Showing posts with label Climate change. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Climate change. Show all posts

Monday, February 24, 2020

Climate justice - What will we do?


Chapter Sixteen
What will we do?


But while there are a few things science does not know about how the climate system will respond to all the carbon we’ve pumped into the air, the uncertainty of what will happen—that haunting uncertainty—emerges not from scientific ignorance but, overwhelmingly, from the open question of how we respond. That is, principally, how much more carbon we decide to emit, which is not a question for the natural sciences but the human ones. Climatologists can, today, predict with uncanny accuracy where a hurricane will hit, and at what intensity, as much as a week out from landfall; this is not just because the models are good but because all the inputs are known. When it comes to global warming, the models are just as good, but the key input is a mystery: What will we do?

Wallace-Wells, David. The Uninhabitable Earth (p. 43). Crown/Archetype. Kindle Edition.

The science of climate warming is not debatable. We have good information and models. Nine of the last ten years have been the hottest on record on planet earth.

We know what is causing climate warming and we know what to do to mitigate it. The question of what our future will be like is not a scientific one as much as it is a moral one. Will we as human beings take responsibility for our behavior and change it to lessen the consequence on the ecosystems we inhabit?

As Unitarian Universalists we covenant together to respect the interdependent web of all existence of which we are a part but many of our political leaders not only do not covenant with us, they do not appear to respect the interdependent web and continue to support policies which damage it.

What are we as Unitarian Universalists called to do? At least three things:

  1. Educate
  2. Organize
  3. Vote
  4. Demonstrate and boycott.


What activities and efforts are being enacted in your congregation to mitigate the situation? Climate change with the destruction of our ecosystems is the overriding moral issue of our time.

Friday, January 31, 2020

The most important justice issue for the survival of humanity - climate stewardship



The impact of The Uninhabitable Earth by David Wallace-Wells on my life has been significant. 

It's not that I didn't know and wasn't aware of many of the ideas and facts he describes in his book, but to see them put together in one place with such stark explicitness helped me appreciate the enormity of the Anthropocene which our species has created on the planet Earth.

Without awareness we are doomed to the negative consequences of our own behaviors as a species of mammals on the planet. Knowledge gives us power even though the truth hurts and can be horrifying.

I have been inspired to learn more, and do more, about the climate change issue. I am inspired to change my own personal habits of consumption and disposal, and also to engage in collective and political action to change the macro systems that affect the environment on this planet.

At age 74, I am lucky if I have another 10 or 15 years on this planet, and learning what I have learned now from this book, my life has new meaning and purpose, to work with the succeeding generations to assure, as best we are able, their health and well being, and the highest quality of life for them and their co-inhabitors on the planet and in the solar system.

Unitarian Universalists covenant together to affirm and promote a respect for the interdependent web of all existence of which we are a part. Advocating for policies which protect this interdependent web, respect it, love it, live in harmony with it, is the most important justice work any congregation can be working on with great reverence and a sense of piety.



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Monday, January 20, 2020

Greatest moral imperative of our time - Protect out climate.


First, the project of remaking the planet so that it is undeniably ours, a project whose exhaust, the poison of emissions, now casually works its way through millennia of ice so quickly you can see the melt with a naked eye, destroying the environmental conditions that have held stable and steadily governed for literally all of human history. That has been the work of a single generation. The second generation faces a very different task: the project of preserving our collective future, forestalling that devastation and engineering an alternate path. There is simply no analogy to draw on, outside of mythology and theology—and perhaps the Cold War prospect of mutually assured destruction.

Wallace-Wells, David. The Uninhabitable Earth (p. 29). Crown/Archetype. Kindle Edition.

I have become aware that up until now us boomers have no idea what our lifestyles have done to the planet. We lived in a time of economic expansion and the highest quality of living ever experienced on our planet in humanity's history. We thought of it as "progress" and expected that every succeeding generation would have a better life style than the preceding generation until now.

Now we have suddenly become aware that our children and grandchildren and great grandchildren and great great grandchildren will not have a better life style but will be, perhaps, much worse. How can we help them and leave a legacy which will be positive?

I support Sunrise even as an old guy. I support Greta Thunberg and the young climate activists unlike the Trumpists who mock and attempt to shame them. I have gotten more politically active to assure that better climate policies are put in place, and better practices are designed and implemented. These efforts are altruistic because I am in the last phase of my life being 74, but I want a safe and satisfying world for my descendents and all others around the world. I am reminded of the Native American value that decisions should be thought of in terms of how they will affect the next seven generations.

Us boomers should be helping the succeeding generations adapt and save Mother Earth for humanity. This needs to be done with a religious fervor. The future of humanity depends on it. Will you join in this effort and commit your time, talent, treasure, and energy to these endeavors?

Monday, January 13, 2020

Climate change policy advocacy

From Democracy Now on 01/13/20

Nearly 150 people were arrested on Capitol Hill Friday in a climate protest led by Academy Award-winning actor and activist Jane Fonda.

Fonda has been leading weekly climate demonstrations in Washington, D.C., known as “Fire Drill Fridays,” since October. For her last and 14th protest, actors Martin Sheen and Joaquin Phoenix, indigenous anti-pipeline activist Tara Houska, journalist Naomi Klein and dozens more lined up to get arrested as they demanded a mass uprising and swift political action to thwart the climate crisis.

