.As school strikers take took to the streets in their 100,000s on Friday, prominent school strikers and well-known climate activists, writers, comedians and sports personalities issued an unparalleled call to action.
Starting on Friday 20 September, school strikers will kick start a week of climate action with a worldwide strike for the climate.
‘We’re asking you to step up alongside us’, the school strikers wrote. ‘There are many different plans underway in different parts of the world for adults to join alongside us and shake up business as usual for our climate. Let’s all step out of our comfort zones; with your neighbours, co-workers, friends, family and go out on to the streets to make our voices heard and make this a turning point in our history.’
SCHOOL STRIKERS
Last year’s UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s special report on global warming was clear about the unprecedented dangers of going beyond 1.5C of global warming: we all know that emissions must drop rapidly.
Already across the globe, the climate crisis is impacting the lives of those at the frontlines, resulting in the escalation of poverty, violence, forced displacement and state crackdowns that affect the most vulnerable.
‘On Friday September 20, at the request of the young people who’ve been staging school strikes around the world, we are walking out of our workplaces and homes to kick start a week of climate action, And we hope to make it a turning point in history.’
BILL MCKIBBEN
Author, educator, environmentalist and founder of 350.org
Bill McKibben, founder of of 350.org, said: ‘Climate breakdown is about much more than emissions and scientific metrics – it’s about fighting for a just and sustainable world that works for all.’
Noting that the price of a solar panels has plunged 90% in the last decade, Bill added that we have the technologies we need to transition to a sustainable world – and we know the policies that would make them work.
‘All across the planet some version of a Green New Deal has been proposed, laws that would speedily replace fossil fuels with the power of sun and wind, along the way providing good jobs and stabilising strong local economies and support the long term health of communities that have been largely ignored’, Bill said.
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