Around the world, youth activists are striking for climate action. Most notably, 17-year-old Swedish activist Greta Thunberg has drawn international attention and media coverage with her climate strikes and Fridays for Future movement.

But that’s only one part of the story. Ugandan activist Vanessa Nakate, 23, has also been advocating for climate action. In January, she attended the 2020 World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, with Thunberg and others. 

Though eager to spread her message to a broader audience, Nakate was cropped out of a photo with Thunberg, Loukina Tille, Luisa Neubauer and Isabelle Axelsson by the Associated Press. That crop sparked a fierce debate over race and media representation. 

“You didn’t just erase a photo,” Nakate tweeted after the incident. “You erased a continent. But I am stronger than ever.”

The lack of diversity in the environmental movement is not a new concern, and Nakate recognizes that.

“I think that there is an issue of white privilege,” Nakate told Earth Day Network. “Honestly, I wasn’t surprised. Media loves news that is a hot piece of cake for them, news that will sell… I believe that if they cover news from activists from the Global South, they think it would not cause as much impact.” 

Nakate has been striking for just over a year. Over the last decade, Uganda has experienced unusually high temperatures, as well as increased floods and landslides. But only recently did she connect these events to climate change.

“I wanted to do something that could enact change in the lives of the people in my country, so I started researching,” Nakate, who lives in Kampala, the capital city of Uganda, said. “Climate change really caught my eye because… in school, it is taught as something that we don’t have to worry about, something that is coming in the far future or that happened in the far past.”

African nations are some of the most vulnerable to and least prepared for climate change. Approximately 300,000 people are already affected by more frequent droughts, floods and landslides, and an estimated 65,000 people have been displaced, according to a government report. 

In East Africa, where Nakate lives, communities are experiencing the worst invasion of desert locusts in 25 years. This is why she and other activists from the Global South are speaking out. 

Nakate wanted to spread awareness so young people could connect disasters and rising temperatures to climate change earlier than she had. In January 2019, she staged a solitary strike outside of Uganda’s Parliament, an idea that came from Thunberg. 

“Honestly, I didn’t know how I was going to spread awareness for it, so I decided to read more,” she said. “That is how I found out about the Fridays for Future climate strikes, and I decided to start striking.” 

Since then, Nakate has participated in nearly 60 Fridays for Future protests and founded Youth for Future Africa, which later transformed into the Rise Up Movement. She has also campaigned for the Congo forests.

“It is important to listen to the activists from the Global South because they’re representing different communities,” Nakate said. “[The Rise Up Movement’s] main goal is to help tell the stories of these activists in Africa who are striking every Friday, who are doing different activities to demand climate action.”

The AP incident has only motivated her and strengthened her platform. She received an outpouring of support from activists across the globe, and her Twitter account became verified. 

“Despite the fact that this incident was so hurtful and painful, it has changed the story for different activists in the Global South,” she said. 

Like the first Earth Day in 1970, youth are the foundation of today’s environmental movement. To mark the 50th anniversary of Earth Day on April 22, 2020, Earth Day Network created EARTHRISE to build the world’s largest, most diverse mobilization of activists. Join the movement.

“The climate issue is a life issue,” Nakate said. “We have to keep fighting until we see the action that we are demanding. Above all, I want people to stop dying as a result of climate change.”

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Yesterday, 16-year-old climate activist Greta Thunberg, who founded the global youth striking movement Fridays for Future, was named TIME’s 2019 Person of the Year. The latest honor from TIME is reflective of a large (and growing) youth climate movement, a movement that is pressuring world leaders to take climate action.

Here in Washington, D.C., for example, 17-year-old Jerome Foster II strikes outside the United States Capitol every Friday. Two-hundred miles up the coast, 14-year-old Alexandria Villaseñor strikes outside New York City’s United Nations headquarters.

But you don’t have to be in a metropolis to strike for change. Deep in the heart of the South, another 17-year-old activist, Isabel Hope, strikes for climate action in Tuscaloosa, Alabama.

Hope in Alabama

Every week, Hope’s mother drops her off at the Tuscaloosa Federal Building to strike as a part of the Fridays for the Future movement.

“I’m out here every Friday to make people think about not only climate change but also what role the South can play in climate change,” Hope told Earth Day Network last month.

Hope started striking after seeing the lack of action taken by her government officials. She called these leaders “climate deniers” and was angry that these politicians accepted hundreds of thousands of dollars from the fossil fuel industry.

In the fiscal year of 2019, Alabama received $34 million from energy revenues produced in offshore oil and natural gas collection, making the state the ninth-highest recipient of energy funds in the country.

To ensure Alabama government officials heard youth voices, Hope organized the first Alabama Youth Climate Strike on March 15, 2019. Around 60 people from across the state joined Hope on the steps of the Alabama Capitol Building in Montgomery to demand for a change in climate policies in the state government.

Mobilizing youth in Alabama

In addition to striking, Hope wishes to create a platform for other youth voices in Alabama. That’s why in June of this year, Hope founded Yellowhammer Youth, a digital space where young people in Alabama can submit opinion pieces and discuss “varying topics from all political and socioeconomic backgrounds.”

“Our staff of students from across the state believe it is important, now more than ever, to showcase the youth perspective here,” reads the Yellowhammer Youth website. “A lot of Alabama lawmakers want to ignore our voices, but sadly those days are over.”

Yellowhammer Youth also acts as a media outlet to fill in the gaps in news coverage on climate issues in Alabama. Hope wishes that more Alabamians understand climate change and realize the importance of the South as a frontline community.

Threats to the American South

Compared to other states, Alabama isn’t active in the environmental movement. As the 15th- most carbon-intensive state economy, Alabama favors a heavy carbon emission industry instead of green alternatives.

Yet, Alabama is one of the states most impacted by climate change. Alabama is highly susceptible to extreme weather patterns: “Flash droughts” occurred this summer, as the American South experienced the driest and hottest September on record, as reported by The New York Times.

Hurricanes are also more likely to occur along the southern coast of the U.S. Climate scientists predict an increase in the intensity of hurricanes. And these extreme weather events won’t just hit tourist paradise (and climate change posterchild) Miami; Alabama will also be hit. But even with these pressing climate issues, Alabama’s state government remains reluctant to act.

“I can tell you now our state government has done nothing,” said Hope.

In 2010, a massive oil spill caused by BP happened on the Gulf Coast, near where Hope lives in Southern Alabama. The oil leak peaked at more than 60,000 barrels per day. Animals were killed and tourism economies crashed. Yet, Alabama lawmakers have continued collecting money from big oil companies.

In 2017, Alabama had one of the highest per capita energy consumption rates in the U.S. They also had the third-most expensive monthly electricity bills by state.

Fortunately, Alabamians are starting to realize the climate emergency we’re in. On September 20, nearly six months after Hope organized her own youth climate strike, several strikes occured simultaneously in the state (that Hope had nothing to do with) —including in Montgomery, Birmingham and Huntsville — as part of the Global Week for Future.

