In the abstract, I don’t find it sad when species go extinct. That’s how nature works. The species that can’t adapt quickly enough die out and make way for those that can. What I find abhorrent is that all of the current environmental disasters (as well as some “natural causes”) are killing off individual beings who never instigated violence against anyone, and who cannot (and presumably would not) consent to being hunted and killed, having their habitats destroyed, being eaten from the inside out by parasites, experiencing organ failure due to microplastic exposure, and so on. Recovery of the environment matters only to the beings who depend upon it. The environmental and climate disaster in the abstract is just the transition to a new state (George Carlin’s “the Earth plus plastic”), and it’s only when one considers the effect on non-consenting sentient beings that it becomes a tragedy on an almost incomprehensible scale.

The crime is not destruction of the environment; it’s the violence against those living in the environment who do not consent to the destruction.