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at half 3 in the morning public transit drivers from the German city of leig gathered together under the cover of Darkness they weren't meeting up to start a long day of driving nor to discuss Logistics no they were there to strike but this picket line looked a little different than a typical unions as activist Nicholas rthur describes in rupture magazine the drivers were joined by roughly 20 Fridays for future climate activists initially those in the union were skeptical of The Outsiders who were these young Str rers rolling up on bikes to this picket line but as rthur explains with the help of listening good conversation food and of course a big barrel fire those climate activists
started to connect with the Striking union workers unfortunately amidst the darkness of fossil Fascism and climate chaos not all of us have a bonfire to gather around or do we today we figure out how to take climate action from the personal all the way to the international from recycling to Flying less all the way to joining the front lines of fossil fuel block ades today we get off the couch and start working to stop climate chaos and if you want to watch this video ad free as well as watch my next video a month early consider becoming a nebula member signing up for nebula using my link literally is what helps this channel stay financially viable and in the process you get access to over 30 bonus and extended art changing climate videos
like the full hourlong uncut interview with climate activist rosewater that you can only watch on nebula you can also watch my next video on the environmental impacts of aiong alongside a speculative science fiction bonus video I made envisioning an ecosocialist future and much more nebula is swimming in awesome documentaries and deeply informative videos and signing up is super easy and you can pay just $3 a month with my special link and I get a cut of that money which helps me make videos like this one all you have to do is head to my Link at go. nebula.com and boom you now have access to a massive library of thoughtful ad free nebula exclusive media from over 200 creators you love when we think of taking climate
action consumer side individual choices often come to mind like replacing our light bulbs with energy efficient LEDs turn off lights when you leave a room and unplug electronics when they're not in use there's a storied history within the environmental movement of picking up trash to protect the planet or installing more efficient light bulbs and study upon study has narrowed in on the most effective thing people can do in their daily lives to take climate action often at the top of these lists are flying less living car-free and eating a plant-based diet in terms of personal choices and consumer choices these are the ones that give you the most bang for your buck but of course
they also require the most sacrifice we live in a world soaked in fossil fuels and as I explained in this video the emotional physical and financial burdens of divorcing yourself from that world in the name of climate action are extremely draining this is great for fossil fuel companies those companies like Exxon have a long history of pushing your focus away from the fact that they are producing and profiting off of all the fossil fuels and chemicals causing this crisis and towards your own comparably minuscule emissions internal documents and daming investigative reports have revealed that the fossil fuel industry popularized everything from recycling to carbon Footprints as a means to distract us
from their massive pollution impact as well as actively pushing us away from actions that could directly affect their bottom line because if the requirement for taking part in a pipeline protest is to have already deleted fossil fuels from your life no one would show up as author no mcin puts it if you can't be an activist unless you have already somehow purged your whole life of fossil fuels then you'll have an act you'll have a movement of three people which is great for the fossil fuel companies um it's an incredibly effective way to repel activist to make people afraid to participate because they don't want to be called a hypocrite so as we keep oursel busy worrying about how much we
drive or how Lally recycle primitive fossil Capital the fossil fuel companies continues to lock in infrastructure and fixed Capital that will exist for well over the next 50 years an individual consumer's choice to drive less or buy better is like a drop of water in a vast ocean the unfortunate reality is that production is more heavily swayed by those who own and control the factories and refineries in other words capitalists and capitalists have only one North Star profit voting with your dollar does little to move that profit needle especially in a world addicted to fossil fuels but climate action list suggest that voting with your dollar isn't our only option we can also take a
stand on climate change by voting another way at The Ballot Box voting in elections usually reaches the top of many liberal climate action lists in a survey of hundreds of the world's top climate scientists 76% said that voting for Representatives with strong climate agendas is one of the most effective actions individuals can take yet for the over four decades since the threat of climate change became publicly known voting in supposed green Champions has done relatively little the American Democratic party for example promotes its climate initiatives but then opens up vast swaths of public land to fossil fuel extraction and continues to funnel money into oil and gas plants in an all