“I would rather be in school right now,” 14-year-old Stella Tarrant said in front of the Birmingham’s climate strikers on September 20. “I would rather be sitting at a desk doing math, because that would mean the adults were taking care of our planet and we wouldn’t have to.”

Your actions

Young leaders are driving the fight to protect our planet, when they should be in class learning. So, how can we support them?

Hope had plenty of suggestions. Strikes for the climate happen weekly in the capital, so if that fits your schedule, try finding something local. If you’re not free every Friday, global mobilizations occur throughout the year.

Don’t fret if you can’t make it out to your government officials, though. Digital striking is another option. In this case, Hope recommends sharing youth activists’ projects, hashtags (including #digital strike, #fridaysforfuture) and tagging @fff.digital.

In this age of environmental inaction, we need to do whatever we can to get our leaders to listen, especially if it’s supporting our youth who are running the movements.

April 22, 2020 is Earth Day’s 50th anniversary. It will be the largest, most diverse global mobilization for the defense of our environment. Join the EARTHRISE movement today.

Photo credit for photo at top: Isabel Hope

The post Youth inspire climate action in the southern US appeared first on Earth Day.

Youth around the world are on strike for the planet — inspired by Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg, many young people are skipping school and taking to the streets every Friday to demand climate action through climate striking organizations like Fridays for Future, Earth Uprising and more.

Despite its relative infancy (Fridays for Future founder Thunberg didn’t start striking until early 2018), climate striking has caught on in a big way. On September 20, 4 million took to the streets worldwide to call for greater political action on climate change. The next week another 3 million turned out in cities around the world.

But there’s another story under the surface, and that’s what’s happening online: digital striking.

“Digital striking is basically a solidarity action for those that can’t strike every Friday from school, so they can show their support for Fridays for the Future through the Internet,” says Iris Zhan, a 16-year-old climate activist from suburban Maryland.

By definition, striking requires a physical presence and sacrifice — one must have a routine or activity that they are striking from — usually in the form of missing school or work to strike. But not everyone can afford to pay that price. That’s why Zhan, a member of Fridays for Future USA, started digital striking several months ago together with George Zhang, a 16-year-old from outside Los Angeles.

Zhang had similar difficulties skipping school to strike — in his case, his school has a strict attendance policy he couldn’t get around. His parents also weren’t too eager to see him skip school.

In some schools, striking is forbidden altogether. Schools don’t allow excused absences for climate striking, leaving students who physically strike forced to often take a hit academically. That’s what happened to Washington native and highschooler Jerome Foster II, whose grade point average started dipping after he started striking weekly outside the White House.

“[Digital striking] gives an extra voice or periphery to the movement and more inclusive to people who may not necessarily be around where the strikes are or whose parents are super strict,” says Zhang.

Digital striking is simple: Take a picture of yourself holding a striking sign (digital or physical) lending support to the Fridays for Future movement (most messages are something along the lines of, “I stand with Fridays for Future,” but signs can also include traditional climate slogans, like “The seas are rising and so are we,” “There is no planet B,” or the OG climate strike message, Thunberg’s “Skolstrejk för Klimatet”).

Next, you upload the photo to Instagram, tagging @fff.digital and using the #digitalstrike and #fridaysforfuture hashtags. Zhan and Zhang then compile these photos into collages every week on their personal pages, as well as the @fff.digital account.

The digital striking movement is only about four months old but has been growing each week. Part of Fridays for Future’s success is rooted in unity, consistency and visualization. To deliver success, the movement needs individuals to strike on a weekly basis, not just occasionally. Digital striking helps to remove barriers to entry and create that consistency.

“We want to emphasize weekly action and not just waiting for the next big strike,” says Zhan.

Another benefit of digital striking is that it gives a voice to people outside of major cities. Often, national media limits their coverage of striking to big cities like New York, D.C. or London. Zhan is from suburban Maryland, with no public transportation — a big deal for teens without licenses — and no high-profile government buildings to strike outside of. Social media provides the time and the place for everyone to strike, regardless of where you’re from.

Digital striking also provides another supportive community for these youth climate activists. In my talks with climate activists the last several months, I’ve learned that this community is integral to the success of the movement. It’s not just the physical support; it’s also the mental support.

“The biggest challenge for me has been my mental health,” said 17-year-old Jamie Margolin, founder of climate organization Zero Hour, on a panel co-hosted by Earth Day Network and Twitter earlier this year. “The climate anxiety is really real for me.”

In September, Foster II told me he relies on comfort and healing calls — a way to “let it out” and “rant” to other activists in the movement. Fridays for Future and the digital community give him an outlet to combat the frustration associated with striking in the face of government inaction on climate change.

Encountering a challenge as enormous and existential as climate change, youth leaders are pulling out all the stops, using every resource they have to sound the alarm on the urgency of this crisis and the desperate need for global action. Digital striking serves as one more factor in the growing climate movement that its proponents hope will coalesce into an unavoidable force of change.

“I personally believe the change will come eventually,” says Zhang. “The facts are starting to add up, and people are starting to be more and more aware of what is going on around us.”

Meanwhile, activists like Zhan and Zhang will continue to digital strike on behalf of the Fridays for Future movement and their future. To them, there’s no other way — they feel compelled to strike. If your future was on the line, wouldn’t you?

“We don’t just want to stay silent — we want to show that we are out here still being active in the climate movement and still demanding climate action,” says Zhan. “I know that a lot of kids can relate to that.”

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The climate movement isn’t just for teens and tweens: As 81-year-old actress Jane Fonda demonstrated Friday, the youth climate strike movement also has a place for octogenarians.

On a chilly November morning in Washington D.C., Fonda protested climate inaction for the fifth week in a row, striking as part of her weekly Fire Drill Fridays. Hundreds joined the two-time Academy Award winner outside the United States Capitol Building, including Ben Cohen and Jerry Greenfield, founders of the ice cream company Ben and Jerry’s.

According to Fire Drill Friday’s mission statement, “The climate crisis is not an isolated issue — it involves every part of our economy and society.” With that in mind, Fire Drill Fridays assigns each week a different climate-related theme. Friday’s topic was the connection between drivers of war and drivers of climate change.

“The Iraq War was largely fought for fossil fuel,” said Fonda outside the U.S. Capitol Friday. “The climate, the environment, millions of people and species are being killed because of oil.”

The U.S. military is the largest institutional user of fossil fuel in the world. American armed forces use more fossil fuels than entire industrialized nations, including Sweden, Portugal, Norway and Denmark.

Additionally, the U.S. military encompasses the largest single expenditure for the U.S. government, with a $685 billion budget in 2019 — that’s nearly as much money as the next eight-largest spending countries combined. Ben Cohen suggested redirecting some of that military spending to instead fight climate change.

“Our national security is a decent environment, and we can make that happen,” said Cohen on Friday. “We’ve got the money to do it. There’s nothing standing in our way except for a lack of political will from the people in that building over there,” he continued, pointing to the Capitol Building.

American political activist and author Jodie Evans was also present Friday, addressing hundreds of those attending the Capitol demonstration.

