#QuestforEmpathy – Rupert Read (full episode) (Rupert Read is an author, teacher and spokesperson for the socio-political movement Extinction Rebellion. His latest book is “This Civilisation Is Finished.”) #CLIMATEEMERGENCY
Extinction Rebellion’s spokesperson Dr Rupert Read is appeared on the podcast show The Quest for Global Empathy 18/09/19 @ 5pm BST.
Promo / Highlight clips
Feel free to use these clips. You are also welcome to post them now, before all the episodes goes live. Included are file download links just in case you wanted to publish them on your own platforms. Please use the #QuestForEmpathy hashtag, and link to the full episode.
1 – Extinction Rebellion’s Rupert Read: It’s not too late [YouTube | File Download]
Charvil Community Tennis Club 4 years running#Tennisfor Kids 🏃♀️🏃♂
!! 30C++ expected tomorrow stay protected, the heat is On ☀️🔥
In addition to the Safeguarding Training you might find CCTC’s ‘Extreme Heat Policy’ for outdoor sports (activities) interesting, ESPECIALLY SECTION 5 – CHILDREN AND HEAT (MOST IMPORTANT)
BREAKING The BIG MELT has begun. With the recent ongoing widespread and catastrophic melting it’s likely through the period 2019-26 that all white has vanished. From 12 years reporting on #GlobalHeating.
12 years ago, “What will happen when all the white is gone?” Since WWII our #OnePlanet had 60 years of toxic pollution (1945-2005), plus 60 years of changing climate (1975-2035), on top we experience 60 years of climate disasters (2005-2065).
Earth to set global #DRR standard for Climate Disaster Governance by showing #ClimateAmbition leadership and beyond. Emphasis on relentless #ClimateDisaster, inaction will have unimaginable costs.
#Kuwait high temperature up to 63 c outdoors and 52.2 c in the shade.
Recently, Kuwait experienced heatwave high temperature up to 63 c outdoors and 52.2 c in which the umbrella came out to remind the public, especially the children and elderly, avoid coming out in the informing and there are 1 fatalities from heatstroke from the impact of hot weather. The Ministry of energy reveals that there is a high power of electricity to 14360 Megawatt per day. Increase 3.5 per cent
From the highest temperature record ever recorded in the world is at 56.7 Death Valley, Furnace Creek Ranch, California Year 1913 the latest world organisation meteorological organisation is doing the verification of the confirm if this is a new record.
Source
https://www.skymetweather.com› content Kuwait heat: Kuwait City makes claim of 63 degrees Celsius, WMO yet to declare it as new …
https://indianexpress.com› Explained Fact Check: 63°C claim from Kuwait — is it really a world record? | Explained News, The Indian …
Implementing the #SendaiFramework urging everyone to check out the new Global Assessment Report on Disaster Risk Reduction (GAR) #GAR2019 report –
What a successful GP2019 with GAR2019 sending out a clear message on climate related disasters. The world terminology is moving from “climate change” to “climate crisis”, global warming to “global heating” etc. Antarctica worlds first haemorrhaging disaster > SHOCK
Unacknowledged, unaddressed and unknown risk sits at the heart of the global threat to sustainable development. “Shock is the new normal, expect the unexpected and prepare for it”
That this House declares an environment and climate emergency following the finding of the Inter-governmental Panel on Climate Change that to avoid a more than 1.5°C rise in global warming, global emissions would need to fall by around 45 per cent from 2010 levels by 2030, reaching net zero by around 2050; recognises the devastating impact that volatile and extreme weather will have on UK food production, water availability, public health and through flooding and wildfire damage; notes that the UK is currently missing almost all of its biodiversity targets, with an alarming trend in species decline, and that cuts of 50 per cent to the funding of Natural England are counterproductive to tackling those problems; calls on the Government to increase the ambition of the UK’s climate change targets under the Climate Change Act 2008 to achieve net zero emissions before 2050, to increase support for and set ambitious, short-term targets for the roll-out of renewable and low carbon energy and transport, and to move swiftly to capture economic opportunities and green jobs in the low carbon economy while managing risks for workers and communities currently reliant on carbon intensive sectors; and further calls on the Government to lay before the House within the next six months urgent proposals to restore the UK’s natural environment and to deliver a circular, zero waste economy.
Today the House must declare an environment and climate emergency. We have no time to waste. We are living in a climate crisis that will spiral dangerously out of control unless we take rapid and dramatic action now. This is no longer about a distant future; we are talking about nothing less than the irreversible destruction of the environment within the lifetimes of Members.
