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Despite the glaringly obvious signs that we’re in a fucking climate crisis, several weeks ago, Joe Biden broke under the pressure of the fossil fuel industry, and approved ConocoPhillips with a permit for the Willow Project, the single largest oil and gas project proposed on US public lands. It’s an $8 billion fossil fuel infrastructure project in Alaska, funded by ConocoPhillips, that’s a disaster for many reasons. It would threaten Indigenous Alaska Native communities, destroy wild landscapes north of the Arctic Circle and erase nearly all of the climate benefits of Biden’s renewable energy projects on public lands.
Why does this matter?
We’re living through an unprecedented climate crisis that will wreak havoc upon the lives of billions of people across the world, and for generations to come. Not only are we in a climate crisis, but we live in a society where profit and corporations rule over people and the planet. Whether you are on the Southeast or Southwest side of Chicago, battling toxic and polluting industry, in East Palestine, Ohio, dealing with the ramifications of a train derailment that has dumped tons of toxic waste into your backyard, or in Jackson, Mississippi, where managing a water crisis caused by government disinvestment and privatization, it is clear that the system is, in fact working exactly as it was designed. It works for the wealthy, the elite, and the corporations who get to profit off of the destruction and exploitation of people, our communities, and our planet.
The fossil fuel industry, specifically, (e.g., ExxonMobile, Shell, BP, Chevron, ConocoPhillips, etc.) has a death grip on our government. It is one of the main reasons why we’re not seeing solutions that meet the scale of scope of the crisis we’re in, all while the profits of the fossil fuel industry just get bigger and bigger and bigger. They’re on a joyride, profiting off of the destruction and exploitation of our people, our communities, and our planet. In the ultimate showdown, it’s us, vs. the fossil fuel industry… and right now they’re winning.
Following the decision of the Willow Project, as I scroll through my social media feeds, filled with people young and all, in despair, one thing is obviously clear; for humanity to thrive, we must abolish the fossil fuel industry. And we need a shit ton of power to do so.
So, what must be done?
So where do we go from here? While many young people are being incredibly politicized over the Willow Project at this moment through social media platforms like TikTok, what’s popular online does not always translate into power. Power to stop the Willow Project. Power to stop the climate crisis. Power to pass the Green New Deal.
We need to build enough people power to defeat the fossil fuel industry and win transformative climate legislation in this country. We deserve a Green New Deal. A world without fossil fuels and pollution, a world where all communities have access to clean air and water, and where all people have access to good, union-paying jobs, playing a key role in decarbonizing our society and transforming every industry, from transportation to housing to schools.
Sunrise is organizing to make that happen. We’re building a movement of young people across race and class to stop the climate crisis and win a Green New Deal. We will force the government to end the reign of fossil fuel elites, invest in Black, brown and working class communities, and create millions of good union jobs. We’re on a mission to put everyday people back in charge and build a world that works for all of us, now and for generations to come.
We build people power by organizing thousands of people to campaign for Green New Deal policies, by taking direct action that disrupts the status quo in ways that build public support and/or force those in power to meet our demands, by building mass public enthusiasm across race and class for the Green New Deal by connecting it to peoples’ lives. We build political power by shifting what the public thinks is politically possible, by electing Green New Deal champions at all levels of government who will not be bought out by the fossil fuel industry, and by passing policies that advance the Green New Deal and improve peoples’ lives.
We need real power and leverage that our movements do not have right now. Many are throwing their hands up, proclaiming that the government does not work, that Biden’s choice to move forward with the Willow Project is proof of the inadequacies of our government. Biden’s choice is proof that the fossil industry is winning. The fossil fuel corporations have spent decades building the type of power to control our government; we must get serious about doing the same. It’s a tug of war, and for us to win, we need as many hands on the rope pulling towards a livable future.
So… what can you do? Join Sunrise. Join other movements and organizations that are working to put an end to the era of fossil fuels. I believe in pluralism and that what’s needed is a diversity of strategies; it is a war on all fronts. It is going to take as many tactics, of organizing to elect climate champions to office, of labor using it’s disruptive power to demand action on climate, of running campaigns in cities that decarbonize and address issues connected to housing, transit, energy, of running fossil fuel divestment campaigns , and of engaging in direct action work to prevent and show down fossil fuel projects. All of it matters for us to win a shot at a livable future.
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My anger and desire to see the fall of the fossil fuel industry is fueled by my desire for life, something they obviously don’t value. I deserve a right to a life where I’m not dodging heat waves, excessive storms and flooding and other climate disasters. A life where I can swim in oceans that are teeming with life. A life with children of my own, who can run around breathing in fresh air, and play with dirt that does not harm or poison them.
At the rate we’re headed, I won’t be able to have that and neither will you. Their actions are a blatant fuck you, to our hopes and dreams and desires… of life. I’m quite shocked that these people aren’t being dragged out of their homes, out of their fancy office buildings, and being forced to witness the level of destruction and disaster they are wrecking upon the world.
And so, we must reckon with the need to completely phase out our dependence on fossil fuels and abolish the fossil fuel industry. We must build the power necessary so that we have the people, the leverage, and the power to say no more, to lay to rest the fossil fuel industry. Or the fossil fuel industry will lay rest to humanity.