“The struggle for peace and the struggle for a livable planet are connected,” said Evans.

The Fire Drill Friday event showcased not just war and its impacts on the environment but also the multidimensional, multigenerational effects of climate change. Climate change affects all classes, races and ages (though not equally), and these effects are far-reaching, influencing homes, jobs, security and the economy.

That all-encompassing approach to climate change — both its impacts and solutions — reflects Fire Drill Fridays’ demands, which include a Green New Deal, respect of indigenous land and sovereignty, environmental justice, protection and restoration of biodiversity and implementation of sustainable agriculture.

In Friday’s talk, Fonda stressed a fair transition to union jobs for workers who work in the fossil fuel industry. The fossil fuel industry will leave $11 trillion in stranded assets in the ground, she said.

“If we don’t create and demand a more equitable, fair, democratic future, then what are we talking about?” said Fonda, referring to the Green New Deal, a U.S. House Bill popularized by progressive U.S. Democrats. “So, this [transition from fossil fuels] has to be holistic and fair.”

Fire Drill Fridays’ demands reflect the stances of other organizations, including Sunrise Movement, Extinction Rebellion and Fridays For Future.

“We’re all supporting each other,” 17-year-old climate activist Jerome Foster II told me at the event. “It’s one big movement.”

Foster is a member of Fridays for Future and strikes every Friday in front of the White House. He said that Fire Drill Fridays was planned in coordination with climate activism organizations, including Fridays for Future. Foster also founded the group OneMillionOfUs, a nonprofit whose mission is “to mobilize one million young people to register and turn out to vote in the 2020 election,” he said.

“What we advocate for is climate justice, immigration reform, gender equality, racial equality,” said Foster. “Those are nonpartisan things. Those are human rights.”

Echoing Foster’s commitment to voting, Cohen stressed the importance of advocacy and mobilization in the fight for climate action.

“We need to be coming together in groups like this all around the country, and we need to keep on doing it,” Cohen said. “It’s a multigenerational commitment… It is our earth, and it is our country.”

Though Fonda has been arrested the last four weeks, she avoided handcuffs on Friday. That’s not to say police weren’t present: Police cars and officers lined the 2.1-mile march that followed speeches outside the U.S. Capitol.

That march included a stop at the Supreme Court (“to support the Dreamers,” said Fonda) and concluded at the White House — where U.S. President Donald Trump’s administration just formally announced the country’s plan to leave the Paris Agreement on Climate Change.

After a cascade of federal rollbacks, however, Friday’s rally pushed a message of stubborn, resilient action at every level.

“It’s going to take everything that you have to fight this battle,” said Krystal Two Bulls, an organizer from Ogala Lakota and Northern Cheyenne. “You’re going to need to be brave and strong.”

To learn more about how climate change affects all aspects of our societies, sign up to receive emails from Earth Day Network. The 50th anniversary of Earth Day is April 22, 2020. To meet this moment, we must build the largest, most diverse global mobilization in history in defense of the environment. Join the movement.

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On a Friday afternoon in early autumn, 17-year-old Jerome Foster II was not at school. He wasn’t at home, either. Foster was outside the White House in Washington, D.C., holding a sign that read, “School Strike for Climate,” and protesting government inaction on climate change.

“Most of the time I’m here by myself,” Foster told me, a different scene from two weeks earlier when Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg joined him and hundreds of youth climate activists to strike outside the White House.

Foster speaks in rapid cadences, his voice spurting forth in call-to-action phrases and rhetoric that echoes an urgency found in the youth climate movement. Most days Foster is easy to point out. He wears a bright blue and green bike jersey embedded with the words, “Think Globally Bike Locally” — it’s become a sort of signature.

But when I spoke to him outside the White House, Foster wore a hoodie. Sweating under an abnormally hot autumn day and in direct sunlight, he said he wore the hoodie because he was battling a cold. Several times he had to excuse himself to cough.

On top of sacrificing his health for the cause, Foster sacrifices a traditional high school experience by climate striking. He’s a senior at Washington Leadership Academy in Northeast D.C. and, like many of his classmates, is enrolled in a handful of AP courses in preparation for college. All those classes are put on hold when he strikes.

“Some teachers fully support my striking, but other teachers are like, ‘You’re going to get a zero.’ Okay, I’ll take the zero,” said Foster.

That attitude reflects the mindsets of countless youth climate activists around the world who strike in the name of climate action. To them, climate change is a crisis that must be prioritized above all else —even if that means forgoing an A.

Kids from all over the world have been striking and using their voices to demand change. Some are inspired by the Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg; others are inspired by each other; others are just fed up by climate inaction.

“We have no more time,” Jamie Margolin, founder of youth climate movement Zero Hour, told me several weeks earlier. “People are dying, and it is important that [world leaders] step up and give a damn.”

Margolin’s Zero Hour movement was how Foster became formally involved in climate activism. Foster loves writing, and he hopes to be a journalist someday — something he worries might clash with his activism. Two years ago, he started a blog called The Climate Reporter.

While searching the Internet for stories for his blog, Foster came across the Zero Hour movement. Surprised to discover there was an entire organization of young people organizing against climate change, he emailed and asked how he could help. That set him off on a course of climate action.

“I just knew about the climate crisis, and I wanted to educate myself more and more,” said Foster. “And I felt that if us young people aren’t going to be taken seriously, then we’re going to make sure we are by uniting globally.”

The youth climate movement is an entire community. Zero Hour isn’t the only environmental organization mobilizing youth — there’s also Sunrise Movement, Extinction Rebellion, Earth Guardians, Earth Uprising and Fridays for Future, the last of which was started by Greta Thunberg.

Though the climate movement has been going on for a couple years, only recently have national media and world leaders begun taking notice.

“It has just been accelerating and growing,” said Margolin. “The pressure has been magnifying. Something is going to tip the scale, and we do not have a choice.”

Margolin started Zero Hour in 2017 to organize a youth climate march. She and Zero Hour succeeded, organizing the Youth Climate March in 25 global cities on July 21, 2018, a little more than a year after the People’s Climate March and the March for Science, both in April 2017. Now Zero Hour is a staple of the youth climate movement.

From marches to strikes

These marches and movements are converging with the recent climate strikes, the latter of which has been widely attributed to the rise of Greta Thunberg. Many consider Thunberg the face of today’s global student strike movement and the reason many, including Foster, initially started striking.

“She knows so much more than anyone,” said Foster, who spoke with Thunberg after a White House strike. “She knows everything you can know about the climate crisis and understands the urgency.”

In August 2018, Thunberg began striking against climate inaction, sitting outside Swedish parliament in Stockholm every Friday and holding a sign that read Skolstrejk för Klimatet (school strike for the climate).

Thunberg remained committed, striking through the cold, wet Scandinavian weather. People took notice. The New Yorker profiled her. In December of 2018, Thunberg spoke at the U.N.’s COP24.