Young people know this. They have the most to lose. A few weeks ago, like many other Members on both sides of the House, I was deeply moved to see the streets outside Parliament filled with colour and the noise of children chanting “Our planet, our future”. For someone of my generation, it was inspiring but also humbling that children felt that they had to leave school to teach us adults a lesson. The truth is that they are ahead of the politicians on this, the most important issue of our time. We are witnessing an unprecedented upsurge of climate activism, with groups such as Extinction Rebellion forcing the politicians in this building to listen. For all the dismissive and offensive column inches that the protesters have provoked, they are a massive and, I believe, very necessary wake-up call. Today we have the opportunity to say, “We hear you.”
OPEN LETTER: This afternoon, Tuesday the 23rd April, Greta Thunberg spoke at a special meeting of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Climate Change at 2pm, in the Attlee Suite, Portcullis House and all MPs are invited to attend… #Education
I do not want to declare a Climate Emergency, that ship has already sailed and now even the deniers are in agreement, after Sir David Attenborough spelled it out clearly to all humanity in his most recent hard hitting documentary on #BBC1, that we have less than a decade to mitigate the greenhouse gasses that are heating up our planet at a rate that is well beyond all the legal agreements our governments have signed up to in both the Kyoto Protocol and the Paris Agreement.
No, I want to talk about a Climate Change Teacher in Every School! A joint partnership, set up between a #UK based education company, Harwood Education and the One UN Climate Change Learning Partnership (UNITAR; UN CC:Learn) has created an innovative solution that will ensure every child receives the very best climate change learning that the UN has created. They have launched the Climate Change Teacher Course on World #EarthDay in the United Kingdom. This trial launch has been sponsored by YPO, they need at least 80 Teachers to sign-up and do the easy audio/visual online course that, when completed, will leave those teachers accredited as the very first Climate Change Teachers in the World, and these teachers will be at the forefront of delivering climate change literacy to all the pupils that attend the schools they teach in.
While global attention has been directed to various climate campaigns, this new Climate Change Teachers Course and its accompanying UN:eduCCate Programme are pioneering Climate Literacy here in the UK first, before they scale up to every school worldwide.
I would also ask you, as an MP of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth the Second’s Government, if you would be interested in taking part in this groundbreaking trial of the Climate Change Teacher Course, that is fully accredited by the One UN Climate Learn Partnership, yourself? Surely every MP should know all the facts about Climate Change:
The Legal Framework
Climate Change and Cities
Climate Change and Health
Climate Change and Gender
Climate Change and Science
Plus all the scientific facts on GHGs (Greenhouse Gasses for those MPs that don’t yet know this) and #SDGs (our Government signed the United Kingdom up to the Sustainable Development Goals but most of us are unaware of the fact that we have not achieved nearly any of the goals they signed our country up to!).
Today, Tuesday 23 April, MPs had the opportunity to hear #GretaThunberg speak at a special meeting of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Climate Change at 2pm, in the Attlee Suite, Portcullis House. As an MP I am asking you to please listen. More than 1.5 million children and young people worldwide attended the #schoolstrikes for climate in March – a global movement which started with just one child, Greta Thunberg.
Young people, including myself, across the UK continue monthly strikes, demanding action on climate change, But I want to go one step further and I want to demand that we have one Climate Change Teacher in Every School!
We desperately need Climate Change Teachers qualified to deliver the UN:educcate Programme, which delivers more than 500 lessons, all based on the current school curriculum but with Climate Change Literacy at their core in every class-room.
We know that our youth will enter the work force which will need them to be climate change literate and able to strive through social innovation.
Not just for future generations but for those in countries such as Mozambique, already suffering the impacts of climate change today.
They tell us that much more needs to be done and much faster.
Don’t we all agree we have an urgency and it is our responsibility to listen and act?
I would be very grateful if you could let me know if you will be participating.
This is an opportunity for all teachers, teaching assistants, absolutely anybody working in a school in this country and educating our youth, to become climate change literate, confident to share climate change best practices. We must ensure that these specialist teachers join a global network of 200,000 scientists, #policy makers, researchers and practitioners from 190+ countries that have acquired the same essentials and therefore understand more of how and why climate change is happening, as well as the mitigation and adaptation we need to deliver to halt the rise in temperature immediately.
