More Action → Less Hot Air

I am very heartened and warmed by the pictures of Bay Area’s event, as I was seeing in Washington. The emotions that bring this movement together are so key. Thanks to the Planning Committee, Sponsors, Endorsers, Volunteers and Participants for creating that heart-felt awareness.

Yes, Taylor, we the people. McKibben made that crystal clear in his MSNBC interview: http://tv.msnbc.com/2013/02/17/climate-policy-comes-out-of-exile/ (Suggest to see all 3 segments: Bill McKibben and the Chief Jackie Thomas are interviewed at the site of the Forward On Climate Rally Sunday morning 2/17, along with leaders of NAACP and Public Citizen Energy Program.)

He said (paraphrasing here) we won the science 20 years ago. The “rational” approach that one might expect to address climate change (and had nacient starts) did not happen, essentially due to the fossil corporate money (over $100 million, it turns out) to denialist misinformation groups.

So to overcome those same active groups, where science failed to lead policy, so we the people must make it happen. Like other social transformations (like civil rights) enough people must take action to make it happen. Personally I think we may need 10x today’s numbers in the streets. As Mr. Cohen noted, our biggest day yet has barely moved the media needle. And we have just begun.

My wife ran across this, from Cloud Atlas:

“The conflict between corporations and activists is that of narcolepsy versus remembrance. The corporations have money, power and influence. Our sole weapon is public outrage. Outrage blocked the Yucca Dam, ousted Nixon, and in part, terminated the monstrosities in Vietnam. But outrage is unwieldly to manufacture and handle. First, you need scrutiny; second, widespread awareness; only when this reaches a critical mass does public outrage explode into being.

We are “raising the temperature of public awareness [however] fractionally toward its ignition point”. Thanks to each of you.

We, the people are rising up. We must. We know from the latest science that the escalating climate crisis looms as the greatest moral, economic, and security issue of our time. Everything else in the world, and the future, depends on how we respond, now, to this global climate emergency.

Our response? An exploding climate movement. The moral urgency of this cause has magnetized the message, attracting young and old alike who are plugging into the movement. Concerned new activists are joining us daily, getting busy, and speaking out—demanding emergency action and changes. Our collective wave is rolling forth, gathering momentum and energy, building toward the tipping point—when large-scale changes and solutions start rapidly occurring to address global warming and avert climate disaster. Our laser focus is radically reducing emissions, and generating clean energy everywhere.

And here we are, rockin’ and rallyin’—our bodies, energies, and talents in motion, marching Forward On Climate. Together, we are riding the growing edge of this evolutionary wave, a swelling tsunami of solutions and actions. Fellow climate warriors, this rally rocked! We’re on the most important ride of our lives—and our grandchildren’ lives. Ride on! Forward into a clean-energy, life-sustaining future.

Great, well organized rally. But we are no longer a democracy, so little hope for effect.

It’s an honor and a privilege to be working with so many determined, smart and loving people dedicated to saving our planet.

Yes!, Excellent Job!, can’t wait to do more to save our planet and the human race along with it, nothing is more important!

It was great. I loved seeing so many different groups working together and having a lot of fun at the same time. Thanks to everyone for planning and being there.

Thanks for a great rally! My only suggestion: Provide a very clear link to the event on Facebook on the event website. A sample email that people could send to friends to invite them could also be good.

Loved seeing everyone there! Go team earth!

I love the awesome rally we had to save the planet.

I’m an aficionada of peaceful demonstrations. I’ve participated in hundreds since my 1st in October of 1961 (student peace union, University of Illinois), & we’ve actually accomplished quite a lot. One of the things I particularly liked about this one was the mixture of people & the fact that people my age & older were less than 10% of the crowd. As a non-religious person, I also liked the prayer; a nice change from Dear Lord, look down on us & take care of us. Vice versa in fact—we’re the ones who need to take care of our Earth. Thank you all. Si se puede.

Thanks for a really well-run and fun rally.

Great rally: well organized, well attended and peaceful. Thanks and praise to all the groups and individuals who helped make this happen. It was great to see such a large and diverse gathering of people standing up for the planet. Forward!

Yes! Thank you for organizing this. I’ve been thinking that if we want our representatives to show up, we need to… and we did! And we’ll keep showing up. Loved the many creative signs, the Indigenous music & drums, & the opportunity to join in a circle dance.

Peaceful, angry, well-organized. I had to go alone… no one seemed to share my passion. I tried to explain it like this: “Keystone XL is the Alamo for Climate Change.”

Can’t wait to see the big group photo… but I’m a little let down we didn’t form a giant “350” … :)

Yesterday was excellent. As a goal for the future, let’s work toward a lower average age of attendees (by adding more young people, not subtracting the oldsters).

I’m really proud of what we did yesterday (2/17/13) at all of the Forward on Climate Rally’s, the tens of thousands who came together to create the largest Climate Change gathering in history. My neighbors at Transition Sonoma Valley joined and marched with thousands from all around the Bay Area to tell the world that building the Keystone XL pipeline is not OK. People all over the world commented, shared, followed and tweeted.

Yet today as I look to the mastheads and banners at NY Times, LA Times, Washington Post, CNN, Fox News, et al., “the biggest rally calling attention to climate change in U.S. history” barely moved the needle. All the usual suspects, The Nation, Democracy Now, Truth-Out, CNN “International”, NY Times (Blog)… that’s right the “blog”. Really? Is where the event was covered, or not. It was truly amazing to be part of what happened yesterday, and as I rise today and the dust settles I recognize that we have much more work to do.

More folks need to understand what’s at stake with Keystone XL. There are many economic and political forces that say – build it. It’s a fix for our continued ability to flood markets with cheap oil for the near future, BUT at HUGE cost to the environment. We know the arguments, I will not repeat them hear. We have heard the scientist types and experts calling the construction of the pipeline GAME OVER. I am VERY worried, concerned, activated. I do not want to be looking at myself one day going, I knew about this and did NOTHING. What about you?

Loved the diversity of people present, the drumming and dancing. A beautiful day. Hope springs eternal.

My wife and I attended this extremely important action. We thought it very well organized, were happy to see so many people out, and glad that it was peaceful. All speakers were excellent, especially the two high schoolers.

Excellent to see this attended with so many diverse organizations. A lot of the more ‘old school’ political organizers and activists in the SF Bay area also were not there. For a lot of people, there is less of a habit of regular activism and rallies. So hopefully we can build the coalition to include many more factions, including some of the major radical groups from SF, the E. Bay, etc., to keep building up the numbers. hopefully next time we can have more like 50,000, or 500,000 out there!!

Great, well organized protest.