My friend Kyle Topfer of the Scientist Rebellion stops by to chat about the climate crisis. We talk about the current outlook on the climate movement and the current narrative in the media. Civil disobedience while being denigrated in the the media has been a successful strategy for other movements in the past, although at the moment it feels as though progress is moving quite slowly.
We also talk about some of the disturbing laws being passed to further punish activists and protesters. Corporations are still paying an incredible amount of lip service to activist groups and the public about their efforts to stop the climate catastrophe. Kyle maintains hoe and persistence while I tend to think we are doomed. This is an incredible and tough conversation with a brave human being!
THIS IS A MESSAGE FROM SCIENTIST REBELLION
https://scientistrebellion.com/
We believe scientists should be resisting on the front lines, but the resistance must be bigger than any one group. If you are not a scientist, you are welcome – behind every action is a whole community of people supporting, creating and organising. When scientists rebel it is powerful because it inspires others to rise up. By bringing scientist and activist communities together, both are empowered.
We are scientists and academics who believe we should expose the reality and severity of the climate and ecological emergency by engaging in non-violent civil disobedience. Unless those best placed to understand behave as if this is an emergency, we cannot expect the public to do so. Some believe that appearing “alarmist” is detrimental – but we are terrified by what we see, and believe it is both vital and right to express our fears openly. The population sizes of mammals, birds, fish, amphibians and reptiles have seen an alarming average drop of 68% since 1970, along with an apparent collapse in the pollinator populations. At this rate, ecosystems around the world will collapse well within the lifespan of current generations, with catastrophic consequences for the human kind.
Self-reinforcing feedbacks within the climate system, in which hotter climates cause additional heating (e.g. increased forest fires, thawing permafrost, melting ice) threaten to drive the Earth irreversibly to a hot and uninhabitable state. These effects are being observed decades earlier than predicted, in line with the worst-case scenarios predicted. Increasingly severe heatwaves, droughts and natural disasters are occurring year after year, while sea levels may rise by several meters this century, displacing hundreds of millions of people living in coastal areas.
There is a growing fear amongst scientists that simultaneous extreme weather events in major agricultural areas could cause global food shortages, thus triggering societal collapse.
For example, the drought in Syria (2011-2015) destroyed much of the country’s agriculture and livestock, driving millions into cities and sparking a civil war from which the world is still reeling. We face a crisis possibly hundreds of times more severe. To be informed is to be alarmed. Current actions and plans are grossly inadequate, and even these obligations are not being met. The rate of environmental destruction closely tracks economic growth, which leads to us extracting more resources from Earth than are regenerated. Governments and corporations aim to increase growth and profits, inevitably accelerating the destruction of life on Earth.
•To achieve decarbonisation on the required scale demands economic degrowth, at least in the short term. This does not necessarily require a reduction in living standards.
•For a just transition, the cost of degrowth must be paid for by the wealthiest, who have benefited enormously from the current destructive world order, while others have faced the consequences.
•A just transition to a sustainable system requires the wealth from the 1% to be used for the common benefit.
The most effective means of achieving systemic change in modern history is through non-violent civil resistance. We call on academics, scientists and the public to join us in civil disobedience to demand emergency decarbonisation and degrowth, facilitated by wealth redistribution
Talks with Climate Activists
Amit Singh | UK Climate Justice Activist | #63
https://youtu.be/7gpJweAbKzU
Talks with Permaculture Designers and Soil Scientists
Dr. Elaine Ingham Ph.D. | Soil and Agricultural Scientist | #48
https://youtu.be/jJmW_4iJpTc
David Holmgren | Godfather of Permaculture | #47
https://youtu.be/DtTWbHmIb1M
The Homeless Romantic Podcast
https://chris-jeffries.com/