"Own the Issue"

I'm off to the Paralympic Games in Vancouver with my students and their families today (homeschoolers always do things with their parents and siblings, which makes my job as their resource teacher much richer). School bus and lunch bags — the whole field trip thing. I'm pretty excited about watching a sledge hockey game this afternoon with everyone.

So it's a perfect day to talk about an Olympic metaphor that might be useful in climate change mitigation efforts.

Last week, I heard a fellow presenter at the climate change conference recommend that we all "own the issue" of climate change and food security. That got me thinking about the Olympics.

Although I hadn't heard about it until my country started winning medals at the 2010 Winter Olympics near here in Vancouver, four years ago (or more) Canada instituted a program to support Olympic sports and athletes called "Own the Podium." I'm still not sure what I think of that name, or the $$$$$ that was poured into the program for just a handful of elite athletes, but, well, it has been successful. Canada won more medals during these Games than any other country ever has. And we did it as the home team. There sure was a lot of maple leaf waving during these Games!

Here's the analogy. A lot of people abdicate even thinking about the climate change issue let alone acting on it because they're not scientists and they don't think they know enough. But look at the number of armchair athletes (in other words, fans) who "owned the podium" along with the Canadian Olympic athletes. If people who couldn't throw a curling rock or ski down a hill to save their lives can feel that they "own the podium," then certainly non-scientists can feel some stake in the climate change emergency.

How about "Own the Future"? What if we got countries competing on greenhouse gas reductions (instead of racing to come up with the best excuses for not lowering them)? What if we gave out medals for countries and communities that "owned the issue" and made the greatest cuts?

Or what if we had the Climate Change Olympics — and nobody came because they all wanted to win more gold medals by not burning fossil fuels to get there? Okay, I'm getting silly now, but I hope I'm making my point. If non-athletes can "own the podium" and take pride in the accomplishments of athletes, then why can't non-scientists (other than the shrill deniers) own the issue of climate change and make a difference in the world?

Help Protect the Polar Bear! Urgent Action Needed

Canada's polar bears are at risk - but you can help!

I just sent a letter to Canada's Environment Minister Jim Prentice asking for the polar bear to be added to Canada's official Species at Risk list.

Public consultations on whether to add the polar bear to the Species at Risk list end on March 19th. This is our last chance to speak up on behalf of the polar bear before Minister Prentice makes his decision. No matter where you live in the world, if you understand that protecting the polar bear will help safeguard our children's future, please take less than a minute to write your letter.

Read more below from Nature Canada, and here's the website from which you can send your letter: http://supporter.naturecanada.ca/site/Advocacy?pagename=homepage&id=107

Thanks!

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On March 19, 2010 — just days away — the "extended consultation" period on whether to add the polar bear to Canada's official Species at Risk list ends. This is your last chance to speak up on behalf of the polar bear before Minister of the Environment Jim Prentice makes his decision.

Tell Minister of the Environment Jim Prentice to add the polar bear to Canada's official Species at Risk List! Send a Letter Now!

The polar bear is not yet listed under Canada's Species At Risk Act (SARA), despite the fact that more than half of the world's polar bears are found in Canada. The government's own scientific advisors on the Committee on the Status of Endangered Wildlife in Canada (COSEWIC) have repeatedly recommended adding the polar bear to Canada's legal Species at Risk list — but Environment Minister Jim Prentice has yet to act.

Urge Canada's government to stop delaying. The polar bear needs strong legal protection!

Global warming is melting the polar ice caps, robbing the bears of the ice floes they need to hunt prey. As the annual sea ice melts, polar bears are forced ashore to spend their summers fasting. If the Arctic ice cap continues to melt sooner and form later, polar bears will become too thin to reproduce and many scientists predict they will become extinct by the end of this century.

Canada must not only list the polar bear, but address the greenhouse gas emissions that are directly contributing to the decline of the polar bear.

Tell Canada's Government the best way we can ensure polar bears are protected from global warming is to pass strong global warming legislation!

Send a Letter Now!

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Here's the letter I just sent:

When a country is privileged to be home to an iconic animal such as the polar bear, does it not behoove that country to protect the animal's habitat? Especially when protecting the animal will also serve to protect that country's citizens from the same threat?

Disappearance of Arctic summer sea ice is a catastrophe in the making. The entire northern hemisphere will lose its summer "air conditioning" -- and once that's gone, our agriculture will be at risk of further droughts and increased heat waves, leading to crop failures and famine. Yes, famine in our rich countries of the north.

I call on the Government of Canada to swiftly acknowledge the fragile state of polar bear populations and to add the polar bear to Canada's Species at Risk List.

I call on the Government of Canada to protect the polar bear's habitat and slow the effects of global warming in Canada's treasured Far North.

Protect the polar bear to protect the future for my grandchildren!