Fonda then marched with supporters down Pennsylvania Avenue to a Chase Bank branch where environmentalist Bill McKibben and dozens of others were occupying the space to draw attention to the bank’s ties to the fossil fuel industry. Ten, including McKibben, were arrested.

The day of action was the launch of “Stop the Money Pipeline,” a campaign to halt the flow of cash from banks, investment firms and insurance companies to the fossil fuel industry.

“Let us remember that we are not the criminals,” Naomi Klein told a crowd of protesters. “The criminals are the people who are letting this world burn for money.”
To watch 14 min video click here.

The three stages of changing climate change policies and practices
1. Educate and inform
2. Vote
3. Strike

Support Democracy Now one of the few non corporate news outlets that reports on climate news.

I make a contribution to Democracy Now regularly.

Wednesday, October 30, 2019

An open letter to mental health professionals and my Unitarian Universalists brothers and sisters

Dear Frank et al.

One of my daughters, who is 50, lives in Pasadena and she asked me a few months ago if I offered therapy for people who are having psychiatric symptoms from the events of climate change. I said, "Not here in Western NY but I would guess there would be a big call for it in parts of California and where other climate disasters tragically and traumatically impact people's lives."

We have known about climate warming now for many decades and now we are beginning to see the consequences of these human caused changes. Will technology save us? A change in our human life styles? Psychotherapy?

I read an article last week on the "philosophy of climate change." It wasn't that good of an article but it did take me back a bit because I hadn't thought of climatge change, up until seeing the title of the article, as a philosophical problem. The more I have thought about it, the more it seems to me that it is a huge philosophical problem, and perhaps, part of our current social anxiety, if not panic, is that we have not thought of it as such before. We tend in the United States to see climate change as an economic and political problem primarily if it gets talked about in the public square at all. But it is the primary existential problem of our age and the future of humanity.

As we consider a philosophy of climate change, we also are lead into a consideration of the psychology of climate change. The first, and biggest challenge, is whether, as we face bigger and bigger devastation and human tragedy and trauma, will we help each other and support one another or turn on each other and protect our own? A dystopian future is as easily if not more easily imagined than a utopian one.

Frank seems to be encouraging us at least to be sympathetic and maybe help if we can. It seems to me it will take a national revival in uplifting democratic and humanistic values which have been sorely missing in our national discourse. We have to create a deep understanding that we are all in this thing called Life together and share Gaia, the interdependent web of existence. What happens to my brothers and sisters happens to me. No person is any longer an island. Me, myself, and I doesn't work any more and perhaps needs to be labled as delusional. A societal psychotherapy is long overdue which is based on wisdom, justice, and compassion. The individualism of hyper capitalism is a mortal sin which is creating hell in our midst. The only Democratic Presidential Primary candidate to attempt to surface a discussion of these philosophical issues is Marianne Williamson and she is dismissed as a flake.

We mental health professionals should be in the business of consciousness raising by teaching our fellow travelers that we are all one and how we treat each other and the earth will determine our ultimate fate. Marianne's book is entitled "The Politics of Love" and while I am not endorsing Marianne's candidacy, I am endorsing love.

David G. Markham, LCSWR
Brockport, NY

Tuesday, September 10, 2019

Blast from the past - Rev. William Sinkford speaks at rally on UU Ministry of the Earth in June, 2007

From Earth Day celebration in June 2007. Rev. William Sinkford, President of the Unitarian Universalist Association.


 
Rev. William Sinkford, President of the Unitarian Universalist Association, speaks at the UU Witness for the Earth Rally in Portland, OR, 0n June of 2007. The rally was organized by the UU Ministry of the Earth. The video lasts about 8 minutes and is well worth watching.




Friday, March 15, 2019

Kids forcing grown-ups to take their future seriously.



Unitarian Universalists covenant togeather to affirm and promote the respect for the interdependent web of all existence of which we are a part. The kids get it. What about the adults?

Are your kids or grandkids skipping school today, 03/15/19, to demand action on climate change?


For more click here.

Unitarian Universalists covenant together to affirm and promote the respect for the interdependent web of all existence of which we are a part.

Saturday, September 27, 2014

People's climate change march

http://democracynow.org - New York City is set to host what could be the largest climate change protest in history. Organizers expect more than 100,000 people to converge for a People's Climate March on Sunday. Some 2,000 solidarity events are scheduled around the world this weekend ahead of Tuesday’s United Nations climate summit. We spend the hour with four participants representing the labor, indigenous, faith and climate justice communities: Rev. Dr. Serene Jones is the president of Union Theological Seminary, which recently voted to divest from fossil fuels; Lidy Nacpil is a member of the Philippine Movement for Climate Justice; Clayton Thomas-Muller is co-director of the Indigenous Tar Sands Campaign in Canada and a member of the Idle No More campaign; and Estela Vázquez is executive vice president of 1199 SEIU, which is expected to bring thousands of union members to the march.



 I'd love to hear from any UUs who were at the march.

Interesting comments from Rev. Dr. Serene Jones, President of the Union Theological Seminary.
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