Extinction On My Mind /12:
“Extinction can also happen”

Our frenzy of denial endangers the entire planet and all its myriad lifeforms

By Randi Hacker

May 1, 2025

One of the things that makes the Anthropocene Extinction – that’s ours – unique among extinctions is that it’s the first extinction we know of in which the species itself is actively engaged in – some might say dedicated to – bringing about its own end. His two sons’ big game trophy hunting notwithstanding, no human in America – maybe no human on Earth – is more actively dedicated to this outcome than Donald Trump. If there were a Nobel Prize for ruthless endangerment, he’d win.

But the rest of us are doing our part, too. We can’t help it: We’re twenty-first-century anthropocentrists; we tread heavy on our earth.

Recently, a friend of mine introduced me to the term extinction burst. It comes out of behaviour psych and refers to a continuation of, if not an increase in, the frequency of a particular behaviour even after the reward for that behaviour has been removed. The behaviour continues apace for a while… and then it stops. The classic example of course involves a rat. The rat presses a specific button. The rat gets food pellets. This works over and over until it doesn’t. But that rat keeps right on pressing that button over and over in a frenzy of denial until… it stops, heaves a great rat sigh, and walks away.

… maybe no human on Earth – is more actively dedicated to this outcome [extinction] than Donald Trump… But the rest of us are doing our part, too. We can’t help it: We’re twenty-first-century anthropocentrists; we tread heavy on our earth.

I believe we humans are currently experiencing an extinction burst of sorts, and we are just now in the frenzy-of-denial stage. Not only are we continuing behaviours that have stopped being rewarding – by which I mean life-sustaining – but it’s almost as if we have stepped up not only the frequency but the sheer number of those behaviours, most of which require products that, in turn, require materials and transportation and disposal. This includes eco-products and products that enhance, or more importantly, extend human life: solar panels, for example, and lithium batteries and plastic rotating compost drums and heat pumps and stents and pacemakers and scans: PET and CAT and MRI, and full body deodorant (so we won’t smell like a human), and electric four-by-fours that are still American enough to crush delicate vegetation under their massive tires as they conquer nature.

And then there are the drugs, so many drugs that address everything from hair loss to erectile dysfunction to plaque psoriasis to weight loss to bowel issues to malaise to severe depression, each adding its special chemical makeup to the aquifer every time we pee, each procured easily and discreetly over the internet, and each with its list of possible “other” effects, like strokes and certain forms of cancer and disorientation and headaches and spontaneous bleeding from unexpected places… a list that often ends with “Death can also happen.”

I think that all our products should come with a similar warning. Whether they’re packed in fully recycled non-BPA plastic or made from fully recycled materials without toxic chemicals, or mailed carbon-neutrally, they’re still part of the great extinction chain, the one that begins with digging or mining or razing or damming and ends in a landfill or the ocean or on the side of the road or in a heap where it once stood. In my novella, the main character, Ellie, has something to say about this.

The drug advertisements on TV are insane. After raving about the way this drug or that drug miraculously alleviates, if not eliminates, whatever affliction it’s supposed to alleviate, if not eliminate, the narrator recites a litany of the other effects – let’s not call them side effects – this drug might have, none of them in the least salubrious and many of them lethal, everything from headaches to dizziness to cancer. And the ads always end with a statement like this: “Death can also happen.”

It occurs to me that every single product created by humankind, things we need (food, shelter, clothing), things we think we need (seaweed smoothies, McMansions, couture), things we just want (breast implants, infinity pools, 5G), should be accompanied by the same disclaimers. “[Product name here] will benefit humans by increasing our convenience, our comfort, and our fun! Other effects its manufacture and use may cause include lumps or swelling in the neck, dizziness, trouble swallowing, nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, decreased fertility rates, lung infections, radiation poisoning, birth defects, lymphoma and other types of cancer, rare potentially fatal brain infections, a weakened immune system, suicidal thoughts or depression, sepsis, kidney failure, stroke, numbness in the extremities, and brain tumors. Extinction can also happen.