the above strategy meanwhile explicitly environmental organizations like the German green party get consumed by the forces of fossil Capital capitulating to an all the above approach to energy and greenlighting the destruction of hamlets like luto to make way for massive Brown coal extraction sites in short regardless of pledges electoral politics are drenched in the money and influence of fossil capitalists don't get me wrong electoral politics will be a crucial realm of struggle in the battle against fossil Fascism and climate chaos but often voting is seen as the only tool to affect the political realm when in reality it's one of many paths towards building a sustainable and just
future if we were to build a zero carbon world that brings a good life to all right now what would that actually entail this is what we need to ask ourselves When approaching the question of climate action the intergovernmental panel on climate change and leading scientists revealed that to keep the world from warming above 1.5° C we need the immediate closure of all fossil fuel infrastructure production and extraction while simultaneously expanding our renewable capacity greatly this necessitates massive transformation to our economic system based on fossil fuels a transformation that would send world shaking Financial shocks into every facet of Our Lives a transformation that would challenge the very basis of capitalism considering
this individual consumer choices are nowhere near the level of potency or scale to affect that change so to answer the question what can I do about climate change we need to escape the realm of consumer choices looking at your carbon footprint will not solve climate change although you definitely shouldn't be traveling around in your private jet or yacht individualized and consumerized actions should be seen as the least you can do instead we must broaden our Horizons our individual choices only become stronger when we link them with others and use those actions to build towards Ward a long-term goal that goal is toppling fossil capitalism and building a renewable-based world this
requires a constant evaluation of our tactics to assure that we're on the right path as Diana oire from the ecosocialist publication rupture argues we should continually be asking ourselves how does this or that action contribute towards a fundamental rupture with capitalism and an ecosocialist transformation of society in short your actions whether individual or Collective should align with the broader goal of toppling capitalism and building a zeroc carbon world and to help with that continuous evaluation one of the best things that you can do is join a group or an organization and show up with whatever skills you've cultivated over your lifetime being in community allows you to compound your power explore
Theory feel linked and less alone and most importantly do work that you probably wouldn't have been able to do alone so what can you do to stop climate if you're yachting every day flying hundreds of times a year or rolling coal in your pickup truck then yes you'll need to end those practices of conspicuous emissions intensive consumption but most of us are stuck within the grinding Gears of the cycle of fossil Capital most of us especially those in the Imperial core live in a world drenched in fossil fuels to asso all oil and gas derived products from our lives is an extremely difficult task not only physically but emotionally as we beat ourselves up for needing to drive a car to work even though there is
no alternative consumer oriented individual actions should be seen as nice to have not essential at best they can shave off a few tons of carbon from your individual footprint while billionaires add thousands to theirs and at worst they distract derail And Delay necessary Collective political action because flying less driving less and eating a plant-based diet often lack broader strategic or political angles that address the root causes of climate change so your climate action should try to strike at the root at what the cycles of fossil Capital causing the climate crisis hold dearest profit as Andreas M and whim carton write in their book overshoot supply and demand may strut
around the stage but behind them profit is pulling the strings and regulating the appearances of both luckily there are so many ways to join the fight in disrupting fossil fuel profits to take meaningful climate action it all starts with a crucial First Step as I already mentioned one of the first and most important things you can do right now is join a local group or movement it doesn't need to be perfectly aligned with your political Tendencies nor have all the answers to the climate crisis The crucial part is that you're diving in with curiosity and pushing the cart down the road towards hitting Capital where it hurts and building a beautiful renewable World in its Rubble find
organizations find leftist organizations to join that's rosewater an organizer from the sunrise movement DC chapter they go on to add a crucial caveat understand that you can leave and you can go somewhere else figure out what reciprocity with that movement space looks like because every relationship needs reciprocity you need to be being taken care of by any movement that you join as much as you are putting in so it's key to keep in mind that joining a climate group or a leftist organizing space should be energizing in lifegiving not a long road to burnout but once you do find your movement home there's so many different kinds of Collective actions you can take part in to force a
transition away from fossil fueled capitalism across the world climate movements and leftist organizing groups have been remarkably successful at making sure the fossil fuel industry pays dearly for every inch of their extraction infrastructure through blockades and sabotage weeks now First Nations protesters have blockaded a road into the site all of this over Shale gas and plans by a company called swin resources to use hydraulic fracturing or fracking to extract natural gas this is a network of direct climate action that Naomi Klein calls bladia the goals of these direct actions are Myriad but altogether they gum up the engines of fossil Capital slowing down if just for a moment the insatiable growth of fossil