“I’ve learned you are never too small to make a difference,” said Thunberg at COP24. “And if a few children can get headlines all over the world just by not going to school, then imagine what we could all do together if we really wanted to.”

As Margolin and Foster were organizing for Zero Hour, another soon-to-be youth activist was on her own quest. And Thunberg’s speech helped guide her journey.

Fourteen-year-old Alexandria Villaseñor, now known for her weekly strikes in front of New York’s United Nations headquarters, had just returned from Northern California, where she saw directly the impacts of climate change on communities.

In autumn of 2018, Villaseñor traveled to her birthplace of Davis, California. Davis is only an hour from Paradise, where the now infamous Camp Fire broke out last year, a wildfire that killed 85 people and destroyed 150,000 acres and 18,000 buildings. The smoke eventually got to Davis. Suffering from asthma, Villaseñor had to return to New York prematurely.

“When I got back to New York City, I was so upset because all my friends and family were still in that fire, still experiencing the effects of the smoke,” said Villaseñor, at a youth climate panel co-hosted by Earth Day Network and Twitter. “I started to research, and I came across how the climate crisis is linked to California wildfires. I started to see the effects of the climate crisis all around the world.”

That curiosity to make sense of the world drives many climate activists. It’s a self-education that often ends in frightening revelations: The world is changing rapidly, and the youth are sensing that they’re inheriting a much less inhabitable Earth than the older generations have lived in.

“My generation will be impacted the most by the climate crisis, more so than any generation before us,” Villaseñor told me after the panel. “It is important for young people to stand up for our futures and demand action because we are the ones being handed this future.”

The more Villaseñor learned, the more she wanted to help. But she didn’t know how. That’s when she saw Greta Thunberg give an impassioned call to action at COP24. On December 14, 2018, Villaseñor took her up on that call and started striking at the U.N. Headquarters in New York. She’s been there every Friday since.

Villaseñor and Foster crossed paths months later at this year’s March for Science. That’s when Villaseñor encouraged Foster to strike.

“I was too scared [to strike], then I met Alexandria,” said Foster. “She gave me a pep talk and said I should do a climate strike at the White House. The day I came back from March of Science, I striked here. It was an amazing experience.”

It’s the science, stupid

Besides the urgency, the self-education and the sometimes-blunt messaging, a common theme throughout the youth climate movement is a steadfast reliance on science.

When Thunberg testified to U.S. Congress in September, she submitted landmark 2018 research from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) as her testimony. The special report gives us a dozen years to curb greenhouse gases to avoid 2 degrees of warming and limit the effects of a climate catastrophe.

“I am submitting this report as my testimony because I don’t want you to listen to me, I want you to listen to the scientists,” Thunberg said. “And I want you to unite behind the science. And then I want you to take real action.”

Thunberg was presenting new research, but at the same time, she was backing climate science that has been known for decades.

The IPCC was formed in 1988 by the World Meteorological Organization and the U.N. Environment Programme to assess climate change based on the latest science. This corresponded with climate scientist James Hansen’s testimony to U.S. Congress in June 1988. As part of his testimony, Hansen, who was director of the NASA Goddard Institute at the time, said, “The global warming is now large enough that we can ascribe with a high degree of confidence a cause and effect relationship to the greenhouse effect.”

A day later, The New York Times ran a headline that read “Global Warming Has Begun.” Bill McKibben’s book “End of Nature,” the first climate change book for a general audience, came out a year later.

Many consider these events in the late ‘80s the line drawn in the sand — the time when the public first learned about the potential impacts of climate change. Since then, however, very little has been done to curb greenhouse gas emissions. Paradoxically, each year since then the amount of greenhouse gas emissions we spew into the atmosphere has increased.

Part of the urgency of the youth climate movement is driven by this blatant disregard of decades-old climate science. Political leaders have known about this since well before many of these activists were born. Rather than ignore these reports, like so many before them, these activists are using them as a sort of fuel.

“We need politicians to have the courage, we need them to have the moral clarity and for them to have the ability to actually say what the facts are,” said Foster. “For them to actually act on them and not make speeches.”

Almost everyone I’ve talked to in the youth climate movement mentioned these IPCC reports in some way, mostly as a call to action that compounds an already urgent tone.

Xiuhtezcatl Martinez, a 19-year-old indigenous hip hop artist and climate activist, has been involved in the climate movement since he was six. He said he was tired of politicians dragging their feet and falling short on their promises.

“We have eleven years to radically transform every sector of our economy to guarantee a job to everyone who needs one and get our economy towards a renewable energy to make sure that we have a dignified and livable future,” said Martinez.

“We are demanding that action is implemented immediately to treat this like exactly as it is: a global emergency, a crisis,” he said. “We have so little time.”

Building momentum

Halfway through my conversation with Foster, a passerby interrupted us. She was visiting D.C. from Hawaii and recognized Foster. She briefly said she appreciated what Foster was doing and then was on her way. Foster was all smiles.

“[Striking] seems to have a ripple effect,” Foster told me. “People that walk past may not know anything about climate change… But if they see ‘School Strike for Climate,’ they see how important it is. I’m taking time out of school to come here and strike. That just shows the extent of the climate crisis.”

That climate crisis seems to be getting worse. With each passing day, greenhouse gas emissions left unchecked are causing irreversible damage to our planet. And this isn’t just a problem for future generations (although climate impacts will get more and more devastating in the coming decades); we’re already seeing the damage of climate change in the form of record droughts, hurricanes, floods and wildfires.

People are taking to the streets to force the issue into public view, driving more awareness to climate change than ever before. Organizations like Sunrise Movement and Extinction Rebellion are shutting down city streets and legislative offices to draw media attention and turn the heads of policymakers. If not with the carrot, then with the stick.

“One of the best ways for people to support this movement is to go out and do civil disobedience in forms of strikes or other direct actions,” Villaseñor said. “Now is the time for us to take to the streets because that is how we can see the most change.”

The first time I talked to Jerome Foster was before a Fridays for Future White House strike that brought Thunberg to Washington, D.C. The event turned out hundreds of youth activists, press members and interested bystanders.

“I’m not seeing action. There’s no hope without action,” Foster told me before the strike. “We won’t stop striking until we see global action to the levels that meets the global crisis.”

About an hour later, Foster gave an impassioned speech — which he later told me was improvised — that helped kick off the event. The speech hits on several main points of the youth climate movement and is included it in its full length below:

I have been striking at the White House for about 14 weeks now, and today, I want to call to action and say that young people around the world are not striking for pity. They’re not striking for forgiveness. They’re not striking for any other reason. We’re striking to demand action, because we don’t want change, but we need change. We need global change.

Because if you look around the world, we’re seeing natural disasters happening at every corner of the planet, from the Bahamas and the hurricanes there, from Central America to the droughts that are happening there, and also in the Middle East, where droughts are happening. And also around the world, we’re seeing entire communities being decimated by the climate crisis.

We’re all acting as if nothing is happening.

That’s why we strike here today. That’s why we strike here every Friday: to say that world governments must have the moral clarity, they must have the political courage and they must be willing to work internationally to solve this crisis because that’s what this crisis demands.

