Extending the Parachute Analogy

Mr. al-Sabah (“Pariah or Partner?,” September 2024) uses the analogy of jumping from an airplane and inventing a parachute on the way down. This could be the only rational choice. 

Picture a fire starting on the plane and a bunch of people preventing me from extinguishing it, because they enjoy fire and somehow don’t feel threatened by it. They might even add fuel. Then they prevent me from getting a parachute because they’ve grabbed them all and are too powerful for me to defeat. The fire spreads until they jump out. It will surely kill me, so I jump and hope for a miracle. 

Now Mr. al-Sabah wants me to partner with them, even though it will accelerate the fall. I will, without hesitation. I will grab anything I can on the way down; their parachutes, clothes, hair ... . That may doom us both, but I have nothing to lose, and I may not be thinking clearly. The same holds for the other people who are jumping. And it’s a big plane. 

I will take Mr. al-Sabah’s proposal of partnership seriously when his family devotes 100% of Kuwaiti oil profits to reversing climate change and repairing the damage. If he’s truly serious, they would devote the past profits (accumulated wealth) to it too. Fossil fuel burning for transition to renewables should be a financially nonprofit activity. They won’t give up their parachutes voluntarily. If their parachutes fail to protect them, I will not rejoice, but I will not weep.