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Quannah ChasingHorse on Generational Change
Welcome to Day Six of our Earth Week series!
I'm incredibly inspired by how Quannah leads. For today's conversation, we interviewed this 18-year-old land protector on how the climate crisis is impacting Alaska, particularly Indigenous communities protecting their lands.
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Nicole and Sydney
Take Action
Donate to the Indigenous Environmental Network, an alliance of grassroots Indigenous Peoples whose mission is to protect the sacredness of Mother Earth.
In Conversation
What’s your earliest memory of getting involved in climate justice?
Well, I grew up out on the land: hunting, fishing, dog mushing, living my way of life. And I noticed little changes in the weather and environment. My mom would explain to me what was happening. I grew up in the movement; my mom and my aunties are all engaged in local organizations and steering committees.
Every time they would come over. I would always sit at the table and listen to them talk about whatever's going on, learning as I grew. They showed me their power through their advocacy work. Seeing that allowed me to become that as well.
The first action I took was when I was in seventh grade. In our school district here in Fairbanks, Alaska, they were having a public meeting to decide whether to change Columbus Day to Indigenous Peoples Day. I was the only person that showed up and advocated for it. An elder listening to it on the radio heard and came in halfway to back me up.
I was grateful for that. Being a little seventh grader sitting in front of all of these – to me at the time – big, important people were very intimidating. All of them were non-native, and I didn't think they would understand. I remember just walking in there and speaking from my heart. They ended up changing it. I was really proud because if I didn't show up that day, it would have never happened.
That's powerful. One of the things I wanted to ask you is specifically about your work in Alaska. What is the urgency of protecting your lands in Alaska?
Yeah. So I did a lot of work over the last two years with Trump in office, trying to drill in our sacred lands in the Arctic Refuge. I was rallying against that, and emphasizing how it significantly contributes to climate change here in Alaska.
The climate crisis is affecting Alaska at twice the rate of anywhere else. It's kind of crazy that not a lot of people know about that. It feels the focus is on other threats in the mainland U.S. But it’s the same, except worse, here in Alaska. We get fires every summer that burn down villages. Our fish tank almost got burned down this year.
Also, the ground is mostly permafrost, especially on the coast. Because of climate change, many of the villages and communities along the coast are collapsing into the ocean, and the water is rising, which is making these people who lived there for generations leave their ancestral homes. It’s dangerous.
Back when I was ten years old, we would get about 60 fish a day in our net or fish wheel. Now we only get, like, eight, and half of them aren't good to eat because of how toxic the waters have become due to the oil and gas development up North, and the mining. Both are centered in areas where our fish lay eggs. So a lot is happening here. And it's really frustrating because we get it just as bad if not worse, but nobody talks about it.
So that’s why I push for advocacy. I think sometimes I’m a rude awakening because not many people accept the fact that the climate crisis affects our way of life and our future generations. I’m afraid that our future generations won’t get the opportunity to learn hands-on, just from books and pictures. That’s what I fear.
Can you expand on that a little bit?
Yeah. My grandma tried her best to raise my mom and my uncle out on the land. My mom grew up on the trapline – dog mushing and hunting, fishing, living in relationship with the land. And my mom wanted that for us. She wanted us to learn and be exposed to that. So that’s all we know. When we came to the city, we hardly even knew what chips were. We felt so thankful for stuff. And it puts it in perspective for me because I think about what my ancestors went through – even two or three generations ago – and how much they endured. I’m so lucky to be here today.
In the future, I fear that we will still be here, but we won’t get to practice our ways of life if we keep continuing on this path, and the government doesn’t allow Indigenous people to protect our land as we have for millennia. 80% of the world's biodiversity is protected by Indigenous people from all over the world. We need society to recognize that and let Indigenous people be a part of these conversations and sit at the table that makes those decisions. That’s why everyone was so excited about Deb Haaland being appointed as secretary. I remember waking up and hearing that news and feeling so relieved and hopeful. It felt like I could relax a little bit more. We have someone on our side now.
When we talk about future generations, I always say that I want my kids and my grandchildren to be able to hunt and go out on the land and feel as connected and as delighted as I do when I go out on the land. It's a way of coping and healing for me. When you're out there, I realize and recognize that this is where my people are from. This is where we have been for thousands and thousands and thousands of years. And we’re still here.
You mentioned the intersection of environmental racism or environmental justice and the Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women epidemic. Can you tell me more about that, and how it influences your work?
Yeah, environmental racism is definitely a big thing. Not a lot of people believe or understand it. But it really bugs me. My aunt was a victim of MMIW. She was killed out on the street. I can't imagine that being my daughter. It was already such a loss to me. That was my auntie, someone that I grew up with, someone that taught me how to bead. It’s sad that she became a victim of that.
But a lot of these camps that were built for building pipelines, or for the oil and gas industry, are located on our sacred lands. This is happening everywhere; the Dakotas, the Amazon, and here in Alaska. They always choose these areas because they don't want the people who profit from the extraction to suffer from its adverse effects. Indigenous people are the least to contribute to these things but feel the impact of it twice more than anyone else. We are the ones that are the frontline. These are our communities that they are in. This is the land that they're stealing. This is who they're stealing from.
This colonization allows for the mistreatment of the people here, too. And it breaks my heart because I'm afraid for my friends and their families. I feel like even in the cities, you can't go outside. I never go anywhere alone, ever.
Yeah. There's so much already being taken from the land, and then that added level of robbing people the right of feeling safe even to be outside. It’s awful. What have you learned most on your journey? Do you use the word activist for yourself?
I don’t *laughs*. Anyone can be an activist for anything, and I love it! Because if you're passionate about something, be an advocate for it, go for it. But for me, it's a little bit deeper. It's literally about my way of life, about my people,and about my future generations. This is who I am, in my identity as an Indigenous person, and how much we've already lost. That's why I say climate warrior, land protector, and storyteller.
I've learned a lot. Growing up, my mom always reminded me to “never forget who you are and where you come from,” and I stand by that. As I become part of this movement more and more, I realize how easy it is to get lost in it. It can be traumatizing because I’m constantly discussing how hurt people are because of this system. And people are often so unaware about the pain we’re experiencing, sometimes the pain they’re causing.
I grew up wanting to be a model, but I never saw an Indigenous model in a magazine or hardly in movies unless they were in a Western movie way back when. It felt bizarre because I saw everyone else except myself. That's when you start forgetting who you are. Society is changing to be more inclusive and diverse. We're starting to see more and more Indigenous people being uplifted. But it’s going to take time.
And through it, you have to be okay with yourself. I’ve learned that you can’t ignore how you’re feeling. I’m starting to open up more about my experience with mental health. I was diagnosed with severe anxiety and depressive disorder last year, but I've been struggling with it since elementary school and just never talked about it. I never felt like my feelings were valid. And so that's why I always constantly remind myself, “never forget who you are and where you come from,” because it reminds me how lucky I am even to be here.
Yeah, absolutely. What is bringing you joy right now?
I love hot Cheetos and pickles. I don't know. It's kind of a res girl thing.
Together, at the same time? I’ve never tried this!
Separate or together, either way. It's so good. I eat it all the time. It's probably not very healthy *laughs*. I’ve also been resting a lot more than usual, and I think it's because I was burning myself out for a little bit. I'm trying to get into a healthier schedule, so I don't overwork myself. I've been snowboarding, so that’s what’s been making me happy lately.
