Humiliation
The Need for Humiliation: Youth Perspective on Climate Change
One weekend, I was at a department store with my family, thrilled to have finally found a pair of Adidas sneakers that had been sold out for weeks. As we waited for the elevator, I noticed it was nearly full—yet oddly, there seemed to be a corner people avoided.
There, in front of all the floor buttons, was a spilled iced latte. People hesitated to enter, zoning out at the mess rather than acting on it. I asked my parents if I could clean it up, not because I wanted to be a hero, but because standing in that cramped space while ignoring the mess felt wrong. My parents said no, but I still reached into my mom’s bag for napkins, kneeled down, and began to clean.
Then suddenly, an irresistible force pulled me from the up. My dad grabbed my arm and made me stand up and told me, “Don’t do it, Jayde.” He wasn’t scolding me or being aggressive, and I wasn’t hurt, but I was just genuinely curious how all the adults in the same elevator were not caring at all about the spilled beverage and disposable cup.
I noticed some of the people next to me complimenting me with eyes that say that I am a good girl for trying to clean up the mess made by other people. When the elevator finally arrived at the basement floor, everyone got out, and I could finally breathe and get out from the packed people. I left the elevator as my parents were rushing me to the car, but there was slight pain deep down my throat as I left the department store. My parents told me in the car that they raised me well and how proud they were to see my attempt to clean up the mess in the elevator.
This isn’t a story of me trying to be noble. It’s a reminder of how normalized indifference has become.
In front of my apartment in South Korea, I constantly see signs that read: “Do not throw away trash here.” Yet every day, twenty or more bags sit under those signs, trash spilling into the street. Last summer, I watched a man step out of his restaurant and casually discard a bag of waste under one of those banners, completely unfazed. The moment felt surreal—how could someone ignore both the rule and the shame?
These small experiences have shaped a quiet realization: as youth, we grow up witnessing the decay of the world not through abstract news headlines, but through everyday negligence.
Even on a global scale, the consequences of adult inaction are devastating. In Gaza, the ongoing war has turned Souk Feras—a once-bustling market for fresh produce—into a 200,000-metric-ton trash site. What once nourished life now suffocates under waste. Meanwhile, trash islands continue to grow in the ocean, disrupting and threatening biodiversity. Images of animals whose stomach is full of fish nets and aluminum cans fill the cover page of magazines these days. We are currently living in a world where nature tells us that there is no more waiting. Our pursuit of convenience is gradually but strikingly destroying the world.
From the street outside my home to war-torn cities, the message is the same: society is collapsing under the weight of its own neglect. But here’s where I believe the youth matter. We have what many adults have lost: the capacity to be embarrassed by apathy. While the young may not have the ability to enforce laws and organize government projects to reduce trash in our everyday life, we have the power to influence others and questions the misbehavior of people by picking up a plastic cup just like I did, or speaking up when someone discards waste where they should not without recycling.
Humiliation—when not weaponized—can be powerful. It reminds us of our values. That moment in the elevator? I was ashamed not of my own actions, but of how normal it had become for adults to look away. If even one adult had bent down to help, perhaps ten others would’ve gone home and told their kids why it mattered to clean up someone else’s trash. That ripple matters.
Environmental problems aren’t always about oil spills or factory emissions. Sometimes, they begin in department stores, on sidewalks, in elevators—where adults have grown used to overlooking what should be unacceptable.
The solution starts with shifting that perspective. The youth are not just the future—they are the conscience of the present. By choosing discomfort over complacency, and action over silence, we help nudge society, one humble moment at a time, toward a cleaner, more caring world.
I believe that small change will have a ripple effect that no governments or countries can imitate. Do not hesitate. Be humiliated and clean up the trash on the street whenever you see it: if that moves one person’s mind, you have done your work. It will undoubtedly bring numerous changes in our environment. Pride comes from those moments when you realize that being shameful brings us a better future and environment.
By: Jinyang Kim
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