We need a Climate Change Teacher in Every School so that they can go on to share their newly acquired knowledge with all students now that we are at one of the most critical points in our species’ existence because we all know that this is a #ClimateEmergency and we want action not words but real, tangible, useful action now.
I look forward to meeting you all at the All Parliamentary Group on Climate Change Event today, to discuss the above with you, in person.
Hannah-Jane Kento, 11 Years Old, Year 7A, Hitchin Girls School, Hertfordshire
I’m a Boston Rebellion, in #Togethernessship with millions against sitting #localgov. PD’s call out Climate Disaster Emergency – By doing so we, ‘the people’s demands’ (PD’s) globally call all town and city councils, municipalities to align all planning and decision making in harmony with the natural Earth comeback, with the Ecological Precautionary principle. Instead of planners and decision makers wreaking the planet with outdated and unsustainable ruling – rogue urban development. From 2020 these acts will be considered as criminal and those responsible will be held to account.
First all towns and cities to recognise the “CITIZENS’UNIVERSAL DECLARATION*” implementing urgently needed energy transition plans to shift, from fossil fuels to renewable energy without delay, in order to reduce greenhouse gas emissions at once. Stop relying on fossil fuels and initiate an urgent shift to a carbon-neutral society without any further delay.
Maybe you’ve had a similar experience to me — every so often the distant nightmare of climate change breaks through. I read or watch something, I’m shocked, I do some things, I hope the Government is responding adequately, I get pulled back into the demands of my life. And after a time — repeat.
I don’t particularly want to think about climate change. I don’t really think of myself as an environmentalist. What can I do anyway? I like being a mum, I like supporting parents of teenagers, I like my work, listening to the radio, gardening and drinking tea with friends.
But recently it has become clear that we have entered a new, very urgent stage in tackling climate change and protecting our natural world; that we cannot carry on as usual any more; that there is no other alternative but for everyone to face the emergency we find ourselves in, and to act from that point.
We need to face the climate emergency and other ecological crises
We have to face that we are in a state of climate emergency — that we have maybe five years (plus or minus a couple) to dramatically reduce greenhouse gas emissions, to have any chance of preserving the world as we know it.
The UN IPCC (United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) report[i] published in 2018 said the world has 12 years to halve greenhouse gas emissions to have any chance of limiting global warming to 1.5 degrees (to be clear, this is action on a scale the world has never seen before, similar to a ‘Marshall Plan’ in every country).
However, the report has increasingly been criticised as a conservative compromise, and respected scientists are breaking ranks to issue serious warnings that we actually need to act much more quickly[ii].
We also face:
that 60% of animal life and over 70% of insects have been killed or disappeared in the past 40 years[iii]
that climate scientists are openly talking about being terrified[iv]
that the effects of climate change are happening more quickly and more seriously than was predicted[v]
that current commitments by governments to reduce emissions put us on course for a ‘catastrophic’ 3 degrees of global warming
that UK soil will be able to produce crops for a maximum of 30 more years in its current condition[vi]
that human extinction (or near extinction) is an actual possibility in our children’s lifetime[vii]
that we are in the midst of our final chance to divert from environmental collapse, without causing massive human suffering
and sadly more…
It is important to face this shocking information as boldly as we can. Without facing this, we have little hope of responding adequately.
Society still ‘asleep’ to climate emergency
In 2018 there was clear evidence of the effects of climate change around the world, which broke through into people’s consciousness in a new way. Despite this, the extent of the crisis is barely reflected in the media, the Government response, or in our daily experience. Our Western lives keep us busy, entertained, distracted, exhausted, numb and ‘asleep’ to the reality that is approaching. There is a sense that we are sleepwalking towards disaster. Many positive efforts have been made — but we have very nearly run out of time
There are hundreds and hundreds of amazing, positive, innovative ideas and projects that address the environmental crises, and most of them move us forward as humans too, we have so many of the answers we need; but we don’t have the necessary political will, and we have very nearly run out of time.
There have been fantastic efforts to ‘transition’ us out of global dependence on fossil fuels, to work towards a peaceful and empowering switch to clean, green energy — much has been achieved and will make a difference.
But it has become clear that fossil fuel and extractive capitalism won’t just roll over — it doesn’t know how to stop, and it probably can’t by itself. It is not a thoughtful and responsive system; it has one setting — extracting fuel and natural resources to make money. The fossil fuel industry continues to receive trillions of dollars globally in government subsidies, even as we approach the cliff edge[viii]. We continue to be urged to consume more and more. Despite scientists talking about the possibility of the collapse of human civilisation[ix], emissions actually increased last year and will again this year.
