Why “350 or bust”?
“The basic matter is not one of economics. It is a matter of morality — a matter of intergenerational justice. The blame, if we fail to stand up and demand a change of course, will fall on us, the current generation of adults. Our parents honestly did not know that their actions could harm future generations. We, the current generation, can only pretend that we did not know.”
On December 7 – 18, 2009, leaders from 192 countries met in Copenhagen to negotiate a limit on fossil fuel emissions that are causing our planet’s climate to change. They failed to reach an agreement at that time, and there is still no international agreement, although China and the United States (the world’s two biggest carbon emitters) did sign a historic climate accord in November of 2014.
The best science out there says that 350 is the safe upper limit for carbon dioxide in our atmosphere. Scientists measure carbon dioxide in “parts per million” (ppm), so 350 ppm is the number humanity needs to get below as soon as possible to avoid runaway climate change. Don’t just take my word for it – check out this link to the scientific paper presented by NASA scientist Jim Hansen at American Geophysical Union annual meeting in December 2007. You could also check out this article at Grist.org which includes a list of the scientific organizations that endorsed the 2001 IPCC report on anthropogenic climate change. Or, if you prefer the data translated into layperson’s terms, check out Bill McKibben’s blog entry, “The Science of 350, the Most Important Number on the Planet”, or this summary of the science at 350.org. It was McKibben’s organization, 350.org, that inspired me to become a climate activist in the fall of 2009.
I’m not a scientist or an expert in climate change. I am a regular citizen, a mother who would like to see a habitable planet for my children, and all future generations. I worked as a registered nurse for over twenty years before returning to school to complete a degree in education, and I now work as a researcher and writer.
I believe that climate change is a moral issue, and building the grassroots global movement for an ambitious, fair, and binding global climate deal is the most important thing that any of us can be doing at this time in human history. We have the unique opportunity to be part of what Paul Hawken calls the awakening of the immune system of the planet, the vast and nameless uprising of peoples and organizations fighting for justice, future generations, and biodiversity. There is no higher calling.
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In the fall of 2010, I and two other Canadians, Cathy Orlando and Cheryl McNamara, started the first three chapters of Citizens’ Climate Lobby in Canada, in Toronto, Sudbury, and Red Lake Ontario. Three years earlier Marshall Saunders, a retired real estate broker and Grameen Foundation Humanitarian Award Winner, founded Citizens’ Climate Lobby after he saw a lack of citizen engagement with government on the issue of climate change (you can read more about Marshall’s founding vision on CitizensClimateLobby.org). Since then, CCL has been growing exponentially, and retired NASA climate scientist Dr James Hansen has become one of our biggest champions.
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“Our moral obligation to fight climate change is to build a collective solution, not to purify ourselves as individual consumers.“
~Margaret Klein, “What Climate Change Asks of Us: Moral Obligation, Mobilization, and Crisis Communication” CommonDreams.org
Citizens Climate Lobby is focused on creating the political will for a liveable climate by empowering regular citizens like me to participate in our democracy, and giving us the tools to do so in a more skillful way. It is the cure for climate trauma, an antidote to hopelessness and despair.
“Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has.”
~ Margaret Mead, American anthropologist, 1901 – 1978
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Christine Penner Polle, Red Lake, Ontario
Hi Christine–
This is from Menno Creation Care Network. I am listing your congregation and mentioning your blog in the next MCCN newsletter, but I’m not sure where you are. I thought Hope Mennonite was in Winnipeg, MB, but I have an email from you that indicates you are from Red Lake, ON.
Please help sort out a confused American.
No problem, Jennifer – check your email!
An Open Invitation To Compose “Dying Sayings” in comments at http://soaringdragons.wordpress.com/2011/05/20/dying-sayings/
This is an invitation that I am posting into the comments of the “About” pages of 188 randomly selected blogs. How did I find you? From Tag Surfer under “Spirit.”
The inspiration for this request comes from Brewer’s Dictionary of Phrase & Fable, Centenary Edition, Revised, 1981, Harper and Row, Publishers, New York. This book has 187 “Dying Sayings,” and I’m sure living WordPress bloggers and blog readers can write no less inspiring self-composed epitaphs than the historically famous.
Among the “Dying Sayings,” pp. 369-372, are the below fourteen entries plus my own:
Newton: “I don’t know what I may seem to the world. But as to myself I seem to have been only like a boy playing on the seashore and diverting myself in now and then finding a smoother pebble or prettier shell than ordinary, whilst the great ocean of truth lay all undiscovered before me.”
Richard I: “Youth, I forgive thee!” (Said to Bertrand du Gourdon, who shot him with an arrow at Challus. Then, to his attendants, he added): “Take off his chains, give him 100 shillings, and let him go.”
Augustus (to his friends): “Do you think I have played my part pretty well through the farce of life?”
Beecher (Henry Ward): “Now comes the mystery.”
Goethe: “Light, more light!”
Hannibal: “Let us now relieve the Romans of their fears by the death of a feeble old man.”
Jackson (“Stonewall“): “Let us pass over the river, and rest under the shade of the trees.”
More (Sir Thomas): “See me safe up [i.e. on ascending the scaffold]; for my coming down, let me shift for myself.”
Mozart: “You spoke of a refreshment, Emile; take my last notes, and let me hear once more my solace and delight.”