fuel extraction indeed in a study of 649 direct action campaigns blocking pipelines mines Wells and fossil fuel infrastructure in general over a quarter of projects encountering social resistance have been cancelled suspended or delayed those winds can only happen when we get up from the computer join with other comrades and actually face down fossil fuel infrastructure head on as rosewater so eloquently puts it the thing that we are fighting is not ignorance it is apathy and it is powerlessness however the numerous direct attacks on the infrastructure of fossil capital is just one climate action tactic through which you can pressure the ruling class and capitalism into aishine f fossil fuels there are
other avenues for you to take climate action which at first might not seem readily apparent in how they connect with the climate movement one of them is the upcoming 2028 general strike to understand it let's go back in time let's rewind the clock all the way back to 1946 on December 2nd of that year Oakland shut down after the local retail Union went on strike against two of the biggest Employers in the area KH and Hastings over 100,000 workers across the city stopped their work in solid everyone from bus drivers to Cooks walked off their jobs everything except pharmacies and Food Markets shut down a general strike took Oakland by storm in terms of scale the strike was massively
successful unfortunately due to the corruption of the leader of the Teamsters Union the strike quickly fell apart by the second day however the ramifications of that general strike still shape labor policy in the United States to this day a year after those labor unions shut down Oakland Congress passed a law that banned solidarity strikes and it quickly became illegal for unions to strike outside the bounds of their contracts the mass strike was dead ever since there hasn't been a single general strike in the United States but all is not lost today the possibility of a general strike is surging forth again indeed outside the US one of the biggest General strikes in history shook India to its core as over
250 million workers and Farmers struck demanding Direct Cash transfers pensions for all an end to anti-farmer laws and more and the months of mass protest spearheaded by Farmers that followed were successful around India Farmers swarmed the streets in Victory the state caved to some of the demands including repealing the neoliberal anti-farmer bills that would have ruined the livelihoods of many Indian farmers and now the Rumblings of that general strike are echoing into the halls of US Labor in the fall of 2023 the president of the United Auto Workers called on all unions to line up their contracts to end on April 30th 2028 through that alignment unions could bypass solidarity strike
laws we want a general strike we want everybody walking out just like they do in other countries Sean Fain the president of the UAW had found a loophole to the ban on General strikes the stage is now set for a coordinated general strike on May 1st 2028 but how does this have to do with climate action in short any labor demand can also be a climate demand as rosewater explains a 20-hour work week a 4-day work week a 3-day work week that's a green New Deal policy because we produce the most emissions while we're at work so if people work less then we're producing less emissions indeed if we know that climate change is being fueled by capitalisms and more specifically fossil capitalisms insatiable appetite for
fossil fuels to eek out and accumulate more profit from labor then directly stealing Away part of that chain is an essential tool strikes hit corporations where it hurts they directly affect the ability of companies to turn a profit and then force them to concede to the demands of Labor and a general strike supercharges that power so this could be a crucial leverage Point not just to push labor demands but also climate demands but it's not just unions that can pressure our economy to transition to a renewable future under General strikes students are a key Ally in the struggle I think our under 18 organizers are the most key part because schools are very explicitly designed to
reflect the workplace their practice workplaces they were explicitly designed to reflect factories the sunrise movement is hoping to spearhead a mass student strike alongside that 2028 general strike and in the process showing solidarity building organizing skills and demanding climate action ultimately the general strike of 2028 whether successful or not can set a fire under us and allow us to make hard asks of ourselves and others so if you're currently looking for a job perhaps consider applying for positions in Industries with strong unions that are critical to the flow of the economy then join the rank and file of the union and push for climate oriented demands and agitate to align your contract to end on
April 30th 2028 this tactic of joining unions to agitate for radical change is known as entryism at the end of the day preparing for the general strike puts in sharp relief what we actually need to win it forces us to build an climate movement that is focused on ending capitalism and building a world based on public ownership of production building deep ties between labor and climate camps will be crucial in the struggle to upend capitalism and build an anti- capitalist sustainable world this is exactly why the climate activists from Fridays for future took to the picket line in leig Germany as Nicholas rthur writes in rupture what unions lacked young activists had and vice versa