About Quannah
Quannah ChasingHorse, age 18, is from the Han Gwich’in and Oglala Lakota tribes and lives in Fairbanks, Alaska. She is an Indigenous land protector for the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, protecting those sacred lands from oil development and fighting for climate justice. Quannah’s deep connection to the lands and her people’s way of life guides and informs everything she does and stands for. Quannah sits on the Alaska Federation of Natives (AFN) Climate Justice Task Force, which was created as a result of a climate emergency resolution she and her friends wrote and passed at the AFN Annual Conference in 2019. She is passionate about Indigenous rights, MMIWG, and representation. She is an avid snowboarder, guitar player, and is apprenticing as a traditional Indigenous tattoo artist. Quannah was honored to make the 2020 list of Teen Vogue’s “Top 21 under 21.” She is an IMG Fashion Model and Actress.
Reflection Questions
What do you hope your future generations can experience during their time on the planet?
What do you know about your ancestors, and their relationship to the land? How may their experiences differ from your relationship to the land today?
View all Interviews
4/26/2021 | Anya Dillard on Effective Organizing
4/25/2021 | Jana Jandal Alrifai on Intersectional Change
4/24/2021 | Alexis Saenz and Community Care
4/23/2021 | Daphne Frias and Disability Justice
4/22/2021 | Mohammad Ahmadi on Environmental Activism
Anya Dillard on Effective Organizing
Welcome to Day Five of our Earth Week series!
Today we're featuring Sydney's interview with Anya Dillard, a 17-year-old activist, philanthropist, content creator, and the founder of The Next Gen Come Up. I loved reading the energy and passion in their conversation.
This is a free, educational newsletter powered by our community. Support our work: share the series this with a friend or donate $8 to keep our work sustainable.
Nicole
Take Action
Support Outdoor Afro, an organization that celebrates and inspires black connections and leadership in nature. Just last year, Outdoor Afro organized its first-ever Black expedition team and climbed Mt. Kilimanjaro.
Donate to WeGotNext, which amplifies individual stories of adventure and activism from communities that have been underrepresented in outdoor and environmental spaces.
In Conversation
What do you define as environmental justice and how did you get involved in the movement?
Before I became an activist, I was really into STEM and I was an animal nerd, so I grew up believing that I wanted to become a scientist, environmentalist, zoologist, or something of that nature. When I discovered that racism was such a huge issue in our country, I pivoted into humanities and journalism. The first protest I ever organized was the climate strike at my high school; I organized the walkout and it served as an easy bridge to environmental justice because I understood the whole mission behind the climate change awareness movement. At this same time, I was also dedicated to initializing my Black Lives Matter advocacy and still trying to get an understanding of who I was as a Black Lives Matter and women’s empowerment activist. That event had a lot to do with me just trying to find a middle ground. It was so early in my academic journey that I figured I can just jump in and offer my knowledge. With that being said, my STEM focus growing up helped me to understand the importance of climate change advocacy and that there are many racial and social factors that determine how people are affected by climate change.
You mentioned the climate strike that you organized through your school. Would you say that your education played a role in your environmental advocacy? I know that it isn’t very common for schools to talk about topics like environmental racism and environmental justice.
I didn't start learning about environmental sciences in the sense of race until this year. Before, we would just learn about pollution and whatever, but we never got into that social dynamic. That I saw through reading the newspaper every other day or watching television and being self-educated. When I organized the climate strike, it was very spur of the moment. It was the day of the national climate strike where a bunch of people at schools and universities were walking out of their classes, so I was like “oh, my town is really diverse and my high school doesn’t play about social stuff, so they must be doing something". I get to lunch and I’m like…what’s going on? Everyone was like “we’re not doing anything. There’s no walkout”, so I just walked out with a megaphone running around saying “we’re walking out for the climate strike”. I managed to get a couple hundred people to come out, but still… it boggles my mind that a school as politically and socially aware as mine wasn’t prioritizing climate change awareness. It was also crazy because I was the only main organizer that was a Black girl and I was also the only person who got detention for that protest. But, I just showed up and was like, I’ll take the detention and take one for the team.
When I was out there on the field giving a speech to the kids that were coming out, I said “two years ago, my freshman year, we had a massive March for Our Lives protest after the Parkland shooting and every single one of us came and sat on this field in the cold winter for it because we knew that it could directly affect us at any point in time.” With climate change, people have this idea where it’s like, “Oh, well we’re not seeing the immediate impact… We’re living in the suburbs, so it’s not like we have to deal with anything that’s directly a cause of climate change or pollution.” So they’re like, “Oh yeah it’s a problem, but … we’re good so we’re not going to immediately act on it”. This is the same thing with police brutality; a lot of the Black community can become victims of police brutality at any given time on any given day, but climate change does not pose an imminent threat to us in our mind because it’s like… “Ok, well evolution took a long time, erosion takes a long time, pollution and water contamination take a long time, so regardless of whether one of our family members just spontaneously ends up with cancer or we start wheezing one day and our doctor says “Oh yeah you have asthma”, we don’t even directly correlate that with the fact that we could be living in a polluted community. I definitely think that my education did not necessarily gear me toward environmental awareness, but it gave me a better idea of why there needs to be more attention drawn towards it.
So where do you think that education can start? In the classroom, do you believe that there should be courses on environmental issues, or do you think it’s just a matter of dedicating a month around Earth Day to special education about climate change? In other words, what do you see environmentalist education looking like?
There are so many things that I didn't learn in my freshman through junior year of high school that I learned in my senior year and I’m like, why aren’t these classes mandatory? Environmental science is something that I’m taking now. We just finished talking about urbanization and how certain communities of color are commonly built around contaminated waste sites. We also studied how some communities don’t trust the census. Because of that, the government doesn’t allocate enough resources to these communities I feel that education starts with mandating those kinds of discussion courses that rely on sharing information about how certain industries profit off of spilling waste into impoverished communities.
I definitely think there should be more classes that everyone is forced to take. They don’t have to be rigorous classes; they could just be discussion classes where you cover one topic a day but still make sure that young people are aware that these problems aren’t going away. If anything, these problems are worsening.
I like your emphasis on how important it is for the youth to get involved in environmental justice. What do you think would have been beneficial for older generations to do in terms of environmental justice? Do you think that we can make up for some of the mistakes they made, or do you think that some of the damage is irreversible?
I think that a huge part of making up for the mistakes that past generations made is understanding that there is a knowledge gap. That gap in knowledge is something that adults like to fight Gen-Zers on because they’re like “well, y’all are young and you don’t know anything about life, so how can you teach us anything?” That’s a dangerous, ignorant perspective to have, because if you can't learn something from another age group— especially when it comes to maintaining the health of our planet— then you’re not realizing that there are things that we noticed you didn't do that you didn't even notice you weren't doing to make change. There are things that go back ages… even the fact that race trumps class in the whole environmental scenario. You could be a middle-class Black person living in a good neighborhood making a substantial salary and you’re stillmore likely to be affected by a pollutant waste site than a white person who makes significantly less money than you. For us to be able to pick apart these problems and reconstruct solutions, we have to admit “Ok, we didn't do this, but how can we help y’all get it done or fix whatever happened because of the fact that we didn't get whatever done”.
So what do you think are some of the steps youth can take to get involved in environmental justice? What do you advise them to do in terms of education themselves and taking action?
