One Day to Go Till the Lima Climate Conference - We Know How to Save the World

Well, there's only a day left before the UN Climate Change Conference in Lima, Peru (COP20) begins.  I'm not a betting woman. I prefer to work a little magic. So let's, instead of taking wagers, conjure up the best possible outcome. 

Let's manifest that all the delegations from the laggard nations, developed or developing (you know who you are, Canada, Australia, Japan, the Netherlands!) never make it off the runway due to freak snowstorms and heat waves, or get lost en route along with their luggage. (Or maybe someone simply locks them in their hotel rooms in Lima.) They just don't show up and therefore can't stall the proceedings.

Then let's manifest that the big industrialized nations all shake hands with China and the USA, congratulating them for their hokey little historic pact. At least they're finally recognizing that Houston has a problem (translation: that there really is a climate change emergency). So we've got the two biggest emitters on board, and their cronies (Europe, Russia, etc.), wanting to bask in the accolades, jump on board, too. (Reminds me of my father, a 3-pack-a-day smoker, who quit smoking because of all the attention we gave my mom when she quit!)

Then the big players, who have found their hearts and their conscience, decide to listen to the little players. You know, the countries where people are already losing their lives, their loved ones and their livelihoods; their food security and their water sources; their homes and entire homelands, all due to climate disruption and chaos. They listen to the stories and the pleas of the G77, the Alliance of Small Island States (AOSIS), the Least Developed Countries (LDC), the Africa Group ... all negotiating blocs that have basically been ignored until now. 

Next up is a little international fireside reading of a very grim (get it? Grimm?) storybook: the IPCC's AR5 Synthesis Report, which "leaves no doubt: Climate change is set to inflict 'severe, widespread, and irreversible impacts' on people and the natural world unless carbon emissions are cut sharply and rapidly." SHARPLY and RAPIDLY, as my hubby points out, means at the least adopting the IPCC's best-case scenario, RCP2.6. "We have a rallying cry," he says.

And then, all together, these nations -- their negotiators and their leaders (who have just jetted in for the last couple of days) -- decide to lend an ear to the members of Climate Action Network (CAN) International, who have come up with the best-ever civil society emergency response to the climate change crisis. 

• Start the decline in emissions next year. 
• Get to zero carbon by mid-century. 

And that, ladies and gentlemen, is the simple magic that can save our world. Abracadabra!

Climate Change Happinesses and Sadnesses

HAPPINESS

I love xkcd's comics. They're pretty off the wall and fun (and sometimes delightfully inappropriate). And he's so generous that he allows non-profit folks to use them for free! The comic above is dedicated to my husband, who's always been someone who tilted at windmills, only the enemies he's been attacking haven't been imaginary. Okay, so maybe the hubby-as-Don-Quixote metaphor doesn't hold up (except in the minds of deniers, skeptics, ignorers and delayers). Hmmm. ;-)

SADNESS

On Friday, I attended a professional development workshop for educators on trauma. It focused on the impacts of trauma on child development, and how those impacts might manifest in our classrooms. The facilitator warned that it might bring up our own traumatic experiences, and by the questions and discussion that came up, I could tell that that was how most of us were making sense of the new information (especially about brain research) we were hearing.

The facilitator talked about Type 1 trauma, which is a single event, and Type 2 trauma, which is ongoing, such as a childhood filled with abuse, and that Type 2 especially creates all sorts of attachment disorders in children and therefore psychological (eg, anxiety) and psychosomatic problems later in life (eg, digestive problems). Everything is connected, and so this made a lot of sense. 

Today, I find myself wondering if we've subjected a whole generation of children (in the West and beyond) to a childhood of ongoing (Type 2) trauma, with parents and other caregivers disconnected from each other and the rest of Nature, within a polluted biosphere (light pollution, air pollution, water pollution, land degradation) and a polluted noosphere (the realm of consciousness), with fewer fellow creatures due to biodiversity loss (kids growing up without birds and butterflies is tragic), at a speed of human life and living that creates disconnections and anxiousness from the very start.

Just a thought. A sad one. Compassionate climate action would include giving children back a healthy, carefree childhood surrounded by caring, attentive parents and their loving Mother Earth. 

HAPPINESS

If you're not deeply involved in climate change activism, it's probably hard to imagine how incredibly traumatic it is to work and work and work for solutions ... and then constantly see only more obfuscation and delay on the global front. So imagine our sheer delight when we heard yesterday that Climate Action Network (CAN) International is promoting its fabulous 2014 climate change position statement far and wide! Thank you, thank you, CAN International and your 900 member organizations, not just for hammering out this powerful emergency response to the climate change crisis, but for pushing the important demands within it onto the international agenda. 

