A disturbing amount of the climate justice movement’s “action” is taken alone, within our own homes.  We sit at our computers and post, Tweet, comment and write op-eds.  We call our Senators and legislators. We change our light bulbs and insulate our homes (literally and figuratively.) The picture that naturally develops in our minds is of little me, sitting here fighting the world’s biggest corporations and their political stooges.  That’s a pretty discouraging picture.

Despite all the attempts of social media to build “community,” everyone is still sitting alone at computers. We did not evolve to develop powerful relationships with an avatar, sending us an instant message.  That’s why a million screen names out there somewhere don’t help us deeply internalize the truth that we are part of something large and powerful.  We evolved to connect with human beings that we can see, hear, smell and feel, and it is that kind of connection that empowers us on a deep level.

Many brilliant writers have commented on how our hyper-individualized society exacerbates our biggest problems.  In the case of the climate movement, hyper-individualism causes potential activists to feel alienated from the incredibly powerful force of a united movement.

The more I advocate for stronger and bolder action from climate activists, the more I see the need for real human connections.  No amount of social media can match the empowerment of being in the streets with thousands of other people who share our passion.  That’s why mass mobilizations that engage in bold action are so important for our movement.  There was probably never a more active time for our movement than the six months after the Capitol Climate Action. That motivation has since been drowned in online “activism” surrounding half-assed climate bills and Copenhagen.

One of the biggest hesitations that seem to stop people from taking strong political action to fight climate change is a lack of empowerment.  Nobody wants to put his or her ass on the line for something that won’t make any difference, and we all know that the actions of a lone, isolated individual seldom make much of a difference.

The Appalachia Rising mobilization in Washington DC at the end of this month comes at a time when we need it most. Appalachia Rising is a mass convergence on the capitol to fight mountain top removal mining from September 24-27^th.  The first couple of days will be the Voices From the Mountains, where we will hear from those most impacted by mountain top removal, and strategize with movement leaders.  The final Day of Action will be a march on the White House, and civil disobedience by those who choose to participate.  The whole event will send the message to Washington that there will be major civil unrest, as long as corporations are allowed to blow up mountains, poison people’s water, and threaten our future.

As a native of West Virginia, I have many reasons to be passionate about defending my homeland from corporate exploitation, and there are many reasons why civil disobedience is powerful and effective.  Right now, I find myself most excited for an opportunity to once again feel the power of a united resistance movement.

The strategy of appeasement and compromise has thoroughly failed, and the discouragement of the climate movement is undeniable.  For years we have been told to kneel and beg, and it has left us empty-handed. Now it’s time to stand up and fight for our right to a healthy and just world.  Obedience to injustice is the ruin of the soul, and our movement desperately needs some rejuvenating disobedience.

Please join me in Washington this month for Appalachia Rising.  Don’t just write an op-ed or call your congressman in support.  SHOW UP.  Get on a bus, sleep on the floor of a church and take a stand with thousands of others who are no longer willing to be obedient to a destructive and unjust system.

Remember, Remember, the Fifth of November…

“ Allow me first to apologize for this interruption. I do, like many of you, appreciate the comforts of every day routine — the security of the familiar, the tranquility of repetition. I enjoy them as much as any bloke. But in the spirit of commemoration, whereby those important events of the past, usually associated with someone’s death or the end of some awful bloody struggle, are celebrated with a nice holiday, I thought we could mark this November the 5th, a day that is sadly no longer remembered, by taking some time out of our daily lives to sit down and have a little chat. There are of course those who do not want us to speak. I suspect even now, orders are being shouted into telephones, and men with guns will soon be on their way. Why? Because while the truncheon may be used in lieu of conversation, words will always retain their power. Words offer the means to meaning, and for those who will listen, the enunciation of truth. And the truth is, there is something terribly wrong with this country, isn’t there? Cruelty and injustice, intolerance and oppression. And where once you had the freedom to object, to think and speak as you saw fit, you now have censors and systems of surveillance coercing your conformity and soliciting your submission. “
Dear Friends,

Tim DeChristopher’s trial has–for the third time–been delayed. While previous delays have been due to hearings and scheduling conflicts, no reason was given for this delay. However, this new date does give us the opportunity to join together for a meaningful November the Fifth, where we can commemorate those who have stood up to injustice and oppression in the past and actively support people like Tim who are doing so today.

Tim was not the first person to run up the prices on Oil and Gas leasing auctions, but he is the first to face time in prison for it. There have been numerous instances of company representatives doing the same thing to hinder their competitors–but because Tim took action as activist, rather than as a businessperson, he is now being prosecuted with two felonies and up to 10 years in prison. As 5 leaders of the climate movement said in their letter calling for support at Tim’s trial:

“ This kind of trial is nothing but intimidation—and the best answers to intimidation are joy and resolve. That’s what we’ll need in Utah.“
Tim is being so strongly prosecuted in order to instill fear in others who might take action. This trial represents an attempt to coerce complacency among the public and prevent others from standing up to a system run dangerously awry in order to preserve a stable climate. That is why it’s so important for us to take to the streets on November the fifth and make a clear statement that The People will not be intimidated–that more of us are willing to put ourselves on the line and demand a just future for ourselves, our children, and for the diversity of life on this planet.

