Global Climate Strikes

By Paul Tolmé

Clare Gallagher is one of the world’s most accomplished ultra-runners, winner of the Western States 100 and Leadville 100 trail runs, but on September 20 she will lace up for an even more important reason. Gallagher plans to participate in the youth-led Global Climate Strike, a worldwide day of protests that will kick off a week of events aimed at preventing a climate catastrophe.

Striking for the planet and the outdoor places she loves is a no-brainer for Gallagher, who has felt the impacts of a warming world on her sport. Two races she planned to run last fall were cancelled due to wildfires in California. Running in Europe last year, Gallagher witnessed a colossal rockslide caused by melting glaciers in the Alps.

Gallagher plans to participate in a climate strike in either Denver or her hometown of Boulder, Colorado, and she urges everyone—especially people who recreate outdoors—to join local strikes in their communities. “There are millions of us who ski and run and hike and climb and play outdoors. We all need to get involved and do everything we can.”

Worried about climate change? Unsure what to do? Mark September 20 on your calendar.

Organizers hope to have strikes that day in all 50 states—more than 100 nationwide in every major metropolitan area including New York City, Seattle, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Chicago, Atlanta, Miami, Washington, New Orleans, Houston, Dallas, Boston, Baltimore, Philadelphia, Honolulu and more, as well as in smaller communities from Hawaii to Montana to Maine and Puerto Rico.

Internationally, strikes are being planned across Europe, South America, Africa, Australia and Asia. The goal is to bring millions of people into the streets around the globe to demand that world leaders and elected officials move aggressively to combat climate change.

“We encourage folks who can leave work on September 20 to join with us,” says Emily Southard, who is helping to coordinate actions in the United States on behalf of the climate action group 350.org. “We want to disrupt business as usual.” The strikes are for people from all walks of life, Southard says. “We are asking sports stars to step off the field or court, politicians to step off the campaign trail, teachers to put down their chalk and join us.”

Youth are a driving force in the strikes, which have grown into a global movement since Swedish 16-year-old Greta Thunberg began skipping school on Fridays last year to protest outside the Swedish Parliament. Thunberg has become the face of the youth climate movement, which showed its muscle last March when students around the planet staged a global climate strike that organizers say drew millions of people into the streets.

Now, they hope to build on that momentum. Time is running out, says Kentucky high school junior Lily Gardner, who points to a 2018 report from the UN International Panel on Climate Change that concludes humanity must take drastic action by 2030 or risk global chaos. “I’m striking because we have less than eleven years to radically change our nation and world to confront the global climate crisis,” she says.

Gardner, who turned 16 on September 9, is coordinating strikes in Louisville, Kentucky, where speakers and musicians will rally outside city government buildings and call on the governor to endorse a statewide Green New Deal. She is also helping to organize smaller strikes across Kentucky for those who can’t make it to Louisville. “I’m striking because I believe everyone has a right to a livable future, and that fundamental right cannot be upheld until we mitigate this crisis.”

A wide array of interest groups is supporting the strikes including organizations representing labor, health care, business, education, science, social justice and more. “This is a moment where we want and need everyone everywhere to get involved,” Southard says.

Ice cream company Ben & Jerry’s is among the businesses taking part. The company is asking its scoop shops to close between noon and 2 p.m. on September 20 so that employees and customers can participate in climate actions. The company likewise plans to bus employees from its Vermont headquarters to a strike in Burlington, says company spokesperson Laura Peterson.

Skiers and snowboarders will also strike. Employees of the snowsports and climate action group Protect Our Winters, or POW, will join a strike in Denver, and the nonprofit is urging its overseas affiliates and roughly 200 partner organizations and businesses to participate as well.

Social media will play a large role in the strikes. POW plans to leverage the power of its large social media audience, which measures in the millions when including its high-profile athletes, with posts about #WhyWeStrike.

“We want to create a call to action, to get our audience to contact their elected officials and demand action on climate,” says Samantha Killgore, POW Communications Manager. “This can’t just be a day where we hold signs and march and feel good about ourselves. We need to focus on creating the political will and cultural change to drive solutions.”

Creating political pressure is a primary focus of the strikes, which are timed to coincide with the United Nations Climate Action Summit on September 23 in New York City. Thunberg, who arrived in New York City by sailboat from Europe in late August, will speak alongside other young climate leaders at a Youth Climate Summit on September 21, following what is expected to be the nation’s largest strike the day before on the streets of New York City.

The goal is to turn up the heat on world leaders to rapidly transition from fossil fuels to renewable energies, and build consensus for actions in advance of the next big international climate change conference, in Santiago, Chile, in December, where nations will negotiate efforts to speed up the objectives of the Paris Climate Accords, from which the Trump administration has withdrawn.

“The 2019 Global Climate Strike is shaping up to be a turning point in our fight against the climate crisis and the adults are here to follow their lead,” says Maggie Bruns, Director of Rock the Earth, the League of Conservation Voters’ education fund. “The future of our youth is worth fighting for.”

The strike week will include a diversity of actions beyond just marches including teach-ins, trainings on how to become a climate activist, demonstrations at fossil fuel plants and pipelines and at financial institutions that fund the fossil fuel industry. In Tarpon Springs, Florida, faith leaders and environmentalists will hold a presentation on religion and climate change, and how people of faith can help. In Virginia, opponents of two proposed pipelines to deliver fracked natural gas to the Atlantic coast will rally residents of West Virginia, Virginia and North Carolina. Art will be an integral part of the strikes. Organizers of the Colorado Climate Strike are creating a Youth Art Showcase that will feature the best works on banners and signs. In Seattle there will be an Interactive Climate Art Installation.

For individuals who are distressed about climate change but have stayed out of the fray, striking for the planet is a positive way to turn emotion into action, supporters say. “Facing seemingly impossible problems can be discouraging. But with climate the answer is something we as humans do very well and have done many, many times in history,” says Auden Schendler, senior vice president of sustainability for the Aspen Skiing Company and a board member of Protect Our Winters. “It’s called revolution.”

Schendler and other Aspen ski resort employees plan to join a strike in nearby Carbondale, Colorado, and the company was considering operating a gondola to the top of the mountain to teach about the impact’s of warming on the alpine. “Participating in the guts of a revolution by marching, by protesting, by taking to the streets or visiting your Statehouse or City Hall and demanding action is salutary, meaningful and empowering,” Schendler says. “The truth is we are not powerless. We know how to do social change.”

Gallagher echoes that sentiment. She attended a youth climate strike last March and found it inspiring. “These actions are important to remind people who are standing on the sidelines and putting their heads down to get out and do something.”

The Movement

Globalclimatestrike.net/usa lists climate strike happenings nationwide.

Strikewithus.org lists the youth-led and adult coalitions participating in the strikes including the Sunrise Movement, the Hip Hop Caucus, MoveOn.org, Greenpeace, the Sierra Club and more.

Want to organize a strike? Youthclimatestrikeus.org was seeking young strike coordinators in a handful of states as this article went to press.