We make manky banana bread as we feel guilty about food waste – before we throw it out

I was waiting for it. The snarky comments to roll in about a column I wrote a few weeks ago about airports and how flying for 27 hours reduces us to a beady-eyed Lord of the Flies-like state intent on hoarding resources (overhead locker space) for survival.

“The writer says she’s done six 27-hour trips in the air in the past 18 months, hasn’t she heard of global warming, melting glaciers, rising sea levels, a mass extinction?” was the gist of a variety of posts.

I have very much heard of global warming and extreme weather events, because I spent most of my adult life in a country where it’s not unusual for one part to be on fire and one part to be flooded, sometimes at the same time.

I do not like flying to Australia – no one does – but unfortunately you can’t sail there any more because the whole eight-month journey and scurvy thing from the early voyages put people off.

Climate activist arrested after defacing Monet’s Poppy Field in Paris museum

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Flying is becoming more volatile. Here is what pilots have to say on the issue

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Populists have the environmental movement in their sights

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Imagine it being impossible to grow potatoes and carrots in Ireland because of climate change, and this would just be the start

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As a former annoying child with a hyper-fixation on environmental issues, I am delighted we have moved collectively towards giving more of a s**t about the planet

What the commenters didn’t know is that four of those six flights were to go back to say goodbye to someone I loved for possibly the last time. Two of them were to bury a five-year-old boy, and that was not something I was going to do over Zoom.

As a former annoying child with a hyper-fixation on environmental issues, and an anxiety that we would all die if the adults in my life didn’t recycle their plastics properly, I am delighted we have moved collectively towards giving more of a s**t about the planet. But this increased consciousness has come with an unintended and petty consequence.

Environmentalism has given us a stick to poke each other with. How sustainable is that top? I bought it from a charity shop. Aren’t you gentrifying secondhand clothes and taking away resources from people who can only afford to shop there? Well, you might be wearing a macramé bikini of your dad’s beard hair but you have an iPhone made from mined, rare earth metals and the tears of forest nymphs.

And on it goes. Because humans have an innate desire to feel superior to others.

We’re now so scared of being judged in the invisible panopticon that we do mad things, even when we’re alone in the safety of our home

You’re not really allowed to use race, weight, gender or socioeconomic status any more to put people down (this is a good thing, in case you’re wondering where I stand), so you have to get creative. Calling out climate-unfriendly behaviour is great for holding corporations and government accountable, but on social media, in a personal context, it feels like a “aren’t I the great lad” pageant at the expense of others.

You know the types of influencer videos that haul people over the coals for buying fast fashion while flogging expensive “sustainable” linen alternatives with their personal affiliate marketing discount codes.

We’re now so scared of being judged in the invisible panopticon that we do mad things, even when we’re alone in the safety of our home. We save bananas that no one will eat because we feel guilty about food waste, using heat and electricity and more food resources to bake them into manky banana bread – that no one wants to eat either – before we throw it out. But we feel better for trying.

In our heads are invisible ledgers which we constantly weigh our actions against their environmental impact. I for one hate the food scrap bin. I can’t touch it without gagging. It’s gross and when no one is looking I put food in the regular bin. But it’s okay because I haven’t eaten red meat in 25 years and I don’t drive. My environmental balance is grand, I tell myself, even though I’m the one also cooking the books.

Perhaps middle-aged male stubbornness is the way to bring the fast-fashion industry to its knees

My dad was into sustainability “while all these hippies were getting dropped off to private school in four-wheel drives”, as he likes to remind us. He could be accused of buying fast fashion because he shops from discount “dad fashion” chains, but he also proudly owns T-shirts that are older than me. If you ask him about an item of clothing’s provenance, he will tell you the year he bought it, what car we had back then and who won the rugby league premiership that year. This is because he shops so infrequently and carefully that every time he adds something to his wardrobe, he remembers the circumstances as if it was a traumatic event.

“This shirt? I got that for your brother’s engagement party in 2005, we’d just bought the Camry I think, yeah because I remember the Eels had a ripper of a year and finished top of the league table.”

He might also have been partially personally responsible for the downfall of one high turnover men’s wear chain. He was heartbroken when it shut its doors forever, until mum pointed out that its main clients were men like him who only bought clothes once every five years, which hardly made for a successful business model. Perhaps middle-aged male stubbornness is the way to bring the fast-fashion industry to its knees.

So this Earth Day it’s important to remember we’re all trying our best in our own ways, and if you are not personally prepared to clean out someone else’s stinky food scrap bin, or pay to replace their plastic containers with fancy glass ones, maybe hold back before you say something critical.