As embarrassing as it is to admit, I was deep into the climate change cult.

As a former journalist with a discerning mind, I kept my head above water (so to speak) on the issue until around 2012, wherein social media became a driving force of human opinion, “community,” and crowd-sourced truth. In my mind that is when, yes, all hell broke loose.

Confirmation bias exploded and suddenly my “news feed” was crammed with stories about endless catastrophes, “existential” crises, and massive die-off calamities. These were from what I considered vetted sources: The Guardian, the New York Times, and so on.

Being in the city, there were no animals around… no bugs, no birds much, and certainly no frogs or reptiles of any kind. Looking at the urban sprawl, the world seemed to confirm what my “news feed” was telling me. It drove me to drink, it strained relationships, and it spiraled from there. Naturally, everyone around me thought the same, so we all acted the same.

There was no need to invest in the future, because it would all be over soon. There was no need to have children, because they would drain the resources of the earth. It got so bad, in fact, that I saw no need to even recycle because, “what is the point?” after all. Eventually, I even endorsed the far-left “Extinction Rebellion” fringe wackos.

This is what the climate-change cultist young people think, and, nowadays, they’ve been brainwashed to think it from a very young age (many times, sadly, by their own parents). It’s why Millennials loathe the sight of children. It’s why young people pay no attention to their dress, conform to any norms whatsoever, and want to name their own gender. It’s made them all apathetic and slovenly. It’s the “Century of the Self” and runaway narcissism, sure, but to them man is a god, man is powerful enough to destroy the earth, and man currently is. No one older cares to stop it, so we only have years to live, so you might as well … “Do What Thou Wilt.”

Of course, it’s all one big hoax.

I’m not sure when the lightbulb came on. It might have been when a more sane friend pointed out that something I posted was, in fact, disproven propaganda. It might have been, post-2016-election, when I started to question everything. Surely, the light bulb was fully illuminated when, upon moving to Tulsa, I opened my back door after a spring shower, and the sound of frogs was deafening.

In order for scientists to receive more funding via grants from the funds of gargantuan medical authorities, they must agree with other scientists. Good luck getting money to research, say, the expansion of ice in the arctic from an “eco”-fund tied to a solar panel manufacturer. That much is obvious.

But more importantly, through this prism, The Reformed Progressive can see the totalitarian stranglehold social media has on society, and it’s only gone from bad to worse to abysmal.

We’ve all seen the reports: Facebook is trying to make you suicidal, TikTok is Chinese spyware, Twitter is ruled by the crazed Left, or, back in the day, MySpace popularity contests, or Tumblr leading to the gender-fluid insanity that manifests itself today.

Should we take care of the environment? Of course. Should we be good stewards–as the Bible says?–naturally. Should we consider alternative sources of energy (nuclear or fusion, anyone?) Of course we should.

But should we put our “phones” away and go listen to the frogs after a Green Country rainstorm? You bet we should.

And the sooner, the better.