The other day I was skimming a book for class about global warming when I happened to come across a particularly disturbing prediction. It said that agriculture in countries near the equator (mostly in Latin America and Africa) would be hit hardest by climate change.

I was merely skimming, as I usually do, so I’m not too familiar with the scientific details (something about the poles reversing and God’s revenge for Darren Aronofsky’s movies), but I know countries with traditionally tropical climates will become drier. And when they become drier their crops might not grow anymore. And can you think of one exclusively tropical resource? It’s coffee.

I thought, “Why worry about all these other depressing problems that might come with global warming like ocean acidification, melting ice caps, colder winters and hotter summers, crazier natural disasters, food and water shortages and all the international relations problems that could come with these extreme changes, when that stuff is boring and really means nothing to me? Instead, I’ll ignore the global issues and worry about something that is only relevant to me.” Now, I’m a climate change activist.

Our coffee is at risk people. WAKE UP!!!

Don’t you realize what would happen if our coffee supply was threatened by higher temperatures, drought and more resilient pests and plant diseases? ALL OUT WAR —that’s what would happen. People. Would. Freak.

This country was built on coffee. From the moment we became a more perfect union and our European brothers began giving us the sweet, sweet coffee bean in exchange for tobacco or something else to the moment of the Great Starbucks Sugary Coffee Drink Revolution of the 2000s, coffee has been the backbone of this democracy. The Declaration of Independence was written with the help of coffee, as was the Gettysburg Address, the Great Gatsby, Springsteen’s Born to Run and the West Wing, I imagine.

What was the point of colonizing all these countries if we’re just going to let their coffee beans dry up? Is there another place we can grow coffee? That chapter in my global warming book might’ve had an answer, but I stopped reading before the practical solutions section.

Anyway, we need to fight for coffee, and many other activists agree with me.

William Faulkner once said, “Never be afraid to raise your voice for honesty and truth and compassion against injustice and lying and greed. If people all over the world…would do this, it would change the earth.” We need to raise our voices for honesty and truth. We can change the earth if people everywhere stood up to the injustice of global warming and the lack of coffee that will inevitably follow, according to the article I skimmed.

Bob Marley once said “Get up, stand up, Stand up for your rights. Get up, stand up, Don’t give up the fight.” Don’t give up people! Fight for coffee. Did you even know Bob Marley was singing about cof

fee this entire time? You aren’t even a real global warming activist if you didn’t. But, it’s not too late to learn the truth about global warming and coffee. It’s not too late to join the fight.

Gandhi once said, “It’s the action, not the fruit of the action, that’s important. You have to do the right thing. It may not be in your power, may not be in your time, that there’ll be any fruit. But that doesn’t mean you stop doing the right thing. You may never know what results come from your action. But if you do nothing, there will be no result.” The fruit he is referring to is obviously the coffee bean. Coffee is the fruit of the action because it makes you do

actions more quickly and effectively. Gandhi was a global warming coffee activist as well.

Forget everything you’ve ever

heard about global warming. That stuff doesn’t mean anything to you and me. Bleaching the coral reefs? Do you live in a coral reef? I doubt it. Dying polar bears? Are you even a polar bear? Probably not. But here’s something we can get behind: your grande, iced, sugar-free, vanilla latte with triple soy milk and a caramel drizzle on top and my five or six Keurig k-cups (Green Mountain Coffee Breakfast Blend) per day.

Let’s stop beating around the coffee bean bush (I’m sure it grows on a bush or something like it). This is not a political issue. It’s a humanity issue. A world without coffee is pure chaos. If you can’t be an activist for anything else, be an activist for your frappuccinos.