There are so many great climate activists out there who are dedicated to going green or encouraging people to support causes like clean water and other great initiatives. There’s Little Miss Flint (Amariyanna Copeny), Ron Finley, and Leah Thomas; I personally follow them for knowledge and inspiration. I definitely think that young people should stay educated by following people like that, reading the news, and by googling “what’s happening to the environment? What can I do to donate? What causes are there? What initiatives can I start?” Even just making it a family tradition of planting a tree somewhere every year or encouraging your school to have a beautification day where you go out and raise a bunch of money to buy more flora for your campus are simple activities that can motivate you to be more aware of the environment and encourage other people to look at environmental justice and environmental racism as issues that need to be talked about today.
What was your earliest memory of environmental justice? It can either be something you did or something that someone else did that stood out to you.
My oldest memory is one time I went to New York with my dad when I was really little. He used to drive me up to see my grandma every weekend in Manhattan. We were driving and I remember seeing this factory with smoke coming out of big pillars. I said to him, “that looks nasty. It looks like really dirty air.” And he was like “yeah, dirt and soot get in the air after they manufacture certain things and a lot of that gets put back into the sky”. And I said to him, “well, we're going towards it… people live there and there are apartments there.” When I heard dirty air, I was thinking “then why is anyone surrounding this; that isn’t healthy”. He explained that a lot of the time— because of low-income housing costs and how the government chooses to allocate resources— a lot of low-income housing is built around these places that the government doesn’t want to get rid of. Because of that, a lot of people do get sick. I remember him explaining that to me, and I knew it didn't sound right. Obviously, as a child, you don’t understand the concept of racism and that some people just genuinely don't care about other groups of people’s wellbeing. In this day and age, we see that with not just air, but water pollution as well.
Flint, Michigan is a textbook example of environmental injustice and environmental racism. There were hundreds of thousands of people that were drinking lead-poisoned water just because the government wanted to save some money. That’s insane to me. Just like how riverside towns in Louisiana and Detroit are constantly being compromised by big oil companies dumping all this waste in rivers and stuff like that. We see it every day, yet people choose to ignore them because they predominantly affect communities of color. Because people of color don’t have as much political influence, it’s easy for regulators, politicians, and administrators in these towns to ignore how these issues are affecting us— especially when it’s saving money for whoever the beneficiaries are.
How has your idea of advocacy changed over time?
Before I knew what activism was, I thought that advocates were politicians, but I learned that those are two extremely different things. True advocates are people that don't care about semantics. They don't really care about perception or optics. All they care about is bringing people to the table to address whatever the issue at hand is. There's an art to being a politician. To be a politician in spirit is to be a campaign. You campaign and you say what you want people to receive in a positive light. Advocates who become politicians are the best politicians because being both of those things is what separates good leaders from power hungry people in the government. Learning that was one of the cornerstones of me understanding the differences between politics and advocacy and how they can both support one another.
What’s something you’ve learned on your environmental justice journey that you want readers to take away from this conversation?
I would say that racism and climate change have a lot in common. People love to debate both of their existences, people love to say how either does or doesn’t affect one group, when in reality it affects everyone in the long term. It’s interesting to think about it this way because when we think about racism, we think we’ll be good after we fix our law enforcement system and initiate a reparation system. But in reality, there are a lot of trickle-down effects of racism, and at least one of those falls under the umbrella of environmental change.
I encourage young people to always find these intersections between social issues. Because regardless of what social issue you're passionate about, there are about 10 other causes that are affected by it. Understanding what's really wrong in society has a lot to do with acknowledging that no issue or group of people is individual. We have to be diligent about how things that we disregard everyday are affecting people across the aisle, even when those people may not share our same experience.
What does the future of your environmental justice look like? What are your next steps of advocacy?
I really want to pursue the creative side of my talents and become an advocate to raise awareness for humanistic causes. The creative leg of my brain was founded on things like writing and film— especially when it comes to documentation. In the future, I want to produce documentaries that raise awareness about how anti-environmentalist industries affect indigenous communities and how certain things trickle down to Black communities. I especially want to explore how certain southern communities heavily saturated with Black and latino people have a lack of holistic health resources and how it heightens the level of health issues within our communities.
My mom has always said that I don’t have to completely abandon environmental science just because I want to be creative; there are a lot of things I can do to utilize my creativity to raise awareness about the issues I’m passionate about. I want to continue fundraising, having conversations like this with different media forms, and helping to spread knowledge surrounding environmental racism.
About Anya
Anya Dillard is a 17-year-old activist, philanthropist, content creator, and the founder of The Next Gen Come Up − an organization that encourages youth to pursue activism, explore community service, and raise awareness through creativity. Anya is best known for helping to organize the largest Black Lives Matter protest and the first-ever public Juneteenth celebration in her town's history, becoming the head of her schools first-ever all-female (all POC) student council cabinet, and for her features in The Washington Post, Elle, Seventeen, and Glamour for her extensive activism and philanthropist work. Anya has been a keynote speaker on forums hosted by Howard University, The Clinton Foundation, and the Conversationalist to name a few, and she has also served as a youth mentor for middle school and high school students in classrooms across the nation and in London.
Reflection Questions
What does the word "community" mean to you?
How has the fear of "doing the wrong thing" influenced how you support the social justice movements you care about? What may be a more helpful emotion to lead from?
View all Interviews
4/25/2021 | Jana Jandal Alrifai on Intersectional Change
4/24/2021 | Alexis Saenz and Community Care
4/23/2021 | Daphne Frias and Disability Justice
4/22/2021 | Mohammad Ahmadi on Environmental Activism
Jana Jandal Alrifai on Intersectional Change
Welcome to Day Four of our Earth Week series!
For today's analysis of environmental justice, I interviewed Jana Jandal Alrifai, an 18-year-old Arab-Canadian youth organizer with Climate Strike Canada and a co-founder of Fridays For Future Windsor-Essex. Her work inspired me for its clarity – that the only way we get through this is together.
This is a free, educational newsletter powered by our community. Support our work: share the series this with a friend or donate $8 to keep our work sustainable.
Nicole and Sydney
Take Action
Sign the petition advocating for No More Empty Summits, urging the Biden administration to take more action to address climate change. Learn more about the campaign here.
In Conversation
What’s the earliest memory that you have of getting into this work?
I started doing this work around March of last year. It would go to calls and whatnot before then, but I feel like I haven't accomplished anything until September this past year, which is when we hosted a teach-in about just recovery with Climate Strike Canada.
Tell me a little bit about putting that together. What was the process, and what were some of the biggest challenges that you experienced?
Oh, so many challenges. A big one is that we are all such busy people with such limited capacity. You have to make sure that you're taking care of yourself, but you also have other people taking care of themselves. Then, try to match the output that you said that you would give. When I started our local group, I had to be sure that it sustained itself, which meant I had to leave some responsibilities to other people. That’s kind of what makes a community a community, because you all learn to juggle the same things together. So capacity is a challenge, and making sure that we all have capacity, which doesn't often happen.
It doesn't often happen. I love that you say that because I think people tend to sacrifice their well-being for this work.
Yeah. Giving all of yourself actually isn't productive or impactful. In fact, they want you to not do good and not be caring of yourself. It’s an act of resistance to do so.
Absolutely. When I was preparing for this conversation, I came across an article where you talked about the relationship between sustainability and faith. I'd love to hear you talk a little bit more about that.
To me, the idea of sustainability comes from taking care of something that will take care of you. I'm a Muslim, and I'm also Arab. We have this general understanding that things are finite. Life is finite. So you have to make sure that you use it well. Not just in terms of, like, “I'm going to use this one chair until I really can't.” It’s also “I'm going to take care of myself, and I'm going to use my finite time wisely”. That is both self-care and doing something worthwhile with your life. And that could look like anything: not just action, but anything that is worthwhile to you.