We stand here today to say yesterday was the best day to take action. Today might be okay, but tomorrow is too late.

And that’s what we’re saying today is that today is the day for action to be taken. Today is the day that youth around the world mobilize to say that enough is enough and that our future will not continue to be burned, that our future will not be continued to be taken away, that our future is a right, that clean air, clean water and a livable future is a right.

And that’s what our government must understand. And that’s what world governments must understand: that the economic systems of today will not work for the climate of tomorrow. And that’s what we’re saying is that we must have a call to action. Our economic system must reflect not growth but equitable development around the world.

We stand with communities around the world, from indigenous people to black and brown people, from men to women, no matter your sexual orientation, your age, your gender, anything that you’re fighting for. We are united in this crisis, because if we’re united in crisis, we must be united in our advocacy, we must be united in our activism, and we must be united in our solutions.

And that’s why we’re here today, to say that today is the last day where politicians will continue to ignore the youth of the world. Because the youth are standing up.

Welcome to Fridays for Future movement, and this is the White House climate strike. Thank you.

A week later, on September 20, 4 million people turned out for the first of two global climate strikes, the largest-ever day of climate action. The next day saw 3.6 million people take to the streets. At the main U.S. rally in New York City on September 20, Thunberg spoke to a crowd of 250,000 people.

“We are united behind the science, and we will do everything in our power to stop this crisis from getting worse, even if that means skipping school or work, because this is more important,” said Thunberg at the rally.

The New York strikes led right into the U.N. Climate Action Summit, convened by Secretary-General Antonio Guterres to discuss national contributions to the 2015 U.N. Paris Agreement, the international agreement that aims to limit global warming to “well below 2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels” this century.

Juxtaposed against the urgency of the climate strikes, the summit fell noticeably flat. Much was said but little was done in terms of concrete action, particularly from the world’s largest emitters. U.S. President Donald Trump stopped by for about 15 minutes. He was refused a platform to talk, given his stance on climate action: The U.S. — the world’s second-largest emitter and largest emitter per capita — is the only United Nations member state to announce a withdrawal from the Paris Agreement.

There was, however, a silver lining. Thunberg was given another opportunity to fuel the climate movement. And she did so by eviscerating heads of state as the world watched.

“People are suffering, people are dying. We are in the beginning of a mass extinction, and all you can talk about is the money and fairytales of eternal economic growth,” she said, voice shaking and on the verge of tears. “For more than 30 years the science has been crystal clear. How dare you continue to look away.”

Thunberg called out politicians for their blatant disregard of scientific reports that spell out the threat of our climate crisis. As she continued, the room fell silent.

“You are failing us,” she said. “But the young people are starting to understand your betrayal. The eyes of all future generations are upon you. And if you choose to fail us, we will never forgive you. We will not let you get away with this. Right here, right now, is where we draw the line.”

This message, coupled with the fact that world leaders committed little concrete action at the summit, will inevitably create even more urgency among youth climate activists.  People talked. The media covered. Thunberg, if you were living under a rock, was now impossible to avoid. So was the youth climate movement.

From climate strikes to Earth Day

Did it happen all at once? Or are we just now paying attention?

The convergence of environmental degradation, climate activism and public attention has created an inflection point in our fight against climate change. The IPCC special report on 1.5 degrees gave us a timeline in this fight. Legislative proposals like the Green New Deal provide us frameworks for action. Meanwhile, protesters continue to take to the streets, demanding a new way forward.

Back in front of the White House a few weeks later, Foster talked about the reaction to Thunberg’s speech in New York.

“She was a celebrity,” said Foster. “It was so cool to see that she is speaking truth to power, unapologetically having this anger because that’s how we feel.”

A general sense of restlessness and intolerance for inaction is seeping into public consciousness, reminiscent of an environmental call to action 50 years earlier. The youth of today — their anger, their sense of urgency, their demands — reflect the youth movements of years passed, including those who mobilized for the first Earth Day in 1970.

“Pressure has been building and mounting for so many years,” said Jamie Margolin, the climate activist who started Zero Hour. “We need to just finally push over the edge and get this mass momentum, like what happened with the first Earth Day, when there were all these bills passed and sweeping legislation and sweeping mobilizations.”

In 1970, a 25-year-old graduate student named Denis Hayes coordinated the first Earth Day, which helped launch the modern-day environmental movement. Much like climate strikers today, Hayes wasn’t just representing the conservation community; he was representing the millions of young people who would no longer tolerate the ignorance wreaking havoc on our environment.

“We find ourselves in the prologue to unanticipated disaster,” Hayes wrote in 1970. “It is already too late to avoid mass starvation, widespread internal diseases, exhaustion of valuable resources, and the senseless death of trees and lakes and people.”

Sound familiar?

“All that we can now avoid,” he continued, “is the ultimate compounding of our mistakes — the death of our planet — and time is running out.”

At a panel in September, Foster spoke about maintaining the momentum of the youth climate movement, echoing the messages of Hayes 50 years earlier.

“We are resorting to going to the streets and yelling and trying to get [leaders] to understand we aren’t just fighting for a river, we aren’t just fighting for a mountain, we aren’t just fighting for a singular home,” said Foster. “We are fighting for your brother, your sister, your mother, your child and your father. We are fighting for everyone that you know.”

The first Earth Day brought together 20 million people – 10% of the U.S. population at the time – as they took to college campuses, auditoriums and streets to demand change. That Earth Day spread across America to shake citizens out of complacency and unite millions in a shared call for action.

The legislation that followed — the Clean Air Act, the Clean Water Act, the Endangered Species Act and the creation of the Environmental Protection Agency — was a testament to the power of a nationwide movement organized by a 20-something grad student from Wisconsin.

Today, young people around the world are looking for similar transformative legislation. They’re looking for real commitments, not broken promises. And they’re hoping this movement can capture that.

To help drive change, Foster started his own international youth advocacy and voting organization called OneMillionOfUs, which works to unite five major youth social movements: climate change, gun violence, immigration reform, gender equality and racial equality.

According to its mission statement, OneMillionOfUs is a “diverse movement of young people with one common agenda, which is to have one common objective based on our belief that today we strike and tomorrow we vote.”

“We have to call everyone from Congress and say that it’s unacceptable that we are ignoring this issue,” said Foster. “We’re in a crisis and we have to act on it. We can’t be focused on what’s politically or economically possible but on what is necessary to take action.”

EARTHRISE: The next global mobilization

So now, up against not just regional or national problems but an enormous global crisis, the planet needs another collective movement. That catalyst of change starts with young people, just as it did 50 years ago. Climate strikes, led by activists from youth movements like Fridays for Future, Zero Hour and Sunrise Movement, is the start of this change.

April 22, 2020, marks the 50th anniversary of Earth Day. To meet this moment, Earth Day Network is launching EARTHRISE, a movement that will continue to build the momentum started half a century ago, revitalized by today’s youth climate strikes.

