The most barbaric approach [to coal extraction], mountaintop removal, can only be described as blasphemous, whether or not nature is one’s only religion. –Dr. James Hansen, “Storms for my Grandchildren”

Check out my first post for MNN, on MTR and civil disobedience as one of our most effective weapons for fighting climate crime.

–FLB

http://www.mnn.com/local-reports/utah/local-blog/the-last-mountain-mountain-lovers-worst-environmental-nightmare

It is generally acknowledged that we won’t get a carbon tax until 2013 and that we should focus our efforts until then on building the movement. It is also a given that the new Congress will try to prevent the EPA from doing their job and we will have to put substantial effort into defending a law passed by Richard Nixon. Trying to end subsidies for fossil fuels is also a worthwhile goal in this Congress; one that will at least expose the hypocrisy of the free market cultists.

I agree with all of that completely, but I’d like to suggest another modest legislative goal for the 112^th Congress: Get young people banned from observing sessions of Congress.

Wait, wait, wait: please keep reading.

I was recently talking with a student at Wesleyan University who agreed with me about the need for civil disobedience in the climate movement, but lamented that our task is harder than that of the civil rights movement because our target isn’t as clear. With the civil rights movement, she argued, it was easy to see how to take direct action against the problem of segregated lunch counters or bus stations. Go to the place where you’re not supposed to sit, and sit. With the climate crisis, on the other hand, where is the opportunity for resistance?

Perhaps our solutions are limited by our perspective on the problem. If the problem is that there are too many parts carbon dioxide per million particles in the atmosphere, then the target for action is indeed elusive and enigmatic. But if the real problem is that those whose future is being sacrificed (young people) don’t have a voice where the decisions about that future are being made (Congress), then the appropriate response becomes a little more obvious. Go to the place where you’re not supposed to have a voice, and make your voice heard.

Now, let’s be reasonable about this goal. If a young person stands up in the balcony of a congressional session and says, “It’s my future you’re sacrificing by turning your backs on the moral imperative of defending a livable climate,” it will be a minor distraction that will be quickly forgotten after the Capitol Police drag the young truth-teller out. When someone stands up after him to say, “History will remember that you sold our survival for campaign contributions,” she will likely earn a condescending and trivial mention in the media to go along with her citation. If a dozen young people make their voices heard that day before taking “free public transportation” to the nearest police station, there might even be a headline that collects hateful comments about naive, spoiled, elitist blah blah blahs.

As with most actions, what happens the next day will determine everything. If twice as many folks rise up the next day to speak truth to power, things will start getting interesting. After more and more young people each day raise their voices to proclaim their right to the same planet their parents had, people around the country will finally start to believe in the existence of a climate movement. When those first trendsetting students go back a second, third or fourth time to throw themselves into the gears of the machine, the “naive and spoiled” criticisms will fall from their backs like blackbirds from the Arkansas sky.

Most importantly, when those uninvited voices prove so persistent and multiplicative that they seriously hinder the 112^th Congress’s God-given right to sell the country to the highest bidder, Congress will have to act. If they truly are as simple-minded and reactionary as they pretend to be, they might even give us exactly what we want and ban people under age 30 (plus Ashley Anderson) from observing sessions of Congress.

Why is that exactly what we want? Because it forces Congress to admit reality. The reality of climate change is that it is a war against the young. But it doesn’t look or feel like a war to most people. It doesn’t fit the picture of what we think of as war. When Congress admits that they can only continue doing what they’re doing by preventing young people from watching, it is a clear statement that the status quo is only possible by waging war against the young. Thus, these waves of action force Congress to either end the war against the young, or start waging it openly.

Of course, it is not only young people with the motivation or the ability to raise their voices in defense of a livable future. So once Congress is forced to wage that war more openly, perhaps our parents will start raising their voices as well. At some point our leaders will have to admit that the status quo is a war against the living.

It’s hard to imagine that there are enough engaged, courageous people in this country to make any of this a reality. The vast majority of available media provides plenty of evidence of the superficiality and selfishness that dominates our culture. It almost seems silly to hold on to a genuine faith in each other. But I suspect we’re approaching a time when the only reason to keep moving forward will be an unreasonable faith in the greatness of humanity.

Even now, the reasonable and pragmatic thing is probably to join up with a big corporation and protect you and yours. Holding on to our humanity may require an unreasonable morality. Or perhaps that’s how it’s always been. Perhaps all bold acts of sacrifice have required an unreasonable faith in each other.

Climate change is a social justice issue.

Every living person depends on the environment. The current system consolidates wealth in the hands of a corporate minority, while threatening the health and security of all people. It is the least privileged and most vulnerable global citizens who are the first to feel the effects of the climate crisis, and who suffer the most damage.

From "Bangladesh faces climate refugee nightmare" (Reuters, 2008)

The climate movement is not the environmental movement. While the mainstream environmental movement is concerned with protecting the tree frog in the Amazon, or the polar bear in the Arctic, the climate movement is concerened with protecting a just, safe future for human beings.

Worldwide, civilization requires a livable climate. Climate change causes drought, floods, and resource scarcity, leading to famine, civil unrest, armed conflict, innocent suffering and government oppression.

As the climate falls apart, families, communities and lives are falling with it.

Advocacy on behalf of the climate is advocacy on behalf of the billions of people whose lives depend on a healthy planet. The global climate is interconnected, both environmentally and socially. Fixing an interconnected world demands interconnected movements; anyone who believes that all individuals deserve basic human and civil rights should see the climate crisis as an imminent threat.

