Nik Kowsar: Enter sustainable DEVILopment

Published 2:00 pm Saturday, March 1, 2025

For years I’ve been a diehard evangelist for sustainable development — making TV shows, writing articles about water and hoping future generations won’t have to Google “What were trees?”

But now, here I am, in the land of the free and the world’s most ambitious carbon footprint, and I’ve had a rude awakening. Turns out, the devil isn’t just in the details — he’s tap-dancing all over them in flaming Prada boots. The details scream that we’ve been committing a spectacular mistake for years, even with all those sustainable development goals.

The United Nations’ sustainable development goals were heroically crafted to create “peace and prosperity for people and the planet.” Yet, somehow, governments have taken these 17 goals and turned them into something more useless than a paper straw in a hurricane. What’s been more “sustainable” than record-breaking temperatures?

The UN set the alarm clock for 2030, as if everything would magically fix itself at midnight on New Year’s, just as the Times Square ball drops behind Anderson Cooper.

From global warming to global boiling



In 2023, UN Secretary-General António Guterres announced that we’ve graduated from global warming to the new age of global boiling. Catchy, right? Almost sounds like the next Apple TV+ dystopian series starring Leonardo DiCaprio.

Could our so-called “smart” and “humane” development be responsible for torching the future of this beautiful, water-covered rock we call home? Of course not! That would be ridiculous! But zoom in just a little, and you’ll see something Earth-shattering: We’ve been played.

For years, we proudly believed we were part of sustainable development. In reality, we’ve been unwitting foot soldiers in a grand scheme that’s more about corporate profits than planetary survival.

Meet the demons running the show



Multibillion-dollar climate disasters don’t just appear out of thin air, so who are the demons running the show? Oil companies, mega-corporations and banks are all in on the game. I have a friend who’s convinced Jamie Dimon is faking his last name just to avoid suspicion. (If you were literally named “Demon,” you’d probably tweak a vowel or two, right?)

So, while we’re clearly incapable of stopping global warming, should we really waste any more time pretending that action is on the horizon? Let’s be honest — now that we know Mr. Lucifer Morningstar himself is running the whole thing, isn’t it time to just sit back, admire his handiwork and celebrate our own magnificent stupidity?

Because, after all, we’ve done our part.

Give yourselves a round of applause. We have:

• Set grand targets (that nobody follows).

• Held fancy summits (with cocktail receptions, of course).

• Given Greta plenty of airtime to yell at people.

• Drafted a 50-page final statement about “urgent action.”

• Secured corporate sponsorships (brought to you by BP and ExxonMobil).

And the results?

Emissions? Higher than ever. Glaciers? Melting like butter on a hot pan. Billionaires? Richer than ever, flying to climate conferences on their private jets while lecturing you about reducing your carbon footprint.

So, Guterres, Greta, G7, G20 and all the other Gs of the world, let’s call it what it really is: sustainable DEVILopment!

Nik Kowsar is an Iranian-American journalist, cartoonist and water issues analyst based in Washington, D.C. He was exiled to Canada and the U.S. after his arrest for a cartoon satirizing a powerful cleric.