SADNESS

You know who these gentlemen are? When I saw this photo, I cried. This is Iraq's president, Fouad Massoum (left) and Iran's president, Hassan Rouhani. They attended the UN Climate Summit in September. Canada's not-so-prime minister did not. 

China, India, Russia, Germany, Australia, Israel, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia and more did not send their presidents and prime ministers. I dunno, it just made me sad that so few world leaders of big nations took the time to attend. Though I have to admit that it warmed my heart to see Iraq and Iran sitting next to each other, knowing what they've been through together.

HAPPINESS

This Hopi prophecy is happy-making for it gives one (all right, me) a sense that yes, it makes sense to keep on trying.

"The time of the lone wolf is over. Gather yourselves. Banish the word struggle from your attitude and vocabulary. All that we do now must be done in a sacred manner and in celebration. For we are the ones we have been waiting for."

Here's to another week of feeling the fear and the sadness (and the joys of connecting and small successes) and carrying on with this vital work!

The Largest Action Ever on Climate Change is Calling for No Action at All

Used with permission

Ah, the bliss of ignorance. Oh, but that I were able to get excited about the People's Climate March, "the largest climate march in history," today. But I just can't, not when the march is actually calling for nothing more than, well, for people to march.  

I don't like being cynical, but there's far too much evidence this time that the whole thing is about good P.R., not about safeguarding the future or convincing governments to take urgent action on climate change (or especially outlining what that urgent action could be). 

Keep in mind that back in June of of this year, Climate Action Network (CAN) International, representing 900 organizations in 100 countries, many or most of them in the more vulnerable regions, released the best-ever climate emergency response position statement: a limit of 1.5ºC or less, not the deadly 2ºC "target"; greenhouse gas emissions declining by next year, 2015; and a rapid transition to 100% clean, renewable energy — in other words, achieving a zero-carbon economy — by 2050 or sooner. 

But no one in the Global North is promoting the CAN International position statement. Why is that? Indeed, it almost seems as though this march was designed to divert our attention from CAN's demands of our governments — demands that could actually make a difference.

To wit:

"Perfect Timing World leaders will be gathered in NYC for a landmark U.N. climate meeting — just the right moment for big public pressure."

Oh really? No, world leaders are meeting on Tuesday, so they won't be "gathered in NYC" on Sunday, like a bunch of conventioneers showing up early for a bit of debauchery before a conference. Timing-wise, Monday's Flood Wall Street march might have a bit more impact.

"Massive Scale We'll peacefully flood the streets in historic numbers, both in New York City and in solidarity events around the world."

Um, I thought George Dubya Bush taught us that peacefully marching in the streets is worth nothing and accomplishes nothing. Millions of us held candlelight vigils begging him not to illegally invade Iraq, but he laughed and snubbed his nose at us and went in anyway, making life hell for millions of Iraqis as well as American and British soldiers. Oh, and just to make sure we understand what the organizers mean by "peacefully": "NOTE: This march route was set after several months of negotiating with the New York Police Department...."

"Unprecedented Collaboration - Over 1,500 (!) businesses, unions, faith groups, schools, social justice groups, environmental groups and more, all working together.... We want to make sure the People's Climate March tells the story of today's climate movement in all its parts — so we're trying something new, and arranging the contingents of the march in a way that helps us thread our many messages together."

I've been told they're paying young people from as far away as Toronto to attend to create that collaboration. And I notice they're keeping the LGBTQ community as far away from the kids and families as they can, without insulting the Indigenous peoples and those impacted by Hurricane Sandy who are at the head of the parade, er, march. 

I mean, come on! Why wouldn't we want scientists to walk with political people, and musicians to walk with beekeepers? Is there to be no cross-pollinization at this march? And if you're an ordinary businessperson (not part of a Clean and Green Business), you're hooped, because there's nowhere that you belong. (Unless you're a Woman ... they come after the Domestic Workers, who are up there at the front with the Indigenous peoples.)

Centered on Justice - Committed to principles of environmental justice and equality — representing the communities that are being hit the hardest by climate change.

If we're going to talk about those hardest hit, where are the anti-poverty groups? And the representatives from whole nations in Africa and the Pacific that are losing their ability to grow food? ("International" is at the back of the line, where they'll stay, I suppose.) Who is representing the millions of other-than-human species who are dying out or having to shift latitudes to survive? (Animals, nature, species are not on the list.) 

