My little brick house takes a mere 20 minutes to reach sauna-like temperatures, making cuffing season – the mad dash for a human hot water bottle to endure winter – kind of redundant. But because I hate feeling excluded, I got a foster dog. Enter Bonita: my personal canine convection heater. She’s a delight, but her massive twice-daily feasts are a nod to the growing $60 billion pet food industry that feeds 110 million American cats and dogs. All that food takes up a lot of land, water, and resources in the process. In Bonita’s quest for kibble, Mother Nature side-eyed us both. No good deed goes unpunished, I suppose.

I had planned a whole spiel about eco-friendly pet cuisine — like the type made from insects or how to make your own healthy pet food and save money. Reckon has more on that here. But then, as this family is prone to doing, Kim Kardashian storms the news with a bra she claims is on a mission to combat climate change.

So, strap yourself in. This week’s Meltdown will briefly delve into Kardashian’s peculiar eco-bra pledge before I offer my support to you in the form of self-care tips for November. Then, we’ll end with something far more existential.

Drizzle

The first thing you need to know about the new bra is it comes with built-in nipples, presumably to distract and fool us into thinking that global warming is a hoax. Is that some subtle greenwashing?

In the commercial for the new SKIMS bra, Kardashian says: “The sea levels are rising, the ice sheets are shrinking, and I’m not a scientist.”

Fact check: accurate.

She later says, while explaining how the bra works, that “no matter how hot it is, you’ll always look cold.”

My question is, who’s trying to look cold? I’m from Scotland, where looking cold is only beneficial if you’re a stray dog or an orphan.

But there is some veracity to Kardashian’s claims that the bra will help beat climate change. Of every bra sold, 10% of sales will go to One Percent for the Planet, an environmental organization encouraging businesses to donate 1% of their annual revenue. SKIMS notes that the donation is a one-off.

While some may be offended by Kardashian’s comedic approach to the climate crisis, which I find refreshing, people online welcomed the bra, saying that it will be valuable for those who have undergone mastectomies or other treatments for cancer.

The problem with SKIMS founder Kardashian using herself to promote the bra is that she is a perpetual user of private jets, which produce about ten times more pollutants than commercial planes per passenger.

Kardashian’s jet emitted 4,268 tons of carbon over 57 flights in 2022, according to an analysis by a now-suspended Twitter account that tracked celebrity jet travel. Globally, the average person emits 4 tons an entire year, while in the U.S., that figure jumps to 16 tons. Her average flight length was just under 100 miles.

The bra is also made from a microfiber fabric, which, as we know, is a petroleum-based product.

Touch Grass

In more uplifting news, we have all made it to November. It’s colder and darker, and that may be a shock to the system. But there are ways you can ease into the winter months that are simple, healthy, and just nice.

Here’s what I’ll do to help with self-care this month and probably all winter.

• Take a bath
• Make a cozy drink (tea, hot chocolate, or maybe a hot toddy)
• Go for a bundled-up walk in the cold
• Have a face mask at night
• Try a new craft
• Take yourself on a date
• Practice mindfulness
• Enjoy sleeping in until the sun comes up (if you can)
• Cook your favorite meal

Compost Dump

Elon Musk, one of the world’s wealthiest men, recently raised some scary points on the Joe Rogan podcast, saying that some people would like to see the end of human existence, and artificial intelligence may offer that opportunity.”If you start thinking that humans are bad, then the natural conclusion is humans should die out,” said the South African tech entrepreneur. “If AI gets programmed by the extinctionists, its utility function will be the extinction of humanity.”He added: “They won’t even think it’s bad.”

While comments like this have played into the idea that people who believe in climate change are doomsday cultists, which I have been accused of, some movements out in the world take a dim view of human existence and would like to see it disappear.

Antinatalism: This is a philosophical position that assigns a negative value to birth, suggesting that it might be ethically better if humans cease to reproduce and eventually phase out existence. Some proponents of antinatalism believe that this could reduce or eliminate human-induced suffering and environmental degradation.

Misanthropy: This is a general disdain or hatred for humanity, often based on the view that humans are destructive and harmful to the planet and each other.

Voluntary Human Extinction: Some movements or individuals believe that humans should voluntarily choose to cease reproducing and let humanity gradually disappear to alleviate the strain we put on Earth’s ecosystems.

I’m not in support of any of this because who’s going to feed Bonita her insect dog food if I’m gone?