Fridays for future has a lot of young super committed activists with extraordinary social media range and constant press coverage all over Germany even in smaller towns workers usually don't have these skills or press coverage but they have economic power and this is exactly what the climate movement was lacking but crucially needed so showing up and supporting the struggle of workingclass people everywhere is a crucial step towards building a zeroc carbon world and power without capitalism but if joining a union climate group direct action or organizing for strike is not your cup of tea than tenant organizing could be tenant organizing as Allison Escalante from revolutionary left radio notes is particularly powerful in that it builds
explicitly political and anti- capitalist bonds between people from all different walks of life it builds resilience and Collective power in a hyperlocal context through tenants organizing you have access to workers that you wouldn't get access to through Union organizing for example the guy who lives down the block who drives for Uber and that's how he pays his rent you're never getting get to him through a union but you can get to him around tency and housing as an issue in addition to battling eviction winning lowered rent or infrastructure demands an organized tenant Union has the potential to demand decommodified lowcost lowcar carbon and solar equipped building as it places more and more pressure on landlords
across the country and the world at the end of the day however all these actions and organizations need to be supported and situated in infrastructures of care neighborhood Mutual Aid caregiving collectives anti- capitalist Community groups and even climate grief discussion circles can act as our backbone as we beat against the walls of capital participating in building out this infrastructure is crucial this can be how you take climate action collectives of care not only make strikes and protests possible by disseminating Goods like food and services like child care to those who need it outside the framework of capitalism but they also strengthen the resilience of communities in times of crisis crises that will only
continue to mount as climate change worsens as rosewater explains if a hurricane hits your mountain town if a wildfire happens where it's never occurred before your neighborhood organizing that is going to be the thing that keeps you most immediately safe so as we look towards the future there are so many possibilities for climate action you can take Beyond voting at the cash register or the ballot almost all begin with joining others in the struggle whether that's blocking pipeline construction organizing a wrench strike in your building unionizing your workplace or preparing your community for crisis there are so many Avenues to take climate action that don't require your wallet back in liip Germany the climate
activists from Fridays for future and the local public transit Union are celebrating a win the strike was a success they won a small bump in minimum wage a reduction in the workday by 1 hour without loss of pay and an extra day off while not earth shattering these winds mean a better life for those in the union but the young activist's solidarity with labor represents a broader one a strengthening of the bonds between labor and climate organizers bonds that will be necessary for toppling fossil fueled capitalism ultimately while toppling capitalism to stop climate change will require massive Collective action from all of us how each of us decides to participate is highly personal finding out what you
like doing and what you're good at is the basis for being an effective comrade in the fight against fossil Capital to borrow from marine biologist and writer Ayana Taylor Johnson the first circle is what are you good at what are your areas of expertise the second circle is what is the work that needs doing are there particular climate and Justice solutions that you're keen on the third circle is what brings you Joy choose things that en liven you the goal is to be at the heart of this ven diagram for as many of your life as you can the reality is that you are the only person who can decide what role you want to play in the movement and how you can stay involved and committed for the Long Haul I can
show you movements and effective paths that are starting to carve away at the rotten core of fossil fueled capitalism but only you can figure out how to best energize and plug into those movements you might fail but you also probably will win it's not black or white things will get worse and we will build beautiful things we will never know the full outcome until after we're gone so if you feel sure that we've already lost you're wrong because you're alive whether it's your skills with the camera your vulnerability your extraversion your fearlessness your art your empathy we need you we need all of you to win a livable and beautiful world for everyone everywhere rosewater and I talked about
building that beautiful and livable future for over an hour but for this video I could only pull a few sound bites from that conversation if you want to watch that full unedited video interview right now it's available exclusively on nebula because nebula subscribers get access to over 30 exclusive R changing climate bonus videos when they sign up I love telling my viewers about nebula because honestly I think it's an amazing deal I mean it when I say that our changing climate would not be possible if nebula and the people who subscribed to nebula using my link didn't exist when you sign up for nebula you not only support this channel get access to over 30 exclusive R changing climate videos and get to watch
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