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Last week to answer this question I went into a specific example of a human rights issue that is being disregarded tying into the human rights issue we have been studying. This week I wanted to delve into connections that I have been seeing between the civil rights movement, and the climate crisis. It may strike you as quite a stretch, and personally it looks like quite a stretch written out. Though this entire week I have been taking note of similarities that I have been seeing when reading “On Fire, The Burning Case For A Green New Deal” and any information prescribed by Mr. Hughes, and Ms. Willemse. I will begin to unpack these connections below. I have also mentioned any connections I made in the podcast linked above!
Racism confines people based on the disproportionate use of skin colour. A racist has a preconceived notion of the value of the person they are being racist towards. They put that person, along with others who they identify as “similar” in a box. This cramped space is not appropriate to be placing people in, though the people that place these people in these spaces cant really find the decency to stop. African Americans fought for their human right, freedom. They slowly gained this through a series of marches, sit-ins, peaceful protests, and rallies. Though today that freedom is not quite detectable because it was never fully given. African Americans are still suffering against segregation, and racism, though today the approach is different. Did you know that 70% of toxic waste treatment facility’s in the United States are placed in and around communities of colour? That these facility’s are affecting around an estimated 1.5 million African Americans? The government is still treating people that are not white as lesser, and its getting a little frustrating. Take immigration for example. Now this is a big topic so I will try to handle it as best I can. In 2018 alone the United States became home to 44.7 million immigrants.
(Watch this for more information)
Seems like a lot but it turns out to be 0.59% of the global population. Still a substantial amount of people. These people immigrate for a variety, and abundance in some cases, of reasons, environmental reasons being one of them. People in the global south are feeling the effects of climate change must faster then it will hit the North. So that means that generally the counties the least responsible for climate change, are the ones who feel the effects first. Which doesn’t seem fair. So these people who live in these counties that are being hit with drought, monsoons, hurricanes or floods are trying to escape. The homes they built have become companions of the sea, and are lost to her forever, so they try to move to America.
Mr. Trump isn’t really the nicest though is he? He turns his back on these people who have lost so much, and are willing to make a new home for themselves in this country, and work to build thier economy, but Mr. Trump isn’t sold. He is racist and doesn’t want to take in “others.” By 2030 Live Science predicts that over 100 million people will be immigrating due to climate related reasons. Where will they turn if the only place that looks safe is really the only place that isn’t? That America turns out to be more dangerous and scary then their home?
Another connection I have been seeing throughout this period is in the planning. Little comments that are identical to each to her. Naomi Klein, the author of On Fire, said “the weight of the world is not on any one persons shoulders… It rests in the strength of the project of transformation that millions are already a part of.” She was confessing that this movement would not progress with people carrying this on their shoulders privately, sure the problem is more one persons then the other and people should be feeling guilt for that, but in the end it does become everyone’s problem. I was watching Eyes On The Prize, a civil rights TV show created in 1987. The show makes bite size pieces of the civil rights movement. The first episode is called Awakenings (1954-1956), and it focused on the exact same events we have been covering in class. The bit that caught my eye was when they interviewed Rev. Martin Luther King Jr after his house was bombed. This is what he said:
Interviewer : “are you scared?”
Rev. King : “No I am not. My attitude is that this is a great cause. It is a great issue that we are confronted with, and that the consequences for my personal life are not particularly important. It is the triumph of the cause that I am concerned about. And I have always felt that ultimately along the way of life an individual must stand up and be counted and willing to face the consequences whatever they are. And if he is filled with fear, he can not do it.”
His message is almost exactly what Naomi Klein said. That you must give up the idea that you carry do thing by yourself. Whatever your fighting for must be on the backs of many before you make progress.
This may seem like a very small connection, but I believe that the climate justice movement could pull a lot from the civil rights movement. That in a sense the fight for a green new deal is similar to the fight for equal rights. The peacefully protesting and marching people are doing today evolved from the civil rights movement. There are still many differences between the climate crisis and the civil rights movement, many to big to even think there are connections, things like lynching, segregation, slavery, and profiling. But those horribly terrible things were the reason to act. The climate crisis has very similar things that cause people to act, things like the 2 degrees of warming that was promised not to cross, leaders that don’t seem to care, and actions that contradict what is said. I’m still a bit iffy about all this, but I have been struck on more then one account of the connection between the civil rights movement and the climate crisis. If you have any further ideas please mention them in the comments because I would love to hear what others think.