The stated goal of EARTHRISE is “to mobilize thousands of organizations, communities and schools and millions of individuals worldwide in a united demand for greater protections of our planet.”

“We need to channel the energy, urgency and indignation of the global youth strike movement to rally around a central message — that we cannot afford to wait any longer as climate change permanently alters our planet — as we push our leaders into action,” said Earth Day Network President Kathleen Rogers.

The similarities between the environmental protests that culminated with the first Earth Day and the youth climate strikes of today are noteworthy, as the success of the first Earth Day provides a call-to-action framework in our fight forward, while the rallying cry of youth activists provides the endurance and energy needed to demand change.

“The tasks ahead are enormous; our accomplishments to date have been trifling,” wrote Hayes in 1970. “But there’s little survival value in pessimism — and we are beginning to dare to hope.”

After we finished talking, Foster’s mother comes up to us and we exchange small talk.

When I look back, Foster is already preoccupied with another group of people — they’re students from a local university, seeking his endorsement for one of their environmental organizations. Seeing Foster standing there with his sign, coughing and sweating through his sweatshirt and talking to students only several years older than him, I’m reminded that Foster is only a kid. He has classes, homework, a couple hobbies, I’m not even sure he can drive yet.

Despite the rockstar status given to these strikers — their popularity granting them first-name familiarity (Greta, Alexandria, Jamie) in climate circles — these kids aren’t superheroes. They’re kids with hormones, social lives and looming deadlines for college applications.

When you talk to these youth climate strikers, though, their passion and eloquence overshadows their age. It’s easy to forget these activists are also just teenagers. When I was 17, the most memorable thing I did was learn to (poorly) play guitar and form a (terrible) pop-punk band. Foster and others — Thunberg, Villaseñor, Margolin — have given up all the things that shape a typical high school experience so that they can strike for the planet. So they can force world leaders to get their acts together.

Previous and current generations let fossil fuels burn despite knowing the devastating consequences. These people have left today’s youth with a responsibility they don’t deserve to inherit — namely, getting us out of this mess — and we must acknowledge the burden placed on them.

“We earned the title young adults because we are acting as adults,” Foster said, weeks earlier at a panel. “We are trying to mobilize like adults when adults are acting like children.”

Or, like Thunberg said at the U.N. Climate Action Summit, “This is all wrong. I shouldn’t be up here. I should be back in school on the other side of the ocean.”

Yet they’re here, striking for our future.

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The groups that shut down 22 intersections in Washington, D.C. on Monday were at it again Friday morning. This time, they took to the streets to march for climate action.

“Climate change is happening right now,” said Kaela Bamberger, an organizer for climate activism group Extinction Rebellion DC. “The extreme weather and the problems derived from all types of climate change will only become more severe. That momentum doesn’t stop, so we can’t either.”

The coalition of strikers — which included groups like Extinction Rebellion, Sunrise Movement and Black Lives Matter — held pink and blue Extinction Rebellion flags and banners that read “No More Business as Usual” and “Capitalism Is Killing the Planet.” The march followed a two-mile route that wound through downtown D.C. to confront major political and private sector offices and protest their role in our climate crisis.

Outside the Trump International Hotel, Liz Butler, a member of the coalition that organized the strike, gave an impassioned speech that demanded urgent action from politicians.

“We will not stand for the destruction of climate chaos,” said Butler. “We have 11 years to take action.”

Those 11 years are in reference to the landmark 2018 Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) special report on 1.5 degrees of global warming, which warned that we have just over a decade to curb greenhouse gas emissions and prevent the worst effects of unchecked climate change.

But the morning wasn’t completely bleak. On the corner of 12th Street and Pennsylvania Avenue, a dance party broke out, led by dancer Firas Nasr. Nasr is the founding organizer for Werk for Peace, a “queer and trans grassroots movement that uses all forms of dance to promote peace,” according to its website.

During morning rush hour, hundreds of climate activists again shut down a busy street in downtown D.C. This time, though, in addition to hoisting up signs and blocking traffic, they were dancing to the tunes of Britney Spear’s “Toxic” and Daddy Yankee’s “Gasolina.”

“This is not a sprint. It’s a movement,” said Nasr at the march’s conclusion. “We’re not just gonna dance. We’re gonna work.”

While 32 people were arrested Monday, no arrests were made Friday. Adil Trehan, an organizer of Monday’s shut down and today’s march, said the coalition of organizers wanted a more traditional march, rather than the mass civil disobedience we saw Monday.

Friday’s march in D.C. punctuated a Global Climate Strike week that saw millions of people take to the street to demand climate action. It started with worldwide strikes last Friday, including 250,000 people striking in New York City, and gathered momentum throughout the week, with the first-ever United Nations Youth Climate Summit on Saturday and the U.N. Climate Action Summit on Monday.  When asked how he expected maintain the momentum, Trehan was optimistic for the strength and endurance of the climate action movement.

“We hope that we can keep momentum going, and I think we will,” said Trehan. “Our movement in D.C. feels stronger than ever.”

The post Out of office: DC streets shut down again by climate activists appeared first on Earth Day.

A pink and yellow boat shut down a major Washington, D.C., intersection this morning. Yes, you read that correctly.

The boat was strategically placed by climate activism group Extinction Rebellion as part of its attempt to “shut down D.C.” The event intends to “block key infrastructure to stop business-as-usual, bringing the whole city to a gridlocked standstill,” according to the Shut Down DC website.

“A lot of people will be upset, but a lot will be inspired,” Adil Trehan, who supports media relations for Extinction Rebellion, said to Earth Day Network on Monday morning. “We need mass participation [to combat climate change]. A lot of options have been exhausted.”

Hundreds of activists from Extinction Rebellion, and other climate activism groups like 350.org and Sunrise Movement, divided into groups to shut down major intersections around the city. Mobilizations included a ten-foot tall fire hydrant, dance parties and the previously mentioned boat, emblazoned with the phrases “Tell the Truth” and “Rebel for Life.”

Charlie Abrams, who traveled from Atlanta to support the strike, said movements like these are “a critical step to save the planet. We can’t wait until 2020,” referring to the U.S. presidential elections taking place that year.

The most high-profile blockade was the boat, placed at the corner of 16th and K streets. The intersection is an important one for logistic and symbolic reasons — in the city, “K Street” is shorthand for lobbying and advocacy, while 16th Street provides an unobstructed view of the White House.

About half a dozen strikers attached themselves to the boat’s steel frame, while a hundred or so activists held signs and banners calling for climate justice and action.

“We’re in the belly of the beast right now,” yelled climate activist Russell Gray, sporting a pink Extinction Rebellion shirt and yellow vest, standing on top of the boat.

An hour or so into the strikes, the D.C. police force, which was present since the strike commenced early Monday morning, descended into the group. Police officers created a perimeter around the boat and after removing two people, began sawing off the steel frame in which some activists had attached themselves to.

Chants of “What side are you on?” quickly ensued. Fortunately, no violence broke out, and in some cases, activists and police officers had friendly conversations with each other.