To learn more, please visit ClimateTrial.com. If you’re ready to help, here are three ways you can help us make a difference:

1. Join the convergence in Salt Lake City the weekend of November the fifth.

• o Let us know if you’d like help finding someone to stay with for the weekend.
• o If you live in Utah, let us know if you’re willing to host others for the weekend.

1. If you can’t travel, register a solidarity action in your community and share photos and videos that we can display in Salt Lake City
2. Donate to Peaceful Uprising. We have a dedicated and passionate group of volunteers contributing hours of work, but organizing also requires money for printing, protest permits, signs and banners, and much more.

Yes.

The more I think about it, the more I realize that immigration is part of our fight in the climate movement.  Here’s why I think we need to be actively involved in the immigrant-rights battle that’s going on right now.

In terms of “stopping climate change,” “containing climate change,’ or even “preventing the collapse of civilization as we know it,” we’re fucked.  Really fucked.  Bill McKibben’s new book, Eaarth, makes that abundantly clear.  The title reflects the point that the planet we used to know is gone.  McKibben couldn’t possibly be any clearer about the fact that there is no hope of avoiding the collapse of our civilization.  What matters at this point is what the collapse will look like and what will come next, and that’s also the scariest part.

When the industrial economy collapses and we move toward a more manual labor based economy, that could be a good opportunity for mass awakening.  It could be a chance for our society to collectively say “Maybe trying to meet our emotional needs through material consumption wasn’t a good idea” or “Maybe greed and competition weren’t the best values on which to base our culture and economy.”  There will undeniably be extreme hardship and loss of life, but it could reconnect us to our humanity, and a new society more in line with our true values could be build on the ashes of this one.

But history suggests otherwise.  While there has never been this kind of collapse on a planetary scale, there have been local precedents.  Whether environmentally induced like in Darfur or economically induced like in Germany in 1930, societies have gone into free fall.  But rarely have those societies acknowledged that they had it coming due to systemic problems in the way they were living.  Much more commonly, a person or group stepped up and said “THOSE people, they are the problem.”  Then the scapegoated group and civil liberties were sacrificed in the name of reestablishing order and security.

The scariest thing in our future is not the physical limitations we will face, but who will be blamed and what moral sacrifices will be made in the futile attempt to maintain order.  That is why what we are doing is so important.  If we go over that edge with a clear focus on climate change, we can acknowledge the true culprit and learn from our parents’ mistakes.  But without that focus, we are susceptible to any interpretation.  Just as climate change is already here, the battle for how we will deal with it is already here as well.

The current immigration debate did not emerge out of a vacuum, and was not nearly as heated just three years ago.  But then gas prices shot up because we are running out of oil.  As the cheap and easily accessible oil peaked, supplies ran short and speculators panicked.  While the oil driven economy at large suffered, the greatest impact was on the housing market since the glut of suburban houses with 90 minute commutes were suddenly less attractive.  So the economy tanked and unemployment skyrocketed.  Since the root issue of basing our economy on a rapidly depleting resource is uncomfortable to deal with, the right wing demagogues had no trouble selling their argument that “THOSE people stole your jobs.”  Hence the front page quote from Archie Archuleta last week about the current atmosphere being more hateful toward immigrants than any point in his 60 years of dealing with immigration issues.  This is a harbinger of things to come.  The current battleground of hatred is immigration, and it matters who wins.  If hatred wins the day today, we face a much darker tomorrow.

If our groups stay out of this issue, we implicitly support the notion that this is just about immigrants.  But the hatred toward immigrants is not just an alternative to compassion toward immigrants; it is also an alternative to a rational discussion of the real problems with our economy and society.  Xenophobia is the alternative to honest introspection.  The climate movement needs to be actively standing up for that voice of honest introspection.  We need that introspection now, and we’re really going to need it down the road.

Merriam-Webster defines opportunity as: a favorable juncture of circumstances; a good chance for advancement or progress.

Few things seem to be going right in the this country at the moment: the economy is still weak, the oil spill continues to devastate communities along the Gulf, the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq continue to drain our country’s resources without much progress, the social fabric of this country feels frayed and divided.  It would seem that our only shining bright moment was Landon Donovan’s goal in the World Cup yesterday.

It would seem that way if you simply focus on the headlines. Amidst the bad news is an underlying narrative that the current trajectory is not working.  And when something is not working, it is time for a change.

