#PeoplesClimateMarch
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“We do not inherit the Earth from our ancestors we borrow it from our children.”—Ancient Indian Proverb
When I was in 7th grade, our class held a contest to see who could come up with the best slogan for the school to celebrate Earth Day with. My “Let’s Redecorate Our Home” with a picture of the earth didn’t make the cut. The winning slogan was “The Solution to Pollution is YOU.” Despite losing the contest, I was determined to help fight the war. And this was well before we knew about the catastrophic potential of climate change.
Today, outside my window of my apartment building near Columbus Circle in New York City, a whole bunch of people decided that YES! The solution to pollution is in fact, up to them.
As the New York Times described it:
“With drums and tubas, banners and floats, the People’s Climate March represented a broad coalition of ages, races, geographic locales and interests, with union members, religious leaders, scientists, politicians and students joining the procession. Climates marches were held across the globe on Sunday, from Paris to Papua New Guinea, and with world leaders gathering at the United Nations on Tuesday for a climate summit meeting, marchers said the timing was right for the populist message in support of limits on carbon emissions.”
There are a lot of things that each individual can do. For me, personally, two of my favorites are:
1) Refuse to use single-use plastics whenever possible.
2) Bicycle or walk whenever possible.
My life doesn’t revolve around the environment, but there may just come a day when there is no longer a choice in the matter. As I’ve said before, it’s almost like an episode of the Twilight Zone — would you take an action if you knew that in some unknown place, someone you didn’t know would die as a result? And yet, that is what is happening. So it’s a relief to see people mobilizing on a bigger and bigger scale to help fix our planet before it is too late.
Enough said. #PeoplesClimateMarch pic.twitter.com/kqI2oaV7Ag
— HuffPost Green (@HuffPostGreen) September 21, 2014
The #World IS rising! #Australia kicks off the #PeoplesClimateMarch. Well done to our friends there! #Melbourne: pic.twitter.com/w3cSYoSIhV
— Green World 2015 (@MMNNGreenWorld) September 21, 2014
This is what a MOVEMENT looks like! NYC, raise UP! #PeoplesClimate #PeoplesClimateMarch #1u #Climate2014 pic.twitter.com/4VXtmskmXR
— SEIU (@SEIU) September 21, 2014
MT @emilybell: “@BuzzFeedNews: Drone footage shows an aerial view of #PeoplesClimateMarch in New York City today: https://t.co/U7ZZ7E9dxj”
— Jessica Clark (@beyondbroadcast) September 21, 2014
Indigenous block holding it down at the #peoplesClimateMarch pic.twitter.com/yNnC2fWHtI
— Frank Waln (@FrankWaln) September 21, 2014
Brilliant and powerful capture of the moment, Lisa!
Thanks Ken. As you well know, we try to help solve a lot of really difficult problems here at The Good Men Project. The environment and climate change, of course is important—in part because of the impact on men. Who is most likely to clean up environmental catastrophes but men—often poor men who work the most dangerous jobs because being a “provider” for their family is part of their identity. And whatever problem it is — from overtly negative stereotypes of men as a gender, to changing the perceptions of todays dads, to fighting racism, sexism, homophobia, to talking about… Read more »