Individual Activism - Seven Points from an Activist Extraordinaire

Our friend and fellow activist (indeed, the most active activist I know!), Anthony Marr, will soon be leaving on his 7th Compassion for Animals Road Expedition (CARE-7). Anthony has dedicated his life to activism on behalf of the voiceless ones: non-human animals, children, future generations of all species.

He is a speaker every year at the Animal Rights Conference in the USA, and in 2009, he made a presentation entitled Individual Activism. Below are the 7 excellent and eloquent points that Anthony made.

1. The Power of One: One activist standing in the rain for 10 days is more powerful than 100 activists holding a one-hour protest in the sun.
2. Where you can lead: If you have no leadership quality, you would not be an activist. There is one thing among the millions that people can do in which you are the best. What is it?
3. Go where no one has gone before: Do what no one has done before. Media will cover you if you do something that has never been done there before, bearing in mind that something new anywhere is new only once.
4. Go where angels fear to tread: Do what no one dares to do — physically and spiritually. You need not be an outlaw to be brave. You can work within the law to change the law. Treat restrictions as challenges to your ingenuity.
5. Choose your enemy with compassion: Do it for justice, not for vengeance, and certainly not out of cruelty on our part.
6. Live for your cause. Be its instrument on Earth: You will live on in the difference that you will have made.
7. Save the Earth for her own sake, and our children and all creatures, for their own sake: An individual human has the potential to be an individual planet-saver.

"The rest is all up to you," he concluded.

You can watch Anthony Marr's speech, Individual Activism, on video.

Good Grief, Why Aren't More People Talking About the Risk of Catastrophe?

When Peter presented at the climate change conference this past week, he talked about how we have to do everything we can to eliminate all risk of climate catastrophe. (We've already got climate change impacts happening all over the world, killing or otherwise ruining the lives of millions of people we don't seem to care about as we sit in our comfortable EuroAmerican homes and communities.)

A well known Canadian IPCC climate scientist — an afternoon speaker — who had snuck quietly into the back of the audience was the first to pose a "question." He said (in front of a roomful of university-aged young people) that he doesn't think we should ever use the word "catastrophe" in front of young people. It's too overwhelming, he suggested. He also said that people who use the word "catastrophic" are being alarmist.

Peter (my first and best climate hero!) responded that it would be irresponsible not to articulate the risk of catastrophic climate change. Risk, he explained, is determined by the formula "Probability x Magnitude," and so even if there is low probability of reaching the upper end of projected increases in global temperature (according to scientists using computer models that don't include Arctic carbon feedbacks, and which have quite consistently been shown to be underestimating impacts and/or overestimating timelines), if this does occur, the magnitude of impacts could be off the scales. So, do we want to risk ANY possibility of catastrophic climate change occurring?

Peter also pointed out (as I have here in the past) that being alarmed about something alarming is not the same as being alarmist. I was so proud of his respect for the right of young people to know the state of their planet and their climate.

At lunchtime, we talked with this climate scientist. His students, he told us, are all depressed and throw up their hands. He spoke of our young friend who committed suicide (though she struggled with an anxiety disorder), and another young man who is fasting until our government passes a climate action bill it promised not to delay when it prorogued the parliament. In a sense, perhaps these young people are not unlike the martyrs of social movements in the past. But also, don't the reactions of these young adults make sense? Aren't they actually logical responses to the global situation?

But there's something else happening here. Many climate scientists who demand proof and evidence and replicability and peer review within their own disciplines have quite readily latched on to this notion that climate change "doom and gloom" cause depression, despair, hopelessness, giving up and a sense of being overwhelmed in all who hear it. But where is the proof? Where's the evidence?

First, I would question how many people are indeed actually depressed, despairing, feeling hopeless and overwhelmed, and have actually "given up." Most people in our society just don't give a flying leap about the fate of the planet and future generations. Those who work with data should demand some data, not a nebulous "sense" about what's happening from some environmental NGOs.

The point I'm trying to make is that any depression, despair, hopelessness, giving up and feeling overwhelmed could be due to several variables, such as:

• a generation that is malnourished (raised on junk food, eating foods with depleted levels of nutrients)
• hearing how bad the situation is and then not seeing an appropriate response from leaders
• getting confused by (or sick and tired of) the bogus claims of the denial machine
• feeling guilty about knowing the truth of the situation and not making any effort to change things
• hearing how bad the situation is and not seeing us older folks getting on with implementing solutions (or not believing that we even can)
• and psychological projection on the part of the scientists (who don't want to face their own fears about climate change)

Unless and until you have evidence, verification, corroboration, authentication, documentation, validation, substantiation and replication of this unproven hypothesis, Dr. Climate Scientist Dude, you might want to consider the possibility that you're wrong ... and start doing the right thing by telling young people the truth about the potential risk of catastrophic climate change we're all facing.