“Joining a mass mobilization can be scary, but all these people feel this is the right thing to do,” said Trehan, when asked about the risks associated with the movement. He also stressed the importance of safety and nonviolence.

Police involvement in mass civil disobedience isn’t new to D.C., nor is it new for many of the activists. Mike Warburton, who donned a Sunrise Movement t-shirt as he passed out information cards about the strike Monday, was no stranger to these risks. Warburton was arrested last year when he and more than 100 activists showed up in or outside congressional offices, urging lawmakers to confront climate change.

“This really is a crisis. We don’t have time to spare. As Greta, says, ‘Listen to the scientists,’” said Warburton, referring to the Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg, who founded the global climate strike movement Fridays for Future.

In addition to the boat at the corner of 16th and K, other intersections were blocked around the city. Groups were divided into different themed groups, said Tarek Maasaraui, an Extinction Rebellion activist who was passing out apples at the vegan-themed group.

According to its website, the Shut Down DC strikes will take place all day across the nation’s capital. Maasaraui also said the strikes could continue throughout the week. That means tens of thousands of commuters, pedestrians and government officials could be affected by the blockades. Hundreds of thousands more will hear about it from media outlets.

The D.C. shutdowns were coordinated to overlap with today’s U.N. Climate Action Summit, a gathering of world leaders at U.N. headquarters in New York to examine national plans to meet the emissions target set by the 2015 Paris Agreement. Shut Down DC also follows the global climate strike movement, which turned out 4 million people worldwide on Friday.

“The intention is to bring attention to the importance of this issue,” said Maasaraui. “[Shutting down intersections] is a risky tactic … but it’s a potentially impactful strategy because it’s such a visible one.”

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Following a global climate strike that turned out 4 million people across the world, world leaders met today at United Nations headquarters in New York City to discuss national contributions to the 2015 U.N. Paris Agreement, the international agreement that aims to limit temperature increase to 2 degrees Celsius.

The most powerful moment of the day’s events came from youth climate striker Greta Thunberg, who is widely credited with starting the global youth climate movement of today through her weekly strikes outside of Swedish Parliament since 2018.

Thunberg, no stranger to verbal eviscerations of politicians, delivered her message on the verge of tears, her voice quaking with emotion.

“My message is that we will be watching you,” she said. “This is all wrong. I shouldn’t be up here. I should be back in school on the other side of the ocean. Yet you all come to us young people for hope. How dare you.”

Addressing the U.N. General Assembly hall of more than 100 heads of state, Thunberg called out politicians for willful ignorance in the face of scientific reports that warn of the urgency of our climate crisis.

“People are suffering, people are dying. We are in the beginning of a mass extinction, and all you can talk about is the money and fairytales of eternal economic growth… For more than 30 years the science has been crystal clear. How dare you continue to look away,” she said.

Earlier this year, world leaders were invited today’s summit by U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres, who issued a very specific mandate reiterated in his opening this morning: Don’t bring beautiful speeches. Bring concrete action.

In calling the event to order, Secretary-General Guterres reflected on Friday’s global strikes that turned out millions — mainly students and young people — to demand increased political action for the planet.

“Young people are here insisting on accountability and demanding action,” said Guterres. “They are right. My generation has failed in its responsibility to protect our planet. That must change.”

On Saturday, the U.N. hosted more than 700 young climate leaders from around the world for the Youth Climate Action Summit, which straddled Friday’s global climate strikes and Monday’s head of state-level summit. At the youth summit, Guterres emphasized his commitment to the goals of the youth climate movement to demand the greatest possible commitments from world leaders.

“That is the problem with world leaders — they talk too much, and they listen too little. I believe that what the youth is doing today, what grassroots movements are doing today, is absolutely essential for [change] to happen,” said Guterres on Saturday.

Monday’s summit had been billed as the opportunity for world leaders to deliver that change. Heads of state — including New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern, German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Marshall Islands Prime Minister Hilde Heine — opened the national commitment portion of the summit with their countries’ plans to increase climate ambition.

Representing one of the most climate-vulnerable populations on Earth, Prime Minister Heine announced her country’s new submission to the Paris Agreement, which increases the island nation’s country-wide ambition to the historic 2015 agreement.

“In the spirit of the Paris Agreement… we have submitted a second and more ambitious commitment,” said Heine. “Other countries must now follow our lead.”

Adopted in December 2015 by 195 countries, the Paris Agreement on climate change made history with both its global support and its timeline for execution. The climate agreement entered into force in less than 11 months, an extremely fast turnaround for U.N. agreements, which often take years to enter into force.

The Paris Agreement target holds the world to less than two degrees Celsius of total global warming, but the numbers initially agreed upon don’t add up: the 2015 and 2016 nationally determined contributions of each country only brings global warming down to about 3.2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels. To make up the difference, the agreement was adopted with the understanding that nations would increase their national commitments every five years. The first of these collective assessments is in 2020.

Monday’s U.N. Climate Action Summit is a way for Secretary-General Guterres to compel increased national commitments from heads of state before the 2020 deadline. Today’s commitment from the Marshall Islands is a step in this direction, but many more nations must follow, including the world’s largest emitters — China, India and the United States — if the agreement is to be met.

In 2017, the U.S. took a step backward with President Donald Trump’s announcement of the intention to withdraw from the agreement. However, in accordance with the text of the Paris Agreement and its amendments, the earliest possible date that the U.S. can officially withdraw from the agreement is November 4, 2020 — one day before the U.S. presidential elections. If the U.S. withdraws, it will be the only member state in the world not in the climate agreement.

“Hopefully our discussions here will be useful for you when you formulate climate policy,” said former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg in a direct call to President Trump, who briefly stopped by the climate summit Monday.

As Secretary-General Guterres prepared to receive announcements from heads of state at Monday’s summit, he emphasized the urgency of acting on climate change: “I refuse to be an accomplice in the destruction of our own, and only, home… it is my obligation — our obligation — to stop the climate crisis before it stops us.”

Thunberg had even stronger words for leaders, which she delivered in an unflinching tone to a noiseless room of politicians who can rarely be silenced.

“You are failing us,” she said. “But the young people are starting to understand your betrayal. The eyes of all future generations are upon you. And if you choose to fail us, we will never forgive you. We will not let you get away with this. Right here, right now, is where we draw the line.”

Image at top: Greta Thunberg speaks to the room of world leaders at Monday’s U.N. Climate Summit. Photo credit: UN Photo/Loey Felipe

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On Saturday, the United Nations hosted its first-ever Youth Climate Summit, bringing together more than 700 youth climate leaders from around the world to voice collective frustration about government inaction on climate change and discuss climate solutions for the future.

“Change rarely happens from the top down,” said Argentinian climate activist Bruno Rodriguez, speaking at the summit. “It happens when millions of people demand change.”

The U.N. summit comes a day after an estimated 4 million people took to the streets worldwide, including 250,000 in New York, as part of the global climate strike movement. The strikes made national headlines, highlighting the power and spread of this youth movement in their unwavering demand for change.

