for me.

Last year, at my work’s Christmas party I was awarded the “Not A Keeper” prize for the most takeaway coffee cups consumed throughout the year. It was even endorsed by “Mother Hature” herself, so I’m pretty sure it was definitely a legitimate prize.

I may have no shame about using disposable coffee cups, but in the interest of politics I’m willing to change my ways. Picture: iStock

Much to my colleague’s dismay, the “Not A Keeper” award didn’t shame me into buying a reusable coffee cup, which I’m sure was their desired effect. In fact, it did the opposite.

As a product of the slacker ‘90s generation I’d rather the Earth be subsumed by rising sea levels than be told what to do. But even more than that, I felt climate change was something only corporations, the government, or Elon Musk could actually fix. But after Musk started to go weird on Twitter and smoke weed with Joe Rogan, I started to lose faith in him controlling the climate in his own Tesla, let alone the planet Earth.

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The other reason I kept adding to landfill with reckless abandon was simply because I’d also never met a KeepCup I liked.

After years of drinking two lattes a day, I’d become accustomed to having $3000 less a year as well as the distinct and familiar feel of a disposable lid touching my lips twice a day.

I had become conditioned to the way that insulated cardboard strip felt in my hands, keeping them warm but also safe from the near-boiling organic Jersey milk steamed at the optimal temperature between 91 and 96 degrees.

There’s something very comforting about the feel of a traditional throw-away coffee cup. Picture: iStock

But new drastic times call for new drastic measures. And seeing a Coal-a-lition Government return to power was the non-biodegradable plastic lid that broke the camel’s back.

If the Government isn’t going to tackle climate change properly, I’m going to do my bit and reduce my size 12 carbon footprint to a dainty size 8, damn it.

Or so I thought.

I started last week out well, paying $17 for a reusable cup that replicated the disposable coffee drinking experience described in needlessly vivid detail above. Rookie mistake.

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Not only did my cup feel like its disposable counterpart, it also looked exactly like one too, meaning I received the same dirty scowls from Gen Y passers-by and received no kudos for my noble gesture of attempting to save the world by investing in my own quaint bit of landfill.

What’s the point of a KeepCup if you’re not banking any hipster points, right?

There was also a mild sense of panic when the office cleaner mistook it for a disposable cup and nearly threw it out into the (non-recyclable) rubbish bin.

Needless to say, my week-long adventures in KeepCupville haven’t been going as planned. But that’s just the price you pay when you place the future of the planet in your own hands.

Not all coffee-drinking climate heroes wear capes, right?

@darren_levin