Reignited: A Response to Naomi Klein’s New Book
I have read enough books on the climate crisis and interconnected crises that they all sound the same by now. They are repetitive by nature, shouting over and over that the earth is on fire and calling folks to take collective action. Me, and the majority of humanity, agree on that, there’s no denial here, so why have so many books saying the same thing? Is it because it’s not sinking in and no one is acting fast enough or that scientists come out with worse and worse information every year or that there are still deniers out there? These books are preaching to the choir, folks who already agree that humans cause climate change are the ones reading the books, the deniers aren’t, why would they want to read something that says everything they believe is wrong? But that’s a long way of saying that of all the books on the climate crisis I’ve read I couldn’t tell you a single defining element that makes it stand out from the others. They all mush together to make one big heaping pile of depressing content that reminds me of my grad school days when I joked that what I really got was a masters in/dealing with depression due to becoming educated on the vast interconnected crises effecting people and the planet. It felt overwhelming and unimaginable to fix all the issues in the world. That hasn’t changed.
A couple paragraphs into the introduction of Klein’s book I started underlining and starring sentences. I felt a shift within me, starting with finally seeing how I was feeling being put into words when Klein mentions Greta Thunberg, the young Swedish activist. I so much related to how Greta took climate change personally, was so overwhelmed with it, and not able to ignore it. I’ve always not felt quite right in my body due to not living a life in strict accordance of my beliefs regarding living lightly on the planet. It’s something that gnaws at my soul and prevents me from feeling content; it’s what Klein calls, “living with moral contradictions.” It’s the imbalance within myself and the lack of control over my own impact that probably, definitely, has made me hyper critical and judgemental of others’ lifestyles and contributions to the destruction of the planet. It’s what, coupled with injustice, fuels the rage burning within me that I’m never able to quench because my actions alone will never be enough. So it’s dealing with these feelings of overwhelming inability to help that I believe causes inaction by the masses, causes folks to push it away; we are essentially mastering cognitive dissonance in order to get on with our lives. However, I’ve recently been enlightened to the idea that this individualistic approach to combating the climate crisis misses the mark. We feel we must take it all upon our shoulders, which is exactly what the fossil fuel (etc) companies want us to think, to distract us from who’s really at fault. The only way change will come is to shift the pressure from our shoulders to those causing the destruction and those in power. And we do that together in collective action.
Movements are made by folks organizing and coming together. And a movement is what wrote the Green New Deal.
I heard about the Green New Deal because I am alive and have access to the internet. Sure, I’m probably more into climate, politics, and activism than the average person; I follow AOC and Bernie on Instagram along with nonprofits and progressive news outlets like Democracy Now!. It’s in my feed. I’m exposed to it. Without having to do any digging or research I can easily follow the Sunrise Movement and the IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) on social media. Just by scrolling down on my phone I am exposed to movements, which helps me stay fairly well up-to-date on subjects that I am passionate about. But all that goes to say, I haven’t done the work to read the Green New Deal. I knew the premise and I supported it even though I didn’t know exactly what was in it. That’s why I was excited to read this book so I could learn more about it. Now that I have a greater understanding of the resolution, I feel compelled to share what I gleamed from it and shine a light on an aspect that might not be known to those who aren’t paying as close attention to the climate justice movement.
The Green New Deal is much more than legislation on protecting the planet and fighting anthropogenic climate change. The GND acknowledges and addresses other systemic crises such as economic inequality (including racial and gender wealth gaps) and rising white supremacy by using an intersectional approach forward. Because you shouldn’t have to pick which crisis to fight against and which movement to support, it doesn’t have to be either/or. The GND encompasses it all and recognizes that each crisis isn’t existing in isolation but rather exacerbated between them all, or as Klein says, “climate disruption is intensifying all these other crises.” This intersectional approach can only be realized by bringing everyone, from different movements and especially those from front-line communities, to the table in solidarity to practice participatory democracy with the goal of communities planning out and writing their own policies on how to tackle the crises. The resolution is calling for systemic transition, and not just away from an unlimited growth, extractionist economic ideology but also a transition of power from those benefiting and contributing to all the crises to the ones most affected.
Because first and foremost we need to acknowledge that, in the words of Klein, “Although climate change will ultimately be an existential threat to all of humanity, in the short term we know that it does discriminate, hitting the poor first and worst.” She continues, “almost 50 percent of global emissions are produced by the richest 10 percent of the world’s population,” therefore those countries/corporations have a responsibility to lead and lower emissions fastest “so that poorer countries where majorities still lack the basics of clean water and electricity can have a more gradual transition.” Because it should not be the sole burden of the ones most impacted to make change but rather those causing it. And surprise, surprise, they aren’t going to do it willingly. Re: they have their power, wealth, and privilege due to the depletion of resources and economic disparities. The whole system was built upon stolen people and lands. The photo of Klein’s text below says it loud and clear. Read it and read it again.
So we must force their hand, collectively. And in textbook fashion they will resist and shift the narrative, and they can because they have, re: all the money and power. They will distract and distance, calling on the traditional hallmarks of xenophobia and racism, which further divides humanity and incentivizes genocides and wars. They are literally and symbolically closing borders to those trying to escape a crisis that those- richest 10% of the world’s population- created. Klein notes, “this is how the wealthy world is going to ‘adapt’ to more climate disruption: by fully unleashing toxic ideologies that rank the relative value of human lives in order to justify the monstrous discarding of huge swaths of humanity.” So as you can see, it’s all much more than preventing a 1.5 degree rise in global temperature and saving the polar bears, people’s lives are at stake- right.now. These crises are testing humanity as a whole, how we answer will show if we are in this together or whether we sit back and watch the minority in power continue to sacrifice humans and our life source for their greed and position.
Thus wraps up my personal call to action tangent, now back to Klein’s motivating book. Aside from the introduction and epilogue detailing the intersectional approach of the Green New Deal, the rest of the book is compiled of articles and speeches she has written from 2010–2019. Each piece is focused toward different topics, like the BP oil spill, Hurricane Maria, record-breaking wildfires, and more. And as stated in the title, they act as the supporting documents for why we need a systemic overhaul as offered in the Green New Deal.
If you can’t tell, I highly recommend this book, especially for those wanting to learn more about the effects of climate change and a proposed way to move forward fighting it. Join me in calling our representatives, voting, and organizing to pass this beginning solution to humanity’s crises.
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This article was originally written on Sara’s website.