I’ve begun a list of items made and used by humans that I think should carry such a disclaimer. I’ll keep adding to it, but I don’t believe it can ever be exhaustive. Foot spas and Neoprene knee sleeves and air conditioners and dryer sheets and nail polish and Depends and Pull-ups and penile implants and IUDs and diaphragms and breast implants and chin implants and calf implants and hair straightener and perms and eyelash extensions and treadmills and fake plants and RVs and home pregnancy tests and silicon chips and eyeglasses and eyeglass cases and eyeglass cleaner and tampons and pill minders and those lint removal roller thingies and snow scrapers for cars…

‘I believe we humans are currently experiencing an extinction burst of sorts, and we are just now in the frenzy-of-denial stage. Not only are we continuing behaviours that have stopped being rewarding… but it’s almost as if we have stepped up not only the frequency but the sheer number of those behaviours…’

Getting back to the extinction burst: What comes after the frenzy, of course, is the giving up, and then the rebooting in light of this new pelletless reality. The rat is lucky. It’s frantic button pushing just affects itself. The survival of the Earth doesn’t depend on whether the rat continues its denial frenzy or not.

It does, however, depend on ours. And this is where the rat’s extinction burst and ours diverge.

Our frenzy of denial endangers the entire planet and all its myriad lifeforms. The button we have been pressing and continue to press is still rewarding us humans with the pellets of the easy life, a life of virtual reality, of cruises and destination weddings, of clothes dryers and manicured lawns, of out-of-season produce and memory foam and hip replacements and of throwing things away and getting new ones. And it looks like we’re going to keep it up until we’ve depleted everything and all the metaphorical pressing of all the metaphorical buttons in all the world won’t give us the rewards we’ve come to expect. And the thing is, we won’t be able to walk off and take a nap because, gated bunkers aside, there will be no place to take a nap at.

But let’s say we all were to stop pressing that button all at once! Everyone! Everywhere! Right now! What if we all totally embraced what a team of UN researchers is calling Deep Change and really question whether our assumptions about material consumption serve us well anymore? Would it make a difference? The article suggests it could; just look at the way attitudes about smoking have changed over time. I suggest not so much; just look at the way people still smoke even though attitudes have changed, and, frankly, we don’t have time to wait for attitudes to change. We’ve had all this time to change, and we haven’t. Which is why what we set in motion years ago is gaining momentum, and size, and toxicity, and it thumbs its nose at Newton’s First Law of Motion that says that a body in motion remains in motion unless acted upon by an external force because what external force would that be in this case? Us?

Maybe fifty years ago, we humans could have rebooted and acted in ways to slow this juggernaut down, and maybe, just maybe, stop it in a foreseeable future. But now? I think it’s so massive and pervasive and deep that, no matter what we do, it will crush us before it loses its momentum, who knows how many millions of hot and inhospitable years from now.

That is, unless an asteroid takes us out first.

But as long as I’m here, I’m going to stop dead on an early morning walk to watch a brace of vultures gather in a plowed field to stretch their wings toward the sun; I’m going to savor the light scent of skunk over by the river; and I’m going to continue sending a fax each morning to Senator Mitch McConnell reminding him that the situation we currently find ourselves in is his fault.

Accepting that extinction can also happen makes every day that it doesn’t a beautiful day on Earth.

Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of WestmountMag.ca or its publishers.

Feature image: Nils Ally, CC BY 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons

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Randi Hacker has been a writer and editor since the 20th century, and she’s been writing about the environment for more than thirty years, mostly to empower young people to take agency in their future. Satirical essays written with a partner appeared in the New York Times Book Review, Punch and Spy, among other publications. Her YA novel, Life As I Knew It, (Simon & Schuster) was named one of the Books for the Teen Age by the NY Public Library, and her TV show, Windy Acres, written with Jay Craven, was nominated for a New England Emmy for Writing. She just retired from her position as the resolutions copy editor for the State of Vermont, a job that has forever damaged her relationship with the comma. randihacker.com