"If the planet dies, all causes are lost causes." -- Anonymous
Humanity's fate hangs on a tight race between two tipping points: a scientific one and a cognitive one.
Scientists
use the term "tipping point" to refer to a runaway feedback loop that,
when triggered, abruptly and irreversibly changes the behavior of a
system, such as the climate. For example, when permafrost melts, it
releases methane, 50 times more potent as a greenhouse gas than carbon
dioxide. Thus: global warming, melting permafrost, more atmospheric
methane, more global warming. The worrisome cycle can easily spin out of
control.
But there's another climate tipping
point: the tipping point of public awareness. If the level of climate
awareness tips before climate catastrophe, we just might salvage a
viable future. And if so,
historians of that future will record September 21, 2014, as the day
that saved planet Earth.
I had planned to attend the
People's Climate March (PCM). Our small town chartered two coaches -- bound for the Big Apple -- and packed them to
capacity. Alas, a knee injury sidelined me. My wife and daughter marched. Spellbound, I watched the event live-streamed from
Democracy Now!
Organizers
had anticipated 100,000 marchers; in their wildest dreams they hoped
for 200,000. Early Sunday afternoon the numbers exceeded 300,000 and
kept climbing. As marchers spilled in from side streets, the procession
swelled and stretched, ultimately reaching four miles in length and
gathering up at least 400,000. A drone captured this
aerial view.
The
environmental equivalent of the 1963 civil rights march on Washington, the PCM was undoubtedly an historical watershed.
But
unlike the civil rights and anti-war movements of the 1950s and 1960s,
during which the media daily brought police brutality and body bags to
our living-room TVs, the mainstream media has been conspicuously AWOL or
unreliable on the climate. ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN, and Fox all ignored the
PCM or treated it as an afterthought. Even NPR downplayed the event. We
can only conclude that corporate media has as a stake in the status quo,
even when business as usual is stealing the future. For genuine news,
it has become necessary to frequent refreshing alternatives such as Democracy Now!, which covered the PCM live for three hours, The Guardian, Nation of Change, and Common Dreams, among others.
I'm no journalist, but for those who missed the significance of this singular
moment due to the mainstream media's abdication of responsibility, permit me a few reflections on why the PCM was monumental.
First,
it was huge: eight times the size of the largest previous climate
march. I've learned a little rule of thumb from local politics. For
every person who shows up for a protest, 10 others wanted to be there
but couldn't, and perhaps 100 others sympathize with the cause. The
sheer size of the PCM implies that Americans are finally waking up. The
rest of the world, it's worth noting, has long been awake on the issue
of climate.
Second, although I can't claim this
as gospel truth, I suspect the PCM gathered the largest coalition of
groups since D-Day, and perhaps more. There were, of course, the usual
suspects, the environmental groups:
350.org
(the primary organizer), Sierra Club, Green Peace, Climate Justice, the
Rainforest Action Network, and so on. But these comprised
just the tip of an iceberg gargantuan enough to sink the Titanic of
climate denial.
Also present were numerous
unions, from the AFL-CIO, to the UAW, to the Domestic Workers Union, to
the Amalgamated Transit Union. Not surprisingly, Occupy Wall Street was
there also, because the 1 percent that is screwing the 99 percent
economically is also screwing us climatically.
Women
were out in full force. In addition to stalwart groups like now NOW and
Code Pink, there were Mom's Clean Air Force and the Raging Grannies,
lobbying for climate action to secure a future for their children and
grandchildren, respectively.
All manner of
medical workers were present: Physicians (and Psychologists) for Social
Responsibility and the New York Professional Nurses Union, for example.
Why? For many reasons, among them climate change's impact on the spread
of tropical diseases and the increasing
frequency of asthma and respiratory illnesses due to atmospheric
pollution.
Anti-war (including Veterans for
Peace) and anti-nuke protestors were there, because addiction to fossil
fuels keeps us perpetually at war, and because nuclear power plants are
ticking time bombs. Renewable energy solves both problems.
Citizens
of 150 counties attended, represented by groups as diverse as South
Asians for Climate Justice and the Eco-Sikhs. Marshall Islanders, for
example, live on average just 6 feet above sea level. Their ambassador
marched to draw attention to the devastation the island nation has
already suffered from rising seas. The Survivors of Sandy marched too,
for much the same reasons as Marshall Islanders.
Indigenous
groups from around the world were front and center, because they've
known from time immemorial that to dishonor Mother Earth is the worst
form of
insanity.
Students from hundreds of colleges
marched because their futures are jeopardized by an unstable climate and
continual war over oil, land, and water.
Communities
of faith, awakening to the moral and spiritual implications of climate
change, were represented by tens of thousands of marchers.
Scientists marched too, proclaiming unapologetically: "The 'Debate' Is Over."
Two
dear friends, Harvard grads both, marched with Divest Harvard,
determined to end profiteering by the fossil-fuel industry, which has
declared war on the Earth's life-support systems.
In
all, 1400 organizations participated, each with a unique identity, yet
united in solidarity for one mega-cause: to rescue planet Earth from
the stranglehold of fossil fuel. And speaking of solidarity, there were
2646 solidarity events held in 162
countries.
Finally, the PCM, unlike mass
demonstrations of the past, was truly a "People's" march. Sure, there
was no shortage of celebrities, politicians, and climate gurus:
environmentalist and principal organizer Bill McKibben, U.S. Senators
Bernie Sanders and Sheldon Whitehouse, former vice-president Al Gore.
Susan Sarandon and Leonardo DiCaprio marched. So did UN Secretary
General Ban-Ki Moon, alongside world-revered primatologist Jane Goodall.
But
there were no major speeches by the organizers or the celebrated.
Instead, there was a moment of silence followed by a deafening roar that
coursed like a wave through the four-mile throng. Some called this a
wake-up alarm, intended for those whose heads are buried in the sand,
whose ears are filled with wax, or whose souls are deadened by greed
and/or power.
There was no need for speeches.
The faces, costumes, placards, and
signs said it all: "The Greatest Danger to Our Future is Apathy," "Stop
the War on Mother Earth," "There Is No Planet B," "We Are All in the
Same Boat."