How has your idea of advocacy changed over time? How has your idea about showing up as a leader in the space evolved since you started last year?
For a very long time, I believed in being nice, diplomacy, and talking to people. But sometimes, talking just isn't going to cut it because it can go in one ear and right out the other. The belief that there’s a “middle ground” is not accurate and doesn’t accomplish anything. So I’ve moved away from that idea into more tangible actions with concrete demands that go with it.
Love it. What are your plans for Earth Day this year?
Well, my local group is planning a little action for our municipality. Generally, a lot of people associate Earth Day with just individual action like, “I am going to take a walk instead of getting in the car,” which shouldn’t be what we focus on. We should recognize that the Earth is beautiful and that we should keep it that way, but we also need to protect it.
Individual action over time will not solve the crisis in any way, shape, or form. So I want to push the idea that this Earth day, what you will be doing is demanding action from your representatives and lawmakers. Because at the end of the day, we shouldn't just celebrate. We should also fight.
Absolutely. What do you wish more people knew about the scope of the climate crisis?
Recovery and climate justice can’t just be practiced from a sustainability point of view, but by rebuilding the systems that have caused climate change to happen. We don't just need to reverse climate change and the climate crisis. We need to make sure that it doesn't happen again. We have to tackle environmental racism, that everyone is not equally impacted by climate change, and that BIPOC communities often have factories and machinery located in their neighborhoods, affecting their health. Their neighborhoods are more likely to flood. Economically, when things get more expensive, which they will because we are running out of the finite sources we’ve placed our economy upon, they will be the people most affected.
So climate justice is the most essential thing that we can do to help the climate and the climate crisis. This is not just an Earth issue. This is a systemic issue. This is an everything issue. In the global North, where I am located, we use a lot of carbon for our GDP, and we're not people who are affected by it. That’s the Global South. Here, we are pushing for a just transition and a just recovery, which is an idea that originally came from labor unions but has been adapted into a framework that we could use to fix the climate crisis.
And in a similar vein, what do you hope Earth Day looks like for the next generation, you know, for the next group of people that are – you're 18, right?
I am, yeah. *Laughs*.
So 18 years from now.
Well, let's see if that happens. Let's see if there are other 18-year-olds because by the rate things are going right now, I doubt that they will have an Earth – at least a beautiful one like we see today and that people before us have seen. I hope that whatever that day looks like, they’re talking about climate action but also realizing “look what we have saved.” I hope they have the chance to be more appreciative rather than feeling forced to go on the defense.
What advice do you have for people interested in getting involved in climate justice work?
I think there are two things that you need to think about. First: what you can do, what your talent is, what you have the ability to do. Are you an artist? Use your art! Are you a writer? Use your words. Are you a good speaker? Use that. Also, what organizations do you want to be involved in, and at what capacity? Because there are, you know, climate organizations that I wouldn't be a part of because our values don't match up. Not because their values are bad or my values are bad. They're just not the same. So think about how your values fit in with organizations you want to get involved in.
It's totally okay to show up to a strike instead of organizing the strike. It is okay to be a supporter rather than an organizer. But if you really want to get started, just do it. You can search for “climate justice” or “environmental justice” organizations in your city, like “climate justice Toronto”.
If there isn’t one nearby, message one group that you think is great and state that you want to help them. They’re all nice people and they’re willing to help you. I think it just takes the leap of faith. Trust that you have the ability to do what you want to do, and trust that there will be people that will help you.
I think a lot of people are afraid of doing the wrong thing, so they do nothing.
Yeah. To be fair, the world isn't black and white, it's, like, grey *laughs*. There are a lot of different spectrums, and you will never be a hundred percent, right. You will never do something a hundred percent wrong, either. There's always that spot in between. Just keep that constant desire to change and be better. None of us started with infinite knowledge, and none of us will ever die with infinite knowledge. We just have to continue pursuing it. You did something wrong. Great. Go make it better.
Hmm. I love that. Thank you. What have you learned most on this journey?
I really like this idea of community and what it means. For a very long time, I associated the word community with things I'm born into, like my Muslim community, my Arab community, and the people I live around, but community is much more than that. When you say community building and Grassroots community organizers, it means that we will all help each other out because we all have something to gain out of this.
I’ve learned tactical things, too, like how to talk to the media, how to make an image ID, schedule meetings, make agendas, things like that. But it’s brought me more affinity and passion with the human experience and fighting for it to continue to survive. That’s the community. We’re in this together in different ways, but, at the end of the day, we find a way to work together with each other as organizers and as people, you know?
What is bringing you joy right now?
The community and mobilization that I have seen in many areas that are demanding justice, especially climate justice, has been giving me a lot of joy and hope. Looking at how much we have been able to accomplish and the community and friendships we have built while doing so have given me a lot of joy. Resistance is joy and joy is resistance.
About Jana
Jana Jandal Alrifai is an 18-year-old Arab-Canadian youth organizer with Climate Strike Canada and a co-founder of Fridays For Future Windsor-Essex.
Reflection Questions
What does the word "community" mean to you?
How has the fear of "doing the wrong thing" influenced how you support the social justice movements you care about? What may be a more helpful emotion to lead from?
Alexis Saenz and Community Care
Welcome to Day Three of our Earth Week series!
It was such a gift to spend time with Alexis and learn more about her work. She reminded me how important it is to live this work – not just see it as a list of action items to check off of a list. She is intentional with how she nurtures the work of youth in her community, and how she centers her elders in everything she does.
This is a free, educational newsletter powered by our community. Support our work: share the series this with a friend or donate $8 to keep our work sustainable.
Nicole and Sydney
Take Action
Donate to Protect Puvungna, a sacred site of the Acjachemen and Tongva people where dirt and debris from a construction site was dumped carelessly.
Learn more about the International Indigenous Youth Council and research to see if there's a chapter near you.
In Conversation
My name is Alexis Saenz. I go by Lex, she/they pronouns. I'm originally from the Arapaho, Cheyenne, and Ute territory of Denver, Colorado, and now reside in Tongva territory of Los Angeles. I am a community organizer, activist, professional dancer, actress, artist, filmmaker. I'm also a dance teacher and a Pilates instructor. I'm 29 years old.
I’m really inspired by the work of IIYC in Los Angeles. Can you tell me a bit more about how it started and what you’re working on now?
I started organizing the International Indigenous Youth Council Los Angeles chapter back in 2017. IIYC began during the Standing Rock movement to protect the Cannonball and Missouri rivers in North Dakota. My sibling was one of the founding members and lived there for a few months. The first action for IIYC LA was a Round Dance, a traditional Native American dance for unity. We did that to raise awareness of DAPL. In 2019, for Native American Heritage Month, I did an event, and we ended up getting a lot of youth interested in being a part of the council, which was amazing.
Our mission is to protect land and water, and to help Indigenous youth become leaders of their communities. We are the International Indigenous Youth Council, which means we include Indigenous people from everywhere, from Mexico, from Panama, from Guatemala, all over. And the goal is to eventually have IIYC chapters across Unči Maka, Mother Earth. Initially, we were focused on frontline non-violent direct action. That's how we started at Standing Rock. Civic engagement is definitely a part of our roots.
In 2019, we got a lot of opportunities to speak and talk at marches and all this stuff, but it felt very tokenizing. We wanted to do something ourselves and demonstrate how important it is to include the first stewards of the land.
