Raise your voice about climate change
If you watched the news over the last days of August, you saw video of an almost inconceivable wave of destruction in Nepal. Untold numbers of people and both the infrastructure and cultural heritage of this ancient region were swept away.
Glaciers in the mountains above a populated valley were weakened by rising global temperatures and came cascading down in a deadly tsunami.
It may have seemed a world away, but the reality is you and I caused that disaster as surely as if we had pushed a big red button that released the deluge. You may roll your eyes but it is literally true. Why? How?
We have failed over several years to take any significant action on climate change. Meanwhile we consistently produce the most carbon emissions of any country on earth — emissions that are causing the globe to get hotter.
Nepal may seem too far away. Put it aside for the moment. What about the weather forecasts seemingly day after day for the past several months putting literally millions of Americans on alert for extreme weather?
It’s been record-breaking weather of every description. Snowfall measured in feet instead of inches. Rainfall amounts considered once in a thousand years occurring annually. Los Angeles burning down! There is no need to list them. The majority of Americans now recognize that this extreme weather is the result of human-generated climate change.
It’s also clear that at a time when “affordability” squeezes every household, climate degradation is getting costly. Maybe it’s just the added cost of running the AC more or having to crank the furnace higher. Millions of Americans have endured moderate to severe storm damage. The cost of repairs comes either from your own wallet, insurance companies, or some level of government. Inevitably we will all bear increased costs due to these continuing catastrophes.
Considering all this, why is virtually no one in political leadership or mainstream journalism talking about it! Why? You know what? It does not matter. As of today — right now — you and I have to start hollering. Imagine if your kids were in a locked car that rolled into the river. That is how loud, and frantically, and persistently we have to yell. Yell!
Do not grasp for a complacency based on today’s already eroded standards, thinking we can adjust to this “new normal,” because this is all only going to get worse. And all the data indicates that the rate of decline is quickening.
First target of our new-found rage: No candidate for office, either challenger or incumbent, should get our support unless they are committed to a strong position of climate safety action.
Complain to the media about their pathetic coverage of the most important story, maybe, in human history. How can they report the weather forecast every 10 minutes but fail to provide any analysis about how rapidly weather is becoming more severe, why that is happening and what the future holds unless we eliminate carbon emissions?
Get on your marching shoes. We need to be gathering in large numbers to protest this lack of action by those who control the levers of power in this society. In government, that means both the federal and state leadership. Those culpable include the executive and legislative branches of government for generally gutless lack of action across the board. True, more is happening on the state level than nationally, but not nearly enough.
The prime target of our ire ought to be the private sector, which continues to engorge itself at the profit smorgasbord while they kill the earth. They have so far successfully lulled most of the population into somnambulant acquiescence to their path of destruction. But no more. For God’s sake, no more.
At this moment, in the days after Labor Day, unions must take up the call: “Workers DEMAND a safe planet!” If unions’ primary role is to safeguard the rights of working people and ensure they enjoy a decent, stable quality of life, what could be more important, more urgent, than fighting to maintain and restore our climate? If the members do not understand it, teach them.
DO NOT Continue to be complacent. Do not surrender the future of your children and their children. Complain. Confront. Holler, yell. Raise hell! DEMAND a safe planet.
John Harrity is the former president of the Connecticut State Council of Machinists. He lives in East Hartland.
