Direct Action Confronts the Climate Crisis [1]
Submitted by John Stauber [2] on
"The global political process to counter runaway climate change [3] has become, for practical purposes, irrelevant," writes Ryan King. "None of the currently proposed emissions reductions [4] being seriously considered in policy making [5] are appropriate to meet the severity of the situation. This overwhelming failure on the part of world governments is pushing the rapid unification of environmentalists, activists, scientists, and others to push for direct, immediate change. ... Al Gore [6], in August 2007, told the New York Times, 'I can’t understand why there aren’t rings of young people blocking bulldozers and preventing them from constructing coal-fired power plants.' Sure enough young people and many others have been involved in these efforts, but they are typically hidden in mainstream media or characterized as 'eco-terrorism [7].' NASA's Jim Hansen [8] as well as many other celebrities and environmentalists have been purposely arrested for acts of civil disobedience against coal and fossil fuel use." He notes that CMD's partnership project CoalSwarm [9] posts "constant updates on direct actions and resources." Direct action is serious stuff, but some activists are also armed with humor and a "SurvivaBall" [10] guaranteed to save those who can afford it from global warming.