It is more and more clear that saving people and planet will take up-ending fossil-fuel capitalism and changing our entire system — and we are approaching this confrontation in the next few years. The more of us who are awake to the emergency we face, the better chances we have.
What does the future bring?
It’s impossible to know exactly how things will play out. Climate science is one of the most complicated areas of science, because of the complex range of interconnecting factors and systems — think of the poor scientists trying to predict cloud behaviour… However, so far the observed effects of climate change are coming in at the more severe end of scientists’ predictions, and it is almost certain that we will see dramatic impacts such as widespread food and water scarcity, very large numbers of climate migrants, extreme temperatures, increasing species extinction, storms, wildfires, and possibly much more within a few years.
In addition to the increasing effects of climate change, we can expect significant ongoing instability in other ways too. The end of the cheap fuel economy will probably continue to cause political tremors across the world; one of the possibilities is that the financial system could collapse because of its links to a collapsing fossil fuel industry[x]. There are other big possibilities too.
As uncomfortable as it is to think about all of these things, it will be a great help to us, and others, if we have had some chance to engage with the fact that big changes are coming.
It will help if many of us have faced that we are in an emergency
It will help us to respond thoughtfully and courageously to the challenges we confront if we have had a chance to face the emergency we are in. It allows us to process and understand that we have moved beyond ‘business as usual’ — that a lot of what has been presented as ‘normal’ in our economic system can no longer apply. It allows us to begin considering other ideas.
Confronting the emergency also stops us being so vulnerable to manipulation, so shockable and less likely to blame scapegoats. It allows us to make important changes to our lives, and to develop the local networks and communities that will be essential. Information and understanding gives us more power.
It’s hard to face the climate emergency
All of this is really hard to engage with, and it can be terrifying and incredibly sad.
It is completely normal to feel huge grief, fear or other emotions when we try to understand the situation and what it could mean. The implications for our children’s lives, or other people’s children. Or our own life. The loss of species. Or maybe even the loss of some of humanity’s greatest achievements and dreams. Our feelings are central to our humanness, our intelligence, and to our caring for each other and the world, and we need space to absorb in every sense what this situation means. If we don’t allow ourselves to feel, we often remain distant, and the emergency continues to be ‘unreal’ to us.
We may also feel ‘discombobulation’, as we absorb that so much of what has been the normal parameters of our life may no longer be relevant.
Sharing our feelings and thoughts with others is so important. When we keep them to ourselves, they can morph, dominate and terrorise us; talking with others means we literally ‘share’ the feelings and experience — we are no longer dealing with them alone; we can confront pain or fear, and understand their true proportions; and it brings us closer. We begin to understand that we are all in this together — and if anything will get us through this, it is solidarity, bravery and togetherness.
For myself, trying to personally grapple with our situation is very hard, and very useful. At times I feel grief-stricken, terrified, shocked and disbelieving. I can’t stop thinking. I cry for what my children may face. I struggle to make sense of it, and am unable to sleep. But I also feel braver, clearer about my life and what I need to do, and more aware of the sweetness of every moment of life and the preciousness of all human beings. And I take heart that I get to fight; we don’t have to be passive, we can actively struggle for the best outcome we can get.
Climate emergency may also bring opportunities to rethink our world
The current situation could also bring opportunities to create a fairer, more caring and united, and less grimly productive world — even as we deal with the effects of ecological crises. The end of fossil fuel and oil power, and the unceasing focus on consumption could be good for us all. But this requires a boldness and forethought that only comes from many people having faced head-on the emergency that we are now in.
What can we do?
The first thing is to personally face the climate emergency. To really take on what is happening and what it means, to look directly at it, and allow ourselves to be affected. And then to ask ourselves ‘What does this mean for my life?’ ‘What role do I want to play?’ ‘How can I be effective and have a good life during this period?’
The next thing is to talk about the climate emergency. The lives of our children, future generations and much of life on earth depends on how we respond in the next few years, and this largely depends on how many of us are ‘awake’.
And then, move to action. How do we act in a way that is consistent with the emergency we face? How bold can we be? What is our particular part of it? How can we join the movement calling for the necessary immediate and dramatic global reduction in emissions and protection of the natural environment?
Thank you for reading. I know this isn’t easy to think about. Thank you for thinking about it.
Please share your thoughts, with me, or somebody. With thanks and appreciation to all of us as we try to do our best in responding to the situation we find ourselves in. Solidarity and love.