We started 2020 with a Four Directions Climate Strike with our Tongva relatives because this is their territory, and we are guests on their land. We also wanted to introduce ourselves to the four directions and let Unči Maka, Mother Earth know what we're doing here and how we want to help. We referenced which climate crisis is happening in each direction because it's different, depending on which area you’re in. If you're in West Los Angeles, you're close to the ocean. That’s very different from East Los Angeles, and South Central, and North Hollywood. We did a month of action and strikes every Friday. We presented demands that were specific to each direction. We also invited other BIPOC organizations to join us and speak from those areas.
For the 50th anniversary of Earth Week last year, we collaborated with a bunch of different organizations across Los Angeles to do an entire Earth Week led by Indigenous folks. Each day had some sort of ceremony tied to it. The entire event had to be moved online because of the pandemic. And then the racial reckoning started. We really wanted to be there for our community and our Black relatives, so we teamed up with Black Lives Matter Youth Vanguard Los Angeles and Students Deserve, who have been doing amazing work around policies with schools and the police. We also did an artivism event, blending art and activism, creating a community gathering for people to create art and connect with each other. A few months later, we did it again with Black Unity, a 24-hour action camp in front of city hall that got raided. We raised funds for the encampment and the folks that got raided. We also did a few smaller actions, like standing in solidarity with Wetʼsuwetʼen, a tribe up in Canada, by hosting an action at the Canadian consulate here in Los Angeles.
This year we’re focused on our foundation and our programming. We want to do more things for the community because what we've realized from last year, and even what's still happening today, is that we need more spaces to come together as a community and heal. We've been doing traditional talking circles, which in Indigenous beliefs is a way to foster healthy ways of communication and healing together. We do those once a month for different groups. We do a femme circle, a masculine circle, and a two-spirit, non-binary circle. We’re hoping to do more in the future – maybe a mixed-race circle, because lots of us are mixed, including me.
We're supporting the LA community fridge group by doing drop-offs and deliveries to different community fridges for our houseless relatives. We also launched our California Native Plant Program with our Chumash relative Nicholas Hummingbird to help people reconnect to the earth. One of my favorite Indigenous wellness advocates, Thosh Collins, always says that “the health of the people reflects the health of the earth and vice versa.” So if we're not healthy ourselves, the earth isn't healthy. We have to cultivate that reciprocal relationship.
I feel like the youngest generations are carrying a lot of the stress and anxiety of today. How else do you see healing become a part of how you organize?
We really want youth to understand that rest is resistance and that taking care of ourselves is taking care of each other. Because we are all related, everything is a relationship. Our relationship with ourselves is reflected in everything else. We want to remind youth that it starts with ourselves, and hopefully, they can work on their individual healing, which in turn heals the planet.
You can't be a leader if you're not leading by example. That's what we really try to practice. We’re practicing transparency and honesty, and conflict resolution in our spaces so everyone feels safe and included. All that work starts with us, and we want to make sure our youth have that understanding. Some of them do because they grew up in this way, but some are now reconnecting to their roots. We also invite our Black relatives, other POC relatives, and our white allies, even if it's not their cultural way or practice, to join in, too.
How has your idea of advocacy or activism changed over time?
I don't look at myself as a leader, even though people look at me that way. I've been taught that you don't decide that you’re a leader. Your community decides you’re a leader. What I've come to realize is that there's always work to be done, and we’re going to mess up at some point on this journey. I used to be so hard on myself, like, “Oh my God, I can't believe I said this.” But the biggest thing that I've learned that I hope folks take away is to hold ourselves accountable and give ourselves grace. That way, we can move forward.
I have so many more things that I need to work on and things that I need to continue to unlearn and relearn. Even when I think I've unlearned it, there's something that comes up that I need to unlearn again. And that's okay. Having that mindset of knowing that there's always space and room to grow is key because everything is constantly evolving and changing. We have to have the flexibility to move and change with it.
The biggest thing that I've learned is intention versus impact. I remember a few years ago, I was like, “it's all about intention.” As things have evolved for me, I'm like, “Oh, no, it is all about impact – and how you hold yourself accountable and move forward.”
What do you hope to leave behind for future generations?
I hope to leave an Earth that is healthy and can help future generations in whatever they want to do. We need to go back to that healing, reciprocal relationship with ourselves, the Earth, and the people around us. Everything we need is provided by Mother Earth. We don’t need to create new things and look outside of her for resources.
What do you recommend to other people interested in approaching climate justice in their community?
Look into making connections with Indigenous folks in your territories. Those are the first caretakers of this land. They should be at the forefront of the climate justice movement. Permission should be asked for, and there are certain protocols for different tribes. Do your research and understand whose land you’re on, and build a relationship with those people. Show up for them, because a lot of times they are forgotten about.
There are so many horrible things happening throughout California and throughout the entire Turtle Island, the so-called United States. People don't even know that lands are being taken from Indigenous folks to this day, sacred sites being dug up, all kinds of things. Help protect and save these sacred sites because it's all that some of our Indigenous relatives have left. It’s really hard for those tribes to continue without these sacred places that they grew up in.
I think that an insidious form of white supremacy is disconnecting ourselves from our elders.
Yeah. That's been lost for sure. People will ask us to speak at actions, and I always ask whether they’ve even talked to an Indigenous elder to see if they could hold that action on their territory. A lot of people do these grand initiatives without even consulting them. We make sure to center elders and youth. It doesn’t mean anyone in between doesn’t have the right to speak their minds. But we believe in the seven generations behind us and the seven generations in front of us, and we move in that way. We were once youth, and one day we’ll be elders.
There are four phases of life: infant, youth, young adult, and then an elder. Respecting those phases and where you are within them is really important. Elders and youth are more connected to the Creator. The elders have lived a long life, and they're growing closer to the Creator. And the youth, they just came from the Creator. Somewhere along the way, we get a little bit lost. Looking at those two phases of our life is going to help us remember. Before we are born, we know who our Creator is, where we come from, who we are, and what our medicine is. Once we're born into this life, we forget all of that. Our entire process of life is remembering what we’ve forgotten. That’s why it’s so critical to work with youth and the elders to guide us as we’re remembering.
That's powerful. Last question for you, what is bringing you joy right now?
What's bringing me joy right now is taking pauses and seeking silence, giving space for myself. I think that when we're a part of these movements, we forget just to pause. I have to remind myself to do that. And when I finally sit and pause, I'm just so grateful. It helps me center myself to figure out where do I move from here? Where do I go from here? What do I want to do? I don't get those moments a lot, but when I do get a moment, that's what brings me joy.
About Alexis
Alexis Saenz is a mixed raced womxn originally from the Cheyenne, Ute, Arapaho and Sioux Territories, known as Denver, Colorado and resides in Tongva, Chumash and Tataviam Territories, known as so called Los Angeles, CA. Saenz is Latinx, Indigenous and European, although she is not sure of her direct tribal nations, her great grandpa was from Juarez, Mexico and Grandma from New Mexico. Lex has been adopted into the Indigenous communities in the Diné and Oglala Lakota Sioux nations. She also organizes with the International Indigenous Youth Council LA Chapter as the chapter representative and volunteers for the EmBrase Foundation. Saenz, graduated from California Institute of the Arts with her Bachelor's of Fine Arts in Dance and Choreography. Alexis is Project Manager for March On Foundation. When she's not fighting for the Environmental, Racial and Social Justice movements, you can catch her teaching dance and pilates and pursuing a career in the entertainment industry as a dancer, filmmaker and actress. Alexis is very passionate about helping her community and people around the globe and hopes to continue this work to make the world a better place for us all. @lexxsaenz on Instagram.