Poe (Edgar Allan): “Lord, help my soul!”
Roland (Madame; on her way to the guillotine): “O Liberty! What crimes are committed in thy name!”
Saladin: “When I am buried, carry my winding-sheet on the point of a spear, and say these words: Behold the spoils which Saladin carries with him! Of all his victories, realms and riches, nothing remains to him but this.”
Webster (Daniel): “Life, life! Death, death! How curious it is!”
Wordsworth: “God bless you! Is that you, Dora?”
Soaringdragons: “I have been waiting for this moment since my youth, and it is with extreme anticipation that I wait now.”
Feel free to compose as many of your own “dying sayings” as you wish in comments. Please bear in mind that this blog is P.G. and contains 19,000 words, none of which are swear words. So, the rule is that if your response includes ‘swear words’ (my own private definition being the standard) I will either edit the response or delete it, my option.
I hope everyone contributes. Cheers!
btw i was forwarded over here through scottbar…something LOL (dont mind scott im screwy with names)…i am finding more and more canadians everyday!
i am not canadian btw. people have a misconception about that when I talk about canada….yea. idk lol
Welcome here, Eva. We Canadians are known to be a friendly, polite bunch on the whole so usually finding a Canadian is a good thing (our current Prime Minister, on the other hand, is quite a different story!)
Hello Christine, I visited your blog and found your content stimulating. My blog will feature something similar, from an engineering and LEED point of view. All the best and hope to read more of your articles.
You don’t know what you’ve got till it’s gone 🙁
Nice. I’m going to have to work that video into my paragraph 🙂
Hi! I heard about your blog while reading the latest issue of Canadian Mennonite and thought I’d check it out. The interview was very interesting and I look forward to reading more about your very worthwhile mission.
So glad you dropped by, Katherine – you’ve got a great blog yourself, and an adorable little boy – definitely worth keeping the planet habitable for!
Great Blog!
In case you have not already been nominated, I am nominating you for the Versatile Blogger Award. If interested, please see more at http://influenceversuscontrol.wordpress.com/about/
-Andrew
How lovely – thank you Andrew.
Now I will need to get busy and respond appropriately!
Love your site. It’s such a treat these days to meet rational Canadians. All the best.
Thanks for dropping by – and don’t give up, there’s more of us out there than most of us realize (and than is reflected in the MSM these days). We’re just not as organized as the neocon nutbars :(. But that can change!
Thank you for the words of encouragement. Cheers.
Great to see you on board with Dr. James Hansen, I have a great deal of respect for him. I would be curious to know your opinions on this May 2015 interview with him on Australian radio http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/breakfast/two-degrees-of-global-warming-is-not-safe/6444698 Also, this paper “Renewable energy, nuclear power and Galileo” http://www.columbia.edu/~jeh1/mailings/2014/20140221_DraftOpinion.pdf
Hi Todd –
I presume you are asking specifically about Dr Hansen’s statements on nuclear power, hence the two links above. Citizens’ Climate Lobby is officially “agnostic” with regard to the best type of energy sources to replace fossil fuels. Dr Hansen sees a place for nuclear in the future, personally I’m not fond of nuclear energy because of the byproducts which are produced. Once there’s an honest price on carbon, and no energy subsidies of any kind, the market will decide which is the best and cheapest way to replace fossil fuels.
Thanks for your response, Christine, I agree with a carbon price. I believe the markets will likely favor reliable 7×24 baseload electricity, none of which some low carbon options are capable of. I believe some don’t consider mining (including rare earth elements), material, manufacture, shipping, basically “cradle to grave” analysis of some electricity sources, for example http://jmkorhonen.net/2013/11/29/graphic-of-the-week-the-hidden-fuels-of-renewable-energy/ and http://achemistinlangley.blogspot.ca/2014/12/on-renewables-and-compromises-part-ii.html . I highly recommend reading all five parts of this “Getting to Zero” series http://www.dailykos.com/story/2014/12/31/1354811/-Deep-Decarbonization-report-high-renewable-path-costs-4x-more-than-high-nuclear-alternative One last point, I am impressed with this Royal Commission being undertaken in South Australia, the four Issues paper are well researched and written, great questions. http://nuclearrc.sa.gov.au/#fndtn-external-commission-visits I look forward to your response, Christine, thanks.
Thanks for all the links, Todd. Hopefully I will get a chance to review them soon.
Thank you for replying, Christine. One more article, on subsidies http://thebreakthrough.org/index.php/voices/energetics/the-fossil-fuel-subsidy-red-herring There is a link at the end of this article to vox.com , which I prefer over grist.org Perhaps if you want to continue on with a conversation, I would welcome that via email at toddderyck@gmail.com (then you could delete this comment, since it contains my email address 🙂 ) Thanks, Todd
Christine,
Thank you for your Mother’s Day sermon. Would we have permission at CommonWord – http://www.commonword.ca (Mennonite Church Canada Resource Centre) to repost the video and transcript you have online? We would reformat the transcript into a PDF document (but would otherwise leave it as is).
Yes, of course, thanks for asking, and for sharing it, Arlyn.
Thank you – we have posted it here – http://www.commonword.ca/ResourceView/5/17789
Thanks Arlyn!