And not to be unkind or insensitive, but is there something about the living and working conditions of domestic workers in the United States that I'm not aware of? Are nannies in Philadelphia being impacted by climate change more than other Philadephians, for example?

"With our future on the line and the whole world watching, we'll take a stand to bend the course of history. We'll take to the streets to demand the world we know is within our reach: a world with an economy that works for people and the planet; a world safe from the ravages of climate change; a world with good jobs, clean air and water, and healthy communities."

Here is how a cynic would parse that one:

With our future (oh, your future? not the future of all humanity and most life on the planet?) on the line (that's an overly calm way to say we're heading for global climate catastrophe) and the whole world watching (ah, there it is, that's what this is all about — a perverse, collective narcissism), we'll take a stand (kinda funny when they're supposed to be marching) to bend the course of history (did I already mention narcissism?). We'll take to the streets (the streets the New York Police Department can contain nicely) to demand the world we know is within our reach (a rather ungrammatically awkward tall order): a world with an economy that works for people and the planet blah blah blah.... (Do these organizers not realize that we've been asking for all this for decades, possibly centuries? Do they not understand how international climate change negotiations work?)

Well, at least I'm not the only cynic about this People's Climate March.

Arun Gupta writes in Counterpunch: "I've never been to a protest march that advertised in the New York City subway. That spent $220,000 on posters inviting Wall Street bankers to join a march to save the planet, according to one source. That claims you can change world history in an afternoon after walking the dog and eating brunch." What does he find most troubling? "Having worked on Madison Avenue for nearly a decade, I can smell a P.R. and marketing campaign a mile away. That's what the People's Climate March looks to be."

Cory Morningstar says: "The People's Climate March and supporting discourse is about protecting capitalism, not protecting the world's most vulnerable people from climate change. [It] is a mobilization campaign created by Avaaz and 350.org, with 350.org at the forefront. The oligarchs do not bankroll such a mobilization (via millions of dollars funnelled through foundations) without reason."

Anne Petermann, writing for Daily Kos, agrees that there is no call for action: "So, what are the demands of the march? There are none. That's right. The march will simply bring together an estimated 200,000 people to march through the streets of New York and then… There will be no rally, no speakers, and no strong political demands. Just people showing up with the overarching message that the world's leaders should take action on climate change. Why no solid demands?"

Quincy Saul writes in Truthout: "No Target: The march is a U-turn through Times Square, beginning at a monument to genocide (Columbus Circle) and ending ... in the middle of nowhere. Here in New York City where the ruling class of the whole world has made their diverse headquarters, the march will target none of them. The march will not even go near the United Nations, its ostensible symbolic target. No Demands: Again, to attract the largest number of people, the march has rallied around the lowest common denominator — in this case, nothing. Not only are there no demands, but there is in fact no content at all to the politics of the march ...."

But I'm sure that if it doesn't rain too hard and nobody's dog gets stepped on, it will be a nice event.

Despite the Climate Change Emergency, There's Some Good News to Report

Okay, the baseline is still that we're in a planetary climate change emergency, and if governments don't get their act together at the upcoming UN climate conference (COP20) in Lima, Peru this December, we're hooped. 

(Easy peasy, lemon squeezy solution: Write to every elected official you can think of to demand that governments put an end to fossil fuel subsidies, start the decline in carbon emissions next year, and opt for RCP2.6+ as the basis for their next global, legally binding agreement at Paris (COP21) in December 2015.)

We're presenting the Climate EMERGENCY Countdown in our own community this coming week. It's not all bad news (after all, if governments put an end to fossil fuel subsidies, start the decline in carbon emissions next year, and opt for RCP2.6+ as the basis for their next global, legally binding agreement at Paris (COP21) in December 2015, then there's some hope!), but at the request and behest of some friends who don't have the stomach for any of the bad news, we're going to make a point of presenting some good news on the climate front. Here's a bit of it, collected from various sources:

1. A handful of chemistry companies are mimicking photosynthesis to turn carbon dioxide emissions into products such as chemicals, fibres and jet fuel. (Source)

2. The UK is transforming old coal mines into solar farms. (Source)

3. The Environmental Protection Agency in the United States is proposing a Clean Power Plan. (Source)

4. Both UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and Executive Secretary of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, Christiana Figueres, both understand the urgency. Perhaps they'll be able to (what's a nice word for) knock some sense into world leaders.

5. Climate Action Network International's June 2014 position statement, Long Term Global Goals for 2050, is the best ever. 

(Hey, I didn't say it was a long good-news list!)