The pessimistic conventional wisdom would tell a story like this: Eventually the oil spill will be stopped, tighter safety regulation on the oil and coal industries may pass to appease public outrage, but we will continue to throw billions of dollars overseas each year for oil, we will continue to drill and mine and frack our communities for the energy beneath them, while energy companies continue to make record profits.   Superficial changes will be politically popular but will do little to change our dysfunctional energy system.  Then the next energy crisis will hit.

Here in Utah, it would seem that this story is playing out. In response to the Gulf oil catastrophe, Utah Governor Gary Herbert released an energy plan where he asked: “Why are we drilling in the middle of the ocean where there is extreme environmental risk when we could be meeting the demand for domestic production from on‐shore development in areas with minimal environmental risk such as Utah?”

Two days later, an oil spill in Salt Lake City dumped 33,000 gallons of oil into a creek that runs through neighborhoods, parks and eventually drains into the Great Salt Lake.

Further, Utah stands poised to adopt the injudicious honor of opening the first tar sands mine in the country.

But like the shining moment of Landon Donovan’s goal yesterday, our country has the opportunity to follow a different story. This year’s litany of coal mine disasters, natural gas explosions and oil spills are forcing Americans to face the question: how much longer are we willing to continue our dependence fossil fuels? As a result of these highly visible and truly unfortunate disasters, public opinion has shifted, recognizing that not only is offshore drilling unsafe but that we need to make the switch to cleaner, safer energy sources.

An opportunity is not a guarantee that change will happen.

Now is the time to call for bolder changes than we have before.  Now is the time to break the myth that drilling and mining and fracking are safe ways to get our energy.  Now is the time to stop the viral growth of tar sands extraction, here in Utah and around the country.  Now is the time to stop subsidizing these destructive industries and kickstart our economy again with investment in clean energy technologies.

As thousands gather on Saturday in Hands Across the Sand events across the country, it is critical that we not only call for an end to offshore drilling, but boldly tell the story of a country that can buck the corrupting stranglehold the fossil fuel industries hold on our nation and can build an economy that values innovation, community revitalization and a cleaner, brighter future.

We have an opportunity to redefine the narrative of this country.  Now is the time to do it.

Podcast: Download (10.2MB)

SALT LAKE CITY, UT (krcl) – An estimated 33,000 gallons of crude oil were released into Utah waterways this past weekend. Ashley welcomes local resident and biologist Peter Hayes, Chevron representative Dan Johnson, retired biologist Ty Harrison and Lynn De Freitas from Friends of the Great Salt Lake to discuss the human and ecological impact of the disaster. In the latter part of the show, we welcome Antonia Juhasz, author of The True Cost of Chevron: An Alternative Annual Report. Juhasz argues that the Salt Lake spill is not unusual given Chevron’s global track record.

www.truecostofchevron.com © Copyright 2010, krcl

Podcast: Download (10.1MB)

SALT LAKE CITY, UT (krcl) – Ashley welcomes left-leaning populist Tim DeChristopher and right-leaning blogger Frank Staheli to discuss ways to transcend the divisiveness of contemporary politics. The three discuss taxes, climate change, Glenn Beck and the Tea Party, and find they actually have much in common. DeChristopher is the founder of the environmental group Peaceful Uprising and Staheli runs the blog Simple Utah Mormon Politics.

© Copyright 2010, krcl

Podcast: Download (10.2MB)

SALT LAKE CITY, UT (krcl) – As the BP oil spill inches closer to shore, activists are preparing for the worst. In the first half of the show, Ashley talks with marine biologist Rikki Ott, who worked to protect her fellow Alaskans from the political manuerving of Exxon after thier spill. She hopes what was learned from the Valdeez disaster will help residents of the Gulf Coast prepare to deal with BP. In the second half, Brinkley Hutchins, a Alabama native and Greenpeace Student Network Leader describes her flights over the spill and the organized efforts of local residents.

www.rikkiott.com
www.itsgettinghotinhere.org © Copyright 2010, krcl

Podcast: Download (9.7MB)

SALT LAKE CITY, UT (krcl) – Peter Young spent several years hiding from the FBI after raiding fur farms in Iowa. Dr. Steven Best is an outspoken writer, philosopher and activist, dedicated to liberating animals from human industry. How far should humans go to rescue creatures who have no voice? Young and Best offer a pro-animal worldview at Utah Valley University’s Animal Ethics Conference. © Copyright 2010, krcl

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SALT LAKE CITY, UT (krcl) – Are we truly seeing a “movement of movements” to challenge the more dire effects of globalization? Activist, author and puppeteer David Solnit takes it to the streets, country to country, working for the people and the planet. Dillon Hase and David Solnit discuss the history of the so-called “anti-globalization movement” and the hope of a Climate Justice Revolution.

Solnit will be speaking in Salt Lake City on Friday February 26 at Ken Sanders Rare Books, 268 S. 200 East. The event begins at 7 p.m.
© Copyright 2010, krcl