Bill McKibben: Global Warming Protests Get Creative
In mid-January, a few of us launched a Web site: stepitup07.org. We didn't have a big group behind us, and we didn't have any money – just an idea, that the time had finally come for Americans to move past concern about global warming and on to real action. We'd organized a march across Vermont last summer, which was a great success – it convinced all of our congressional candidates, from socialists to conservative Republicans, to put global warming front and center in their campaigns. But the final day of the50-mile pilgrimage drew 1,000 people – and we were shocked to read in the newspapers that that represented the biggest demonstration about climate change in American history.So we picked a day – April 14 – and asked people around the nation to organize demonstrations: on church steps and in city parks, and anywhere else that seemed appropriate. We sent out a bunch of emails. And then we waited. But not for long. In the course of a month, more than 600 groups have signed up to host StepItUp rallies on April 14. It's going to be one of the biggest environmental protests since Earth Day 1970. So far they're planned in 47 states. And more to the point, they represent a fount of unbelievable creativity: Scuba divers are organizing underwater demonstrations off the endangered coral reefs of Key West and Maui; climbers are planning to hang banners from some of the country's greatest rock walls; people will gather on the levees in New Orleans, and along the someday-tidelines in many of America's coastal cities, painting blue stripes to show where the water will come unless we take action; musicians are sending in songs; and one artist organized 800 school kids in Utah to spell out StepItUp with their bodies on the school playground and then took a picture from a helicopter.
And all this without, so far, one single story in the conventional media. The information is just online. Why the response? Because people understand what a crisis we face, but have felt overwhelmed by it. Just by issuing an invitation, we've given people a chance to act on their deep love for creation, their deep love for the people (poor people, mostly, at least at first) directly threatened by this greatest of crises, and their deep love for the future. I didn't know if people would respond, but I know now. What a wonderful feeling to click on the website every day and see the spirit at work.
Bill McKibben wrote the first book for a general audience about global warming, The End of Nature, way back in 1989. His new book is Deep Economy: The Wealth of Communities and the Durable Future .
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Comments
Simple solution to rising CO2 levels...... Everyone plant 20-50 tress.
Posted by: Kris Weinschenker | February 14, 2007 4:12 PM
Looking at the snow and cold outside the window the only warming crisis we have here is a lack of it.
Posted by: chuck | February 14, 2007 4:12 PM
Everyone plant 20-50 tress. Kris Weinschenker | Homepage I assume this is a joke and I get it. Kris you are way to bright to act in a simple-minded way if you aren't using tongue in cheek. It isn't fair for you to use blogs, other than your own, to spew out your anger with the judicial system. I could engage you on the courts but this isn t the place for me to question you or for you to bring that here. I know you can t take what I say laying down but at my age and the fact that both my sons are attorneys and my wife is a court reporter for a Supreme Court Justice should cause you to consider these words in the spirit they are offered.
Posted by: butch | February 14, 2007 5:04 PM
I like to hunt and fish but with my children so busy with church, school and other activities - don't get to do it much. But I do donate to Ducks Unlimited - Muskie s Inc. and several other organizations like them. They have done more to protect and preserve the environment than a lot of groups that meet on church steps and parks to protest. If it were not for organizations that desire to protect the wetlands for water fowl so that they can hunt them in season - there would be a lot less land for them if we had to depend on the 'environment' groups. It is called management of our resources. I can not take part in all these 'protest' gatherings like some as I have a job. Later .
Posted by: moderatelad | February 14, 2007 5:14 PM
mod, I understand and any of those types of things are worthwhile. This blog "I think" is trying to get behind policy that will move the political process to have government do the types of things that "Ducks" etc is doing. I'm a serious gardener and bogs, wetlands cleanse water better than any sewage treatment facility. I recycle my gray water through a homemade bog, which then goes to my water feature. The fish in the water feature let me know if I'm creating a problem like canaries in a mine.
Posted by: butch | February 14, 2007 6:16 PM
What are you talking about, Butch?
Posted by: Blake | February 14, 2007 6:17 PM
blake, be more specific?
Posted by: butch | February 14, 2007 6:20 PM
butch | 02.14.07 - 1:21 pm | #
Cool - and I could get behind that issue. But we need to have a comprehensive plan for the future and see that as Nuclear and Hydro for electricity - something that the Seaira Club I don't think will approve of doing. Wind generators are another option but we have seen what happens when they propose that one. (the Kennedy's went nuts when there was talk about wind power on Nantucket and Redford had a fit when they were talking about using his land) So - we will 'talk, talk and talk some more'. later - .
Posted by: moderatelad | February 14, 2007 7:01 PM
"What are you talking about, Butch?" Kris made a comment about trees, you told him your wife is a court reporter for a Supreme Court justice.
Personally, I don't like chain restaurants, so I won't set foot in a Cheesecake Factory.
Posted by: kevin s. | February 14, 2007 7:30 PM
My comment was out of place, it refers to Kris dropping by to dump on the court system out of context and moving on. It was out of order and I shouldn't have posted it.
Posted by: butch | February 14, 2007 8:16 PM
Kudos to Wallis's blog for inviting McKibben to share his ideas and encourage those of us who feel convicted to do something tangible for our planet.
Posted by: S K | February 14, 2007 8:45 PM
Kevin I'm not uninterested in you asking what I'm talking about but Blake asked the question unless you are both. And, you were right to call me to task.
Posted by: butch | February 14, 2007 9:08 PM
No global warming protest can be taken seriously unless there is someone on 12 foot high stilts.
Posted by: timks | February 18, 2007 4:34 AM
The link between Mind and Social / Environmental-Issues. The fast-paced, consumerist lifestyle of Industrial Society is causing exponential rise in psychological problems besides destroying the environment. All issues are interlinked. Our Minds cannot be peaceful when attention-spans are down to nanoseconds, microseconds and milliseconds. Our Minds cannot be peaceful if we destroy Nature.
Industrial Society Destroys Mind and Environment.
Subject : In a fast society slow emotions become extinct. Subject : A thinking mind cannot feel. Subject : Scientific/ Industrial/ Financial thinking destroys the planet.
Emotion is what we experience during gaps in our thinking.
If there are no gaps there is no emotion.
Today people are thinking all the time and are mistaking thought (words/ language) for emotion.
When society switches-over from physical work (agriculture) to mental work (scientific/ industrial/ financial/ fast visuals/ fast words ) the speed of thinking keeps on accelerating and the gaps between thinking go on decreasing.
There comes a time when there are almost no gaps.
People become incapable of experiencing/ tolerating gaps.
Emotion ends.
Man becomes machine.
A society that speeds up mentally experiences every mental slowing-down as Depression / Anxiety.
A ( travelling )society that speeds up physically experiences every physical slowing-down as Depression / Anxiety.
A society that entertains itself daily experiences every non-entertaining moment as Depression / Anxiety.
FAST VISUALS /WORDS MAKE SLOW EMOTIONS EXTINCT.
SCIENTIFIC /INDUSTRIAL /FINANCIAL THINKING DESTROYS EMOTIONAL CIRCUITS.
A FAST (LARGE) SOCIETY CANNOT FEEL PAIN / REMORSE / EMPATHY.
A FAST (LARGE) SOCIETY WILL ALWAYS BE CRUEL TO ANIMALS/ TREES/ AIR/ WATER/ LAND AND TO ITSELF.
To read the complete article please follow either of these links :
PlanetSave
EarthNewsWire
sushil_yadav
Posted by: sushil_yadav | February 18, 2007 12:44 PM
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