Reflection Questions
What are your self-care practices? How do they help you be a better activist?
Who are the elders in your community that are advocating for environmental justice? How can you help amplify their voices?
Why is it so important to learn from our elders, and the youth? How may their perspectives differ from yours?
Daphne Frias and Disability Justice
Welcome to Day Two of our Earth Week series!
I absolutely loved chatting with Daphne, and was so inspired by her leadership. In today's discussion, you'll learn more about how necessary it is to center disabled voices in the climate justice movement, the harm of ableist environmental justice initiatives, and the power in trusting your voice.
This is a free, educational newsletter powered by our community. Support our work: share the series this with a friend or donate $8 to keep our work sustainable.
Nicole and Sydney
Take Action
Donate to Open Doors NYC, a network of artists, activists and advocates motivated by community building, gun violence prevention and disability rights.
Read more about the intersection of disability and environmental justice.
In Conversation
What was like the earliest time in your life that you remember getting involved in this work, your first memory, your first step in?
My first memory is from when I was in high school. I was becoming increasingly more ill and my disability was progressing. Each winter I would get pneumonia and eventually I was diagnosed with reactive airway disease. So, the pollution and the air quality around me impacted my health. During that time, I was part of a pre-professional program for young people interested in working in the healthcare field. That was the first time that I learned about public health. That program was centered in Washington Heights, New York City, which is a predominantly Hispanic, Black, and Brown community that has one of the highest levels of asthma amongst young people per capita. I actually did a research project about why this community has some of the highest rates of childhood asthma. And that's when I realized, wait, this is a climate crisis.
How did you gain the confidence of stepping into this and becoming a speaker and an organizer? What was that process like for you?
The beginning years of my work definitely stemmed from a lot of anger where I was like, “why doesn’t anyone care about the issues that are impacting us?” So I sent that anger into action. I was like, “I'm not going to wait anymore for someone to listen. I'm not going to beg our elected officials to listen. I'm going to make them listen to us”. So I started organizing within my community. It was hard, because many people in my community have that immigrant mentality, which is like, “you don't want to get noticed, you should just be grateful for what you have. Even though there are things that are impacting you, you don't really do anything about it.” So I had to convince my community that their voices matter and that it's okay to speak up and be heard.
And I knew that I had the ability to change that dynamic. During elementary and middle school, I went to school with my peers. But for high school, I went to a predominantly white institution with a lot of access to resources. And I noticed that for the students there, speaking up was a very natural thing. They didn't even think twice about it. When something was wrong, they went to the principal and administration and did something about it. I realized, “if they’re doing that, I can do that too. And I can do that in my community. “
So in the summer of 2019, I ran to be part of the county committee of Assembly District 70, Election District 80 in West Harlem. We're the community advocates that bridge the gap between citizens and representatives. I won my election. I won my election through the power of community. I was the first disabled Latina person to ever hold this position. It showed me that community is unstoppable.
That’s incredible. Congratulations! Tell me more about the intersection of disability and environmental justice. How did we get to a place where environmental justice is so rooted in ableism?
In essence, I think it’s because society tries to teach us that the voices of disabled people don’t matter. I also think that ignoring the voices of disabled people makes it easy to create solutions for the climate crisis that society can say benefits everyone and makes people feel like heroes. But in reality, they ignore a large part of the population.
We face a two-fold challenge in creating equitable voices of disabled people in the climate movement. First, we have to let people know that we exist. Once we get past that hurdle, then we can express that we’re also facing some of the biggest impacts of the climate crisis. This complexity makes it incredibly difficult for our voices to be heard. There’s so much that gets missed: like how natural disasters disproportionately affect us, and how we’re forgotten about in evacuation planning.
The climate crisis also exacerbates disability. We have communities that face issues like heat intolerance and communities that face weakened respiratory systems like myself. The changes in the seasons and air quality can aggravate disabilities and even cause more, growing the disability community.
Also, there's a habit of villainizing disability within the climate movement when we look at things like the movement to ban plastic straws.
*Groan*
First of all, if you think that the fate of our earth rests on using straws or not, you're missing the whole thing. You're missing everything. Secondly, to villainize people with disabilities is to completely erase the accommodations and the needs that we require to survive. The things that we're asking for aren’t luxuries. They’re essential for our survival.
Also, when we talk about villainizing people with disabilities for how much plastic we use. Well, we didn't create the healthcare system. When people require feeding tubes and ports, we need those things to be sterile. And unfortunately, that means that those things are going to be single-use items. We don't control that. We’re literally just trying to survive. So villainizing those things is incredibly ableist and it misses the entire point of environmental justice.
Exactly: if we’re trying to save the planet and its people but villainize part of the population in the process, we’re doing the opposite of environmental justice work.
Yeah. It fosters otherness. But by othering people, we create a polarization because, at the end of the day, we are all one human race, living on one planet. We all have to work together to make sure that this one home we have survives.
The systems that be, and the systems of oppression that have led us to experience ableism are the same systems of oppression that created the climate crisis. So if you're trying to look at those issues in silos, you're doing something wrong because those issues are correlated. Disability justice is all justice, and all justice is disability justice.
I imagine this work can be draining. How do you resource yourself as you hold this space?
It's definitely hard because some of the conversations require me to bear the truth of my experience in order to get people to listen to me. That can be very emotionally tolling and exhausting. But I think it's incredibly important for expanding equity and justice within the disabled community. Also, the way I hold space is simply by demanding that space. I will be at these tables where these pivotal, global conversations are happening. I'm constantly seeing campaigns and things that don't include disabled voices. And I'm not afraid to call those people out. I think that we live in this weird society where we see things that are wrong, but we don't say anything because that's the status quo, and we're afraid of the backlash. But look, what does any of that backlash matter when, like, you don't have a planet? It literally makes no sense.
Thank you for that. What do you hope Earth Day looks like in 20 years?
I hope that in 20 years, Earth Day is a sort of birthday celebration for how clean and prosperous our Earth is, instead of how the Earth is dying. In 20 years if we don't do something, there will probably only be one-half of the Earth left, so I hope it’s a celebration of life. I hope that everyone has learned how to create a more symbiotic relationship with the earth instead of only taking from it.
Can you tell me a bit more about the organization you want us to support and why you chose it?
Yes! The organization is called Open Doors NYC. It’s an amazing nursing home nonprofit based on Roosevelt Island. Many of its inhabitants are people with disabilities, but specifically survivors of gun violence. They use spoken word to talk about their experience and to dismantle the notion that just because you're disabled doesn't mean that your voice isn’t powerful. They're working on a film right now to talk about their experience of what it was like to be in a nursing home during the pandemic.
One of their members created the online hashtag #nursinghomelivesmater, which became a huge movement. And I think it encompasses so much of what I said, subverting the norms of systems of oppression and saying, “nope, we're here, we're loud, we're proud, and our stories matter.” They need as much support and help as possible.
Many people are going to be looking at this world and looking for ways to change it. What would be your advice?
First, you're never too young to get started. The status quo tells us many things about young people – that you have to wait to be a certain age to do X, Y, Z. That's completely irrelevant and completely false. You're ready when your spirit and your soul say that you're ready.
The best way to get started is by asking a question: what makes you tick? What makes you upset about the systems that be? What makes you upset about your community? Are there things you see in your community and your ecosystem that you can say to yourself “this could be better” or “it doesn't have to be this way”.
