(posted for Bill McKibben)
I’m backstage at the very grand Boston Opera House, where we’re holding a pre-rally tonight to get people charged up for the People’s Climate March. It’s a great evening, as wonderfully diverse as this march is going to be: Sandra Steingraber, the soul of the anti-fracking movement, and Varshini Prakash, a leader in the national divestment movement; two top labor organizers in Bruce Hamilton and Joe Uehlein; Kalila Barnett, a veteran Boston environmental justice organizer, and the Rev. Fred Small (who has his guitar slung over his shoulder); John Kassel who runs the Conservation Law Foundation and Vanessa Rule, co-founder of Mothers Out Front. And to close the evening Ananda Lee Tan, dynamic fountainhead of every kind of climate justice activism.
But the real joy is the people in the audience. They’re representatives of the thousands upon thousands that are going to be in the streets of New York. I’ve got no doubt now that this will be the largest demonstration about climate change in the planet’s history. I’ve also got no doubt that by itself it won’t solve the problem.
Instead it’s a moment—a marker, and a big one, in the progress of this fight. I wrote the first book about all this a quarter century ago this year, and I kick myself every day for not figuring out sooner that as much as we needed books we needed movements more. Up against the raw financial power of the richest industry on earth, reason alone won’t cut it. We’ve won every argument but so far we’ve lost the fight.
But we can still—well, not win. Too late for that: the planet is going to warm more than it has already, and the results are going to be nasty. But we can still keep it from getting entirely out of hand. That may not sound like a great rallying cry, but in fact it is. This generation has been handed the greatest challenge the world has ever seen, and Sept 21 in New York we’ll see how up for it we really are.
Marchons! 48 Hour People's Climate March Recruitment Storm:
Thursday August 21st at 12 Noon through Saturday the 223rd at 12 Noon
We are one month out from the historic People's Climate March. The September 21 March is being held two days before the UN Climate Summit, where government and corporate leaders will convene to discuss taking action to address climate change.
Tens of thousands are expected to march in New York City.
Join in the 48 hour Recruitment Storm by registering and inviting friends to participate. Our goal is to add 10,000 new marchers by the end of the day Friday. Let's make September a game-changer for the climate movement.
Sign up here!!! --> People's Climate March