Us older people must fight for a better America, and world, for younger generations | Bill McKibben

Baby boomers were complicit in the decay of our civic life and cultural fabric - and we must play a serious role in fixing it

I had the chance this month to spend a couple of weeks on an utterly wild and remote Alaskan shore - there was plenty of company, but all of it had fur, feathers or fins. And there was no way to hear from the outside world, which now may be the true mark of wilderness. So, bliss. But also, on returning, shock. If you're not immersed in it daily, the tide of mass shootings, record heatwaves and corroded politicians spouting ugly conspiracies seems even more truly and impossibly crazy.

Camping deep in the wild is not for everyone, but there's another way to back up and look at our chaos with some perspective - and that's to separate yourself in time instead of space.

Bill McKibben is Schumann Distinguished Scholar in environmental studies at Middlebury College and the author most recently of The Flag, the Cross, and the Station Wagon: A Graying American Looks Back at His Suburban Boyhood and Wonders What the Hell Happened