I promise that even if other people aren't speaking about it, they're feeling the same things that you're feeling. They're just waiting on one person to ask them how they feel – and that one person can be you. You can start a revolution. Words are the building blocks for revolutions. Words can make anything happen. I believe in the power of conversation and community to empower you to do that. And I believe in you. I don't have to know you to know that you have power. So I believe in you. I believe in your cause. And I believe in the power of your voice to get things done and make the change.
Please let me know when you decide to write a book! Last question: what is bringing you joy right now?
This weekend is my first weekend off in eight weeks! I'm carving out a self-care weekend, and I'm super excited about it. I’m going to brunch with my family! I'm also really excited because I've been working on my branding, and it looks so pretty. I'm so excited to share with the world. The people on the team I have been working with are some of the most amazing people, and that brings me immense joy.
About Daphne
Daphne Frias is a 23-year-old youth activist. She is unapologetically Latina. Having Cerebral Palsy, and using a wheelchair she is fiercely proud to be a loud champion for the disabled community. She got her start shortly after the Parkland shooting by busing 100+ students from her college campus to the nearest March For Our Lives (MFOL) event. In August of 2019, she was appointed as the NY State Director for March For Our Lives. Learn more on her website and follow her on Instagram @frias_daphne.
Reflection Questions
What current environmental justice initiatives are happening in your community right now? How many of them are ableist?
How can you ensure your work is inclusive to people with and without disabilities?
Mohammad Ahmadi on Environmental Activism
Welcome to Day One of our Earth Week series!
I had the pleasure of interviewing Mohammad Ahmadi, a 17-year-old climate justice activist based in Chicago, IL. He is the co-founder and Communications Coordinator of Earth Uprising International, and co-founder and team member of Hinsdale for Black Lives Matter.
This is a free, educational newsletter powered by our community. Support our work: share the series this with a friend or donate $8 to keep our work sustainable.
Nicole and Sydney
Take Action
Donate to Earth Uprising, a nonprofit organization providing resources and opportunities to support the youth climate movement.
Join Earth Uprising as an organizer by filling out this form.
Identify three youth-organized environmental justices initiative in your city.
In Conversation
What is your earliest memory of getting involved in environmental justice?
I've been passionate about the environment, specifically since I was a kid. But my primary motivation was from when I visited Iran in 2014 and 2015. I saw lots of pollution, and I saw dust storms, droughts, desertification, and deforestation. I started to realize how the climate crisis will impact Iran and many other countries.
After that, I saw an opportunity on Instagram to become an ambassador for Illinois Youth Climate Strike. After that, I realized that the climate crisis isn't just an environmental issue but intersects with all other issues: migration, human rights, agriculture, and everything. Climate justice and racial justice are interlinked. Before that, I just thought that the crisis was about saving the polar bears and recycling, which is important, but there’s a much larger problem.
That's powerful. I think a lot of us when we were younger – maybe not your generation, but mine certainly – got that one-sided view of environmental justice. Every Earth Week, we would hear stuff about cutting the plastic around the six-packs of soda to save the sea turtles and, like, raking leaves.
Right. This is a human issue; we’re fighting for human life. Hundreds of millions of people are going to become climate refugees. And the most affected areas – the islands, developing countries, low-income communities – are going to be impacted the hardest. This is a fight for them.
How does this influence your activism now?
With Earth Uprising, I first got involved locally in the summer of 2019. Now, after being a part of the Illinois Youth Climate Strike, I started Earth Uprising Chicago. The first thing we did was organize strikes in front of the Chicago City Hall. We had different themes targeting different groups (the media, fossil fuel, etc). Our focus was to try to get Chicago to declare a climate emergency. We dropped off letters, hosted digital campaigns, partnered with other groups. And we were successful; in February 2020, the Chicago city council declared a climate emergency.
We thought that was important because, although the declaration is symbolic, it shows that you recognize that this is an emergency and that action is needed. Then, we met with politicians, and we talked about the national climate emergency declaration. That's a lot of my local work with Earth Uprising. Internationally, I'm on the Earth Uprising team as Communications Coordinator, where our main job is to support our local organizers.
We have chapters all around the world - I think in about 20 countries. All of our chapters are focused on promoting climate education, bringing climate education into schools, and getting youth involved. We believe that when you're educated about the climate crisis and its intersections with all these different issues, it will motivate you to take action. That’s how it happened for me. I was passionate about the environment first, but once I learned about the humanity at stake, I was motivated to get even more involved.
For the first presidential debates, we wanted to see a climate question, so we partnered with Move On and many other environmental groups to petition for it. Our petition got over 130,000 signatures – 200,000 total across all groups, and there was a climate question at the first presidential debate. So that was a success in our eyes.
Right now, we’re doing a partnership with Ecosia, the search engine, and we're giving micro-grants to youth organizers who are starting climate projects in the U.S.
Very cool. You mentioned your work with Hinsdale for Black Lives Matter. Where do you see racial justice and environmental justice intersecting?
My work with Hinsdale for Black Lives Matter started last June after the death of George Floyd. I had gone to a protest in Chicago and, when I returned, felt the need to create something in my town. My town is 90% white and conservative, and I didn’t know what I was getting myself into. We started to plan our first local protest and got a ton of pushback from people worried that we’d spark looting and violence. Over 500 people showed up, and it sparked a conversation about racism in our community.
We partnered with local Black Lives Matter groups and organized a strike against environmental racism on September 25th, the global day of climate action. We had several demands, including comprehensive and intersectional climate education for our school districts and climate emergency declarations by our town, Hinsdale, and other local townships. State-wide, we demanded the Illinois Clean Energy Jobs Act be passed, and nationally we demanded the passing of the Green New Deal and the Climate Equity Act.
What does Earth Day look like for your work this year?
This year we’re hosting our summit called Youth Speaks 2021. We're partnering with Earth Day Network and two other groups: Education International and Hip Hop caucus. We're doing three days of climate action on April 20th, 21st, and 22nd, which is Earth Day. The first day is the summit: we have eight sessions on freedom of protest migration, environmental justice, and education, etc. We were going to have youth from all around the world discussing those issues. We are also going to release a set of demands for the Biden administration to address.
So what have you learned most on this journey? Like what did you know stepping into this, as it seems like a very public role? There’s a lot of leadership involved. Maybe even a lot of management is involved. What have you learned that you didn't know before through this work?
It takes a lot of effort to educate people and get them involved. In my area, it's been extremely, extremely difficult to get more people involved. It takes a lot of effort and strategic collaboration to make it possible. You need to work together. You can’t just be one organization trying to do everything on your own. We’re constantly collaborating with other activists and organizations. We try to use each other’s strengths to amplify our messages and educate people together.
Yeah. What world are you hoping to leave behind for the generations that follow?
Well, I'm hoping to leave behind a world that is not ravaged by the climate crisis. So we avoid 1.5 degrees Celsius or two degrees of warming each year. I’m just trying to leave behind a more educated population. The youth is the next generation, so if we can educate them, they will demand change from the government faster when they’re older – whether it’s climate justice, racial justice, or anything else.
What is bringing you joy right now?
I think seeing all these activists using their skills and passions to make a change. And when you see that, it motivates me even more, to continue taking action. It also brings me joy when I see success, whether it's a small achievement or a big achievement. That’s inspiring.
Yes! I know this work can be really draining on individuals. So how do you practice self-care?
It is, especially for youth activists. We’re also balancing school and other activities. So it's very difficult. Both the mental stress and strain and just doing the work takes a lot of time. I try to balance things pretty well. There’s always so much more work to do, though. I wish I had more time to spend on local activism, especially with Hinsdale for Black Lives Matter.