“We showed that we were connected, and the young people are unstoppable,” Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg said in her message at the U.N., speaking to the success of the previous day’s strikes.

Three climate activists – Rodriguez, Wanjuhi Njoroge and Komal Kumar, the latter two from Kenya and Fiji, respectively – joined Thunberg onstage to open the youth climate summit. The four were joined by U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres.

With the U.N. Climate Action Summit Monday and U.N. General Assembly following, Guterres served as a bridge between the youth climate movement and U.N. global leaders. To that end, Guterres flipped the traditional paradigm of his role, serving as a “keynote listener,” rather than speaker. The Secretary-General listened to the activists voice their frustration with national and global leaders’ inability to tackle climate change.

“Is it really too much to ask you to stop wasting time and walk the talk?” said Kumar.

Straight talk has been a theme of the youth climate movement, inspired by the frank statements of Fridays for Future founder Thunberg, who has directed her ire at policymakers in several speeches over the last year.

While world leaders have consistently dragged their feet on issues of climate change, youth are taking to the streets to demand change, impatient and intolerant of platitudes and excuses to delay climate action.

“This is not the time and place for dreams. This is the time to wake up,” said Thunberg, speaking on Tuesday to U.S. Congress.

Joining the youth leaders onstage for half an hour, Secretary-General Guterres appeared receptive to the young panelists, embracing his role as a keynote listener.

“That is the problem with world leaders — they talk too much, and they listen too little,” said Guterres to a room of applause. “I believe that what the youth is doing today, what grassroots movements are doing today, is absolutely essential for [change] to happen.”

Climate change is a challenge on a global scale: Individual leaders can make a dent in their own country’s carbon emissions, but without international agreements to compel unprecedented global action, greenhouse gases will continue to spill into the atmosphere. And if that happens, the world will descend into a much warmer — and more unjust — world.

“Climate change and huge disasters are causing more harm, war, strife, suffering, migration — that has created more climate refugees,” said Kehkashan Basu, 19, founder of the Green Hope Foundation, in an interview with Earth Day Network. “That has [led to] other problems that include exploitation and abuse of women and girls, even more than usual.”

“We need to act,” Jamaican climate leader Dainalyn Swaby, 27, said in an interview Saturday. “We are ready as the next generation of leaders, because we understand the responsibility that we have.”

Secretary-General Guterres concluded his talk at the summit by reflecting on his generation’s failure in the face of climate change. The world has warmed, and little has been done to curb the consequences of this warmer world, but the fight is not over, the U.N. head argued.

“My generation has largely failed, as you know, to preserve both justice in the world and to preserve climate,” he said. “My generation has a huge responsibility. It is your generation that must make us be accountable to make sure that we don’t betray the future of humankind.”

Yesterday’s recent strikes and today’s youth summit suggest that this younger generation is up for the challenge. But the question remains: Will the world — and its leaders — rise up to meet it? Monday’s U.N. Climate Action Summit will begin to answer this question.

Image at top: UN Staff members stand outside the SDG Action Zone on the lawn of U.N. Headquarters. Photo credit: UN Photo/Laura Jarriel

The post Activists meet in New York for UN Youth Climate Summit appeared first on Earth Day.

An estimated 250,000 people, mostly youth, showed up in New York City today to send a message to leaders: The planet is in a climate emergency, and young people will not sit by and do nothing.

Holding signs that read “Respect Your Mother (Earth),” “The Climate Crisis is Now” and “It’s Time to Panic,” young people took to the street, gathering in Foley Square in Lower Manhattan for a rally before marching to New York’s Battery Park.

Between chants of “We are unstoppable, a better world is possible,” climate activist Vic Barrett took to the stage to lament and protest the injustice of the uninhabitable earth he is inheriting.

“I was born into a culture that has been stolen from us,” said Barrett, a plaintiff on the constitutional climate lawsuit Juliana v. U.S. “This is our time. This is our future.”

New York City hosted America’s largest climate strike, but around the world, an estimated 4 million people from all seven continents (yes, even Antarctica) took to the streets to support the movement. The strikes were largely inspired by the Fridays for Future movement, started by Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg just over a year ago.

“We will not just stand aside and watch,” said Thunberg at the New York rally. “We are united behind the science, and we will do everything in our power to stop this crisis from getting worse, even if that means skipping school or work, because this is more important.”

In a surprising show of solidarity, New York City Public Schools supported the strike, encouraging teachers and classrooms to join the march in an announcement made the previous week.

“If we don’t fight then nothing is ever going to change,” said Nadia, a sixth-grade student from Brooklyn. “And things can change, but what we need to do is take action. If we participate in protests and strikes like this, then every single person can help to make this situation better.”

The protests come after a decades-worth of disturbing (and largely ignored) reports from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. One of the most referenced reports came last year, warning that we have only 12 years to slow the most destructive aspects of climate change.

In 12 years, the high school students that rallied today won’t even be out of their 20s. A planet ravaged by climate change isn’t a distant future for them. It’s their whole life. That’s why the climate movement has been mostly driven and organized by young people.

Seventeen-year-old climate activist and Zero Hour founder Jamie Margolin also attended the New York strikes. Margolin has led her own youth climate movement for several years now, mobilizing tens of thousands of youth across the country with her nonprofit Zero Hour. Margolin shared her perspective on climate change, its causes and the potential for the youth climate movement to drive the solutions in an op-ed published in the New York Times today.

“I am trying to send leaders the message that this is Zero Hour to act on climate change. We have no more time,” said Margolin to Earth Day Network on Monday. “I am here striking and telling leaders to stand up for what really matters: The Amazon rainforest, my future … because people are dying, and it is important that they step up and give a damn.”

Multiple reports and studies have shown that worst impacts of climate change can be slowed through better management of land and preservation of biodiversity, especially in places like the Amazon. In recent years, the role of indigenous knowledge has risen in the public consciousness as an important climate solution as scientists and civil society alike recognize the unique, long connection that these first peoples have to the forests and lands.

“We are connected with nature, we live within nature, we are the ones who have been guarding the forests for the longest generations, for [millennia],” said Michael McGarrell, of Coordinator of Indigenous Organizations of the Amazon River Basin, at the rally.

Several hours into the rally, the strike at Foley Square transitioned into a march down Broadway and concluded as a rally in Battery Park, where Jaden and Willow Smith headlined a concert attended by thousands. Fridays for Future founder Greta Thunberg closed the event with a call to arms.

“Together and united, we are unstoppable,” said Thunberg. “This is what people power looks like. We will rise to the challenge. We will hold those who are most responsible accountable. We can, and we will.”

The strike comes a day before heads of state convene in New York for a week of major events at the U.N., including the U.N. Youth Climate Action Summit and the Climate Action Summit. The summit is a way for countries to get more nations on track to meet the standards set at the 2015 Paris Climate Change Agreement. For leaders of countries uninterested in cutting emissions and reversing the trends of global warming, Thunberg has a simple message.

“This is just the beginning,” said Thunberg. “Change is coming, whether they like it or not.”

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