11 August 2015 – The following is based on a presentation that Suzanne Weiss did at an August weekend this year at Elbow Lake sponsored by Ideas Left Outside.
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Global warming translates into tragedies of millions of lives lost to starvation, lack of drinking water, and disease.
Climate scientists agree that 85 percent of the oil in the tar sands must remain buried in the ground if global warming is to be held to 2 degrees Celsius. The current pace of tar sands production in Canada contradicts this aim with its plans to increase tar sands extraction far beyond their present level.
As activists, we must focus on what the scientist say is the fundamental reason for climate change – carbon emissions fuelled by fossil fuels like the tar sands.
Many people in the movement think that a concerted move towards renewable energy would solve our problem of global warming. But that in itself will not do.
We recycle, improve our diets with natural foods, create urban agriculture, ride bicycles, protect the animals, install windmill farms and solar power, and tax the corporations. These are all positive – but do not address or clarify that underlying insanity causing global warming – the fossil fuels and tar sands.
Our tasks as environmentalists is to say no to the oil corporations. They should not be permitted to extract all the oil. They should leave it in the ground.
Our task is to stand up to the government that supports the oil corporations. Is the country to be run by the majority or by the oil conglomerates owned by the one percent?
A focus on fossil fuels and tar sands poses the problem and the solutions.
It points to the enemies of a safe and healthy world, and gives us time to build a united focused movement against them and for a new economy.
Public actions acknowledging that in Canada, the tar sands is the central problem, and demanding that they be left in the ground will democratize the issue.
Let’s grab the opportunity in the coming Canadian federal elections. The climate action proposals of all the parties in the federal elections are essentially meaningless unless they include a call for the immediate reduction of carbon emissions and a moratorium on tar sands development.
First published Toronto East End Against Line 9