Naomi Hollard was on her way to a climate summit, passing through one of Michigan’s most polluted zip codes, 48217, in southwest Detroit, when her throat started burning. Her view out of the car window was even more harrowing. Miles of toxic industrial facilities lined the landscape, and oil and gas refineries spewed black clouds into the air — right next to schools, sports fields, and family homes.
“And who lives in those homes, breathing the air filled with sulfur and seeing the petroleum coke spill into the riverbank?” Hollard said. “Black and brown communities.”
Hollard, a 21-year-old activist with Sunrise, a national movement that pushes for the passage of the Green New Deal, was first inspired to join the climate change movement when she feared for her family's safety after Hurricane Maria hit the island of Guadeloupe in 2017. Half of her family lives in the Caribbean, a region in which significant storms and hurricanes would directly threaten the livelihood of her family should climate inaction continue, Hollard says.
Two years later, she brought the Sunrise movement to her college, Columbia University, where she organized climate strikes with other students. Now, as a spokesperson and training manager for Sunrise, Hollard conducts sessions across the country on topics ranging from diversity in the climate movement to how to guide public narrative and conduct anti-oppression work.
Hollard belongs to a growing group of activists who are fundamentally reshaping the narrative around the climate crisis. Where the mainstream environmental movement once sidelined justice demands from communities of color, activists like Hollard have adopted a human focus in their activism, pushing the larger climate change movement to recognize how a warming world has already adversely impacted people of color, Indigenous folks, and low-income communities. These activists push political leaders and regular citizens alike to educate themselves, acknowledge their own privilege, and then work tirelessly for those most closely impacted by the climate crisis today.
Mashable asked climate activists on the ground today to explain how everyday folks can best acknowledge racial justice when thinking about and acting on the climate crisis.
1. Learn the basics — if you haven't already
Tamara Toles O'Laughlin, the North America Director for 350.org, an organization dedicated to ending our fossil fuel era and guiding a "Just Transition" to renewable energy, makes the relation between climate and racial justice clear.
"Around the world, the effects of climate change are felt most acutely by [the] people who are least responsible [for it]. It’s critical that we connect the dots between climate and racial justice in order to truly build communities that are equitable for all," she said. "At its intersection, our demand to end the era of fossil fuels must be rooted in equity, and the protection and realization of human rights. What has prevented a public dialogue about the intersection is a deep structural design that treats them as separate."
To climate activists like Hollard and Toles O'Laughlin, the work of climate justice is fundamentally incomplete without incorporating broader social justice goals. The Sunrise-approved Green New Deal, for instance, explicitly calls for the promotion of "justice and equity by stopping current, preventing future, and repairing historic oppression..." faced by those most vulnerable to the immediate impact of the climate crisis.
“Climate justice is racial justice,” Hollard said.
2. Understand today's impacts — and understand what needs to be done about them
Andrea Manning, a 19-year-old sophomore at the University of Georgia, serves on both the national team and Georgia chapter for Zero Hour, a youth-led movement that organizes climate marches, lobbies politicians, and educates local communities. Her daily schedule sees her jumping from literature classes to work at her campus library to organizing with other Zero Hour activists on Skype in the evening. Rather than deeming blanket environmental efforts adequate, Manning wants more people to understand the importance of addressing the root causes of our climate crisis when attempting to enact solutions.
“Most people understand the [environmental] basics. ‘Save the turtles; use metal straws.’ But that’s the bare minimum,” Manning said. “We might be prolonging impacts, but we need to get to the systems of oppression behind them.”
Manning notes that much of climate activism today is future-oriented, from FridaysForFuture marches, which protest current climate inaction, to policy proposals that set far-off emissions goals, like some of the pledges set by major countries in the Paris Agreement. She finds that work deeply necessary and long overdue — but incomplete. Interpreting climate change as a threat that will only impact future generations ignores the fact that many marginalized communities have been living with the effects of climate change for years, Manning says.
“If you’re not affected by climate change today, that itself is a privilege,” Manning said. “This is survival work. [We need to] talk about communities impacted right now. Let’s talk about Indigenous folks; Let’s talk about Flint, Michigan. Let’s talk about disabled folks in disaster zones.”
Hollard echoes her sentiment.
"From Flint, Michigan, where a racism-fueled water crisis poisoned an entire community, to Standing Rock, South Dakota, where wealthy elites jeopardized an entire people’s water source with an oil pipeline, it’s clear that only a multi-racial, cross-class movement can stop them," Hollard said.
3. Keep engaged
Manning notes that social media can be an effective entry point for self-education.
"Learn from the voices of oppressed folks online," Manning said. "[A] social media education looks like following the POC dedicated to educating themselves and other communities, [and] listening to what they have to say, asking questions, and engaging with the content."
She recommends:
The Conscious Kid (@theconsciouskid)
Walela Nehanda (@itswalela)
Asian Activist (@asian.activiist)
Three Token Brown Girls (@3tokenbrowngirls)
Kristy Drutman (@browngirl_green)
Especially for white folks engaging with POC educators online, Manning urges people to remember that the labor expended by POC educators should be compensated and respected, and that discomfort when challenged should never take the form of projecting anger or shame onto others.
4. Use your own privilege to lift up others
As someone involved in climate justice work since 1999, or, for half of her life, Toles O’Laughlin stresses learning from those who have come before.
“We’re talking about human survival here, but this isn’t the first time that humans have needed to survive,” she said. “There’s a lot to be learned from communities that have had to survive time and time again. Invest your time and resources into oppressed communities.”
Manning agrees, and says that making space for others means acknowledging your own privilege in a given space.
"As a black youth climate activist, I do not represent the multitude of people who are young, black, and in this space. I need to make sure that I am not the sole voice being heard," Manning said. "Look at Vic Barrett, a young black, Indigenous, Honduran-American climate activist whose cultural context and lived experiences differ greatly from my own. I would be doing a disservice to them and any other black climate activist to say that I represent them and their experiences. But what I can say is 'look at Vic,' 'see Vic,' 'hear Vic.' I can quote Vic; I can uplift Vic. And if I were to gain visibility, I could include Vic."
"Uplifting the full community means that there needs to be many times that we're stepping back, sending people to speak in our place, and bringing people in with us as we're speaking," Manning said.
Toles O'Laughlin also reiterates the importance of letting others speak for themselves.
"Our job is to make sure that all communities can participate, and that especially those most impacted by the climate crisis, including low-income and black, Indigenous, and communities of color, are helping to lead and steer what climate justice must look like," she said.
5. And then actually show up
"When we have a call for attendance to a protest or town hall, be there. If you find yourself showing up to the Women's Marches, March for Our Lives, and FridaysForFuture strikes but not for marches [or] strikes addressing police brutality, racism, homophobia or transphobia, examine the role you're actually playing in our work," Manning said. "Are you with us? Like, for real? This is critical. Support us in action, don’t just acknowledge and tokenize us. That's it. It's that simple."
Topics Activism Social Good Racial Justice