One way of self-care is to cut back on something so you have time to focus on specific things. If I have ten different commitments, I can't spend time on each of them. If I spend time on one thing, that's probably more beneficial.
Taking breaks is important, too. We have to have good mental health; it’s necessary to keep our movements going. If we’re all burn out, then who’s going to do the work?
Reflection Questions
What does activism look like for you? How can you take a stand in your community?
Who are some of the inspiring leaders in your community? How can you help their work sustain?
How has your relationship to the Earth inspired your environmental justice work?
Reimagine Earth Week.
This Thursday, April 22, is the 51st anniversary of Earth Day, one of the most significant secular movements observed worldwide. Modeled after the anti-war and civil rights movements that preceded it, the first Earth Day, held on April 19, 1970, was a massive demonstration where millions of people took to the streets to rally for environmental justice. The event supported the advancement of a series of legislation in the years to come: an amended Clean Air Act, the Clean Water Act, the Safe Drinking Water Act, the Endangered Species Act; the Marine Mammal Protection Act; the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (Time).
Hi folks! Real talk – I wrote this because I honestly couldn’t wait to share my excitement about our upcoming Earth Week series. Over the past few weeks, I’ve enjoyed working alongside Sydney, the series’ managing editor, to learn about youth leaders tackling the impact of climate change in their communities. Unlike me in my younger days, each of them is informed and intent on making a difference. I’m honored we’ll be able to celebrate and amplify their work.
In the meantime, today’s email highlights the results of our Earth Week survey (many thanks to the grownups who shared this with youth in their lives). This information helped shape the series. Like our 28 Days of Black History series, this week-long initiative will run alongside the Anti-Racism Daily, and you’ll have to sign up separately to receive it. The series starts Thursday, April 22. You can sign up here: thisisourho.me.
This newsletter is a free resource and that's made possible by our paying subscribers. Consider giving $7/month on Patreon. Or you can give one-time on our website or PayPal. You can also support us by joining our curated digital community. Thank you to all those that support!
Nicole
TAKE ACTION
If you’re an educator, take the pledge to #TeachClimateJustice at your school (via Zinn Education Project).
Explore environmental justice books for kids and grownups on our Bookshop page.
Follow these steps to address the misinformation you find online.
Join a local chapter of a youth-driven organization addressing climate change, including Sunrise Movement, Fridays for Future and Extinction Rebellion.
GET EDUCATED
By Nicole Cardoza (she/her)
This Thursday, April 22, is the 51st anniversary of Earth Day, one of the most significant secular movements observed worldwide. Modeled after the anti-war and civil rights movements that preceded it, the first Earth Day, held on April 19, 1970, was a massive demonstration where millions of people took to the streets to rally for environmental justice. The event supported the advancement of a series of legislation in the years to come: an amended Clean Air Act, the Clean Water Act, the Safe Drinking Water Act, the Endangered Species Act; the Marine Mammal Protection Act; the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (Time).
Fifty-one years later, the environmental threats we face are no less severe, and Earth Day has lost its teeth (Teen Vogue). But a new generation is leading the charge in addressing them through advocacy and activism. We surveyed over 1,000 of our readers under 18 about Earth Day, this climate crisis, and where we go from here.
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I wish I knew how wide[spread] it was. You always learn about turtles and the beaches with plastic but never the island forming in the Pacific or the rivers full of it bc of the factories on their edges.”
Anonymous response to “What do you wish you knew about climate change when you were younger?” from our Earth Week Survey.
A clear and consistent point of feedback was the lack of education on environmental justice provided in school. Part of this was intentional: corporations seeded misinformation about climate change to schools. A prominent example of this happened in 2017, when the Heartland Institute, a conservative advocacy organization, mailed climate science curriculum with false information to thousands of teachers across the country (Inside Climate News). The content argued that most scientists disagree that humans contributed to global warming or that climate change is such a big deal (which is false). It encourages teachers to educate their students on this “vibrant debate” and tell “all sides” of the story. Read perspectives from science teachers.
But influencing school curriculum is just part of how corporations intentionally skewed the dialogue around climate change to protect their bottom line. The fossil fuel industry would create fake grassroots organizations that would “stand in solidarity” with their organizations. They created misinformation campaigns to vilify other organizations to protect their own. And, they wielded public, philanthropic campaigns to double down on the benefits of their work (Grist). The NAACP notes how these campaigns would specifically aim to discredit the concerns of poor communities and communities of color, chastising them for not taking more personal responsibility or dismissing their demands as impossible (NAACP). An investigation revealed that ExxonMobil gave nearly $31 million between 1998 and 2014 to 69 groups that spread climate misinformation. Similarly, the Koch brothers have given over $100 million to 84 groups since 1997 (Inside Climate News).
Other corporations weren’t as deliberate but also contributed to misconstruing environmental activism. Recognizing that consumers were increasingly eco-conscious but wary of the costs to meet those demands, corporations invested in greenwashing, campaigns that hinted at eco-friendly initiatives that are often anything but. In this way, corporations signaled that consumers could make earth-friendly choices by shopping with them, using phrases like “upcycled,” “sustainable,” “natural,” and “ethical.” This Innisfree “Hello, I’m Paper Bottle” controversy is a blatant example. As of November 2020, roughly 63% percent of U.S. adults said they believed “purchasing sustainable brands or products makes a difference for our environment” (Ipsos).
Social media has made it easier for misinformation to take root, which only complicates the issue. Earlier this year, Facebook committed to addressing inaccurate information on climate change, including and information labels to posts about climate change that direct people to a climate change information hub and updating that hub with facts from trusted institutions (Market Watch). Last week, the organization announced that it now uses 100% renewable energy and reached net-zero emissions. Skeptics quickly noted that this announcement sounds hollow if they don’t live up to their word (Market Watch).
40% of our survey respondents learned about the urgency of climate change on social media, more than any other source (and compared to 24% in school). Ensuring that information is accurate and trusted is critical for empowering the next generation with the right tools to take action.
All of this contributes to why many of us may believe that personal responsibility was a critical component of environmental justice. This isn’t inherently dangerous; it’s essential to raise awareness and make kids feel empowered to change the world early. But it’s a half-truth, one that shields corporations and government from accountability. More damaging, it draws an unhealthy correlation that individual actions improve the conditions for individual people. It also ignores the intersection of environmental justice and systemic oppression,
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I wish I knew that the climate crisis is not just about the environment but is connected to all our systems of oppression.
In response to “What do you wish you knew about climate change when you were younger?” from our Earth Week Survey.
Saving the Earth isn’t a single-focus issue. Progress lies at the intersection of nearly every human rights issue. Incarceration, immigration, disability justice, global security, landback initiatives – we can’t address any of these until we are willing to analyze how climate change encourages and exacerbates each. In addition, we must understand that the brunt of the adverse impact of climate change will be felt by those most marginalized – not necessarily those that forget to recycle – creating a never-ending cycle of cause and effect. The voices most impacted are often left out of the conversation, developing policies and practices that don’t center those most harmed.
92% of youth under the age of 18 are not learning about environmental racism in school.
But today, some of the most inspiring environmental justice initiatives of the past few years have been led by youth, most notably, the climate strikes of 2019 (Verge). You’ll hear more about these initiatives later this week. Despite this, an overwhelming 56.8% of our youth respondents feel hopeless or very hopeless about the future of this planet. This Earth Week, consider: how can you raise your voice to support more accurate and inclusive environmental justice initiatives? Where can you move in to lead or move back to follow? And most importantly, how do you plan on joining the fight?
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