America: September 2020. Chaotic, criminal mishegaas in the White House. Wilding White Nationalists in the streets. Furious, righteous protests met with tear gas, rubber bullets, and police brutality. A pandemic is raging. The real economy – the economy of people struggling to make ends meet – is imploding, while the stock market rises higher and higher, bringing unimaginable riches to a ridiculously tiny slice of the population. California is ravaged by wildfires. Texas and Louisiana are pummeled by a ferocious hurricane that was the strongest to make landfall in the Pelican State in 160 years.
I am a proud resister and progressive, and a lifetime registered Democrat. As a Little, I accompanied my parents to demonstrations. In grade school, I proudly wore an “I was planned” button, and sported a red armband each May Day. In junior high school, to the derision of my peers, I publicly supported President Carter. In college I joined Greenpeace and marched against nuclear power and for social justice issues.
For the last five years my issue of choice – the issue on which I spend 75% of my activism time and money – has been climate change. In these parlous times, and particularly since Trump was “elected” to office, some friends have challenged me on my focus, and asked me if I haven’t abandoned “more pressing” issues, as if climate change were not the most pressing issue of our time. But all of these issues are deeply connected.
This year’s long hot summer of socially distanced protests have been urgent, tumultuous (though 99% peaceful), revolutionary and potentially world-shattering. The demonstrators are lancing a 400 year old boil and not letting the complacent among us look away. You want American heroes? I nominate the BLM and social justice warriors organizing and demonstrating and making their voices heard!
But remember that among the many and cruel racial disparities in the United States they are protesting are housing, food security and healthcare. Climate change intersects with each of these in ways that put POC at a distinct disadvantage. I cannot fight for human rights and racial equality without fighting against climate change.
Kamala Harris is the nominee for VP. We didn’t manage to elect a woman last time – maybe this time, we’ll vote a woman into the #2 spot. In the meantime, it’s important to note that women will be adversely and disproportionately affected by the changing climate. For example, the widespread drought and crop disruptions caused by climate change will destabilize our food supply, disproportionately affecting women, for whom food insecurity is a pressing problem. I cannot fight for women without fighting against climate change.
Unions are under relentless attack from the right. Without unions, we the people lose most of our power to demand that we be paid and treated fairly. Even non-union workers must have an adequate minimum wage, that families can actually LIVE ON. I am 100% for a $15/hour minimum wage – or more! – and we are going to need it if folks are shelling out to re-re-re-re-build after the latest hurricane, flash flood, or wildfire. I cannot fight for working people without fighting against climate change.
Poverty is an intractable problem in America: about 12% of us (that is 36,460,000 people!!!) currently live in poverty. While the well-off will deal with the impacts of climate change where they live by buying what they need to survive, or will simply move to more amenable places out of the path of hurricanes or wildfires, poor people will not. They will be left behind in crumbling communities already ravaged by natural disasters – or directly in the path of new storms, floods, and drought that results from a warming atmosphere. I cannot fight for poor people without fighting against climate change.
Climate change is the ur-issue of our time. It’s the monster in the closet that has already devoured your neighbors and is just waiting to pounce on you. It’s the top! It’s the Colosseum – it’s the top! It’s the Louvre Museum – it’s a melody from a symphony by Strauss!
Climate change will change everything. It cannot be ignored, and it should not be fobbed off as “less important” because the link to something more front of mind and in the headlines isn’t immediately apparent.
As for the upcoming election?
We have already lost 4 years of potential government action under Trump. Imagine what else we will lose after another four years of deregulation, fracking, kowtowing to the extraction industries, increased drilling, Artic exploration, support for coal, relaxed emissions standards, and more.
You already know we need to get out and vote. And when Biden and Harris are elected, we need to push them hard to fully adopt the Green New Deal.
Remember: emissions are still going up. #HairOnFirePeople
Post by Kira Thomsen-Cheek