The climate crisis is an issue that unites us all on a single team, fighting for the future of humankind.

Who is this DeChristopher?

In December of 2008, Tim DeChristopher rescued thousands of acres of pristine Utah land from being transformed into sources of dirty energy by disrupting a federal auction so shady it was later dismissed by the incoming Obama administration. Leases up for sale included land adjacent to Utah’s national parks and monuments. Attempts had been made to stop the auction from happening via conventional channels, but those tactics weren’t enough to stop this fire-sale by an outgoing administration with nothing to lose.

The infamous auction (Photo: KSL)

So Tim stepped in. He registered as Bidder 70 and started winning every parcel up for auction, well aware that this degree of fraud was criminal. With Tim eventually apprehended by federal agents, the auction was shut down. For stopping the auction, Tim faces ten years in prison and a $750,000 fine. His judge has also ruled that Tim cannot use the necessity defense (arguing that preventing larger crimes against Utah, its citizens, and the planet, overrules the criminality of Tim’s actions) or even mention his motivations to the jury during his trial.

Who are these people?

PeaceUp, Summer 2009

Tim’s success inspired a handful of Salt Lake environmental activists to band together and start Peaceful Uprising, a climate action group dedicated to defending a livable future from the fossil fuel industry. PeaceUp has since made leaps and bounds in growth and networking, bringing a unique and necessary voice to the climate movement. PeaceUp is now a 501(c)(3) with a lot of plans, a lot of energy, and a lot of inspiring allies. Together with those allies, PeaceUp organized Countdown to Uprising, a convergence for climate justice to support Tim and celebrate the great American tradition of civil disobedience, February 24^th through 28^th in Salt Lake City.

The Trial: Why does this matter?

“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.” – From a call to action co-written by various leaders of the climate movement (climatetrial.com)

Tim is likely to pay a high price on our behalf. After scolding the former administration for its shameless haste to auction off oil and gas drill sites near Utah’s cherished national park lands, the current administration is throwing the book at Tim as an example to deter future activists.

This trial is not about Tim. This is about our ability to stand up for what’s right, even in the face of huge corporate interests. It’s about every Utahn, every American, and every global citizen whose family, livelihood and life is threatened by catastrophic climate events, caused by the emissions from those selfsame corporate interests. This is about our right to speak up on behalf of all the people who are regularly wronged by the crimes of Big Dirty Energy.

What’s next: What can we do about this?

“There are courageous acts of civil disobedience being performed quietly, privately, by individuals throughout Utah and this country, that are just not being played out in the public sphere,” said Terry Tempest Williams, prominent Utah author and activist. “These people are not facing a trial in a court of law. Tim DeChristopher is.”

Tim’s success proved that a single person has the power to redirect our country’s suicidal course toward climate catastrophe, if only he or she dares to be courageous and make sacrifices.

The fossil fuel industry the largest, most powerful industry worldwide. The mainstream environmental movement’s laudable attempts to address our most urgent problems on the issue of climate change have failed. Now is the time for effective action that has immediate, real impact.

Civil disobedience works. In order to force an urgent issue that requires immediate governmental attention, civil disobedience has historically been the only tool to finally force a stubborn government to act on crucial social justice issues.

It’s up to us now to push the climate change envelope; to force our leaders to act on our behalf; to use our collective voice and demonstrate that this is the most important issue of our era. Saving our civilization from collapsing into its own self-destruction will take no less than an uprising. The world’s best scientists have told us that in the very near future we must decrease the carbon in our atmosphere drastically, as at present, the planet is headed down an irreversible course that will raise mean global temperatures. That means our planet will not likely be able to sustain life as we know it.  Changing our light bulbs and riding our bicycles will not save our climate. We need a global focus on this issue, and we need it now.

There has never been a more important time to organize and act.

El cambio climático es una parte de la justicia social.

Desde "Bangladesh faces climate refugee nightmare" (Reuters, 2008)

Cada ser humano depende del medio ambiente. El sistema actual concentra la riqueza en las manos de una minoría empresarial y pone en peligro la salud y la seguridad de todos. Son los menos privilegiados y los más vulnerables los que sienten los primeros efectos de la crisis climática y los que más daño sufren.

El movimiento climático no es el movimiento ecologista. Mientras el movimiento ecologista pretende proteger la rana de árbol en las amazonas y el oso polar en el ártico, el movimiento climático se preocupa por un futuro equitativo y seguro para los seres humanos.

A nivel mundial, la civilización requiere un medio ambiente habitable. El cambio climático causa sequías, inundaciones y una carencia de recursos, que conllevan la hambruna, disturbios civiles, conflictos armados, sufrimiento por para de los inocentes y la opresión de gobiernos.

Conforme con el deterioro del medio ambiente, las familias, las comunidades y las vidas también deterioran.

La abogacía a favor del medio ambiente es a la vez la abogacía a favor de casi siete mil millones de seres humanos cuyas vidas dependen de un planeta sano. El medio ambiente global está interconectado entre si, tanto de manera ecologista como de manera social. Reponer un mundo interconectado supondrá movimientos interconectados: cualquier persona que cree que todos los seres humanos merecen los derechos básicos debería apreciar la crisis climática como una amenaza seria e inminente.

La crisis climática debe unirnos a todos en la lucha para el futuro de la humanidad.

Escrito por voluntarios Peaceful Uprising