Tag Archives: climate emergency

Sorry for the silence, my friends, I’ve been working on a new book – a book for young children told in the voice of my dog Pepy (woof!) – but I didn’t stop working as Senior Editor at Impakter magazine, also contributing articles (yeah, I confess, there’s been a break of several weeks, but I was wrapped up in writing the first draft of my Pepy book …). Now a new article is out, so, as usual, here’s the opening:

The climate emergency makes the comparison between humans and dinosaurs inescapable: Both face extinction from a climate crisis. But with a difference. The dinosaurs didn’t bring it on themselves. An asteroid hitting Earth and a giant volcano did it for them. By contrast, humans are doing it to themselves. The scientific evidence is incontrovertible, the climate emergency results from the industrial revolution.

And the climate emergency is much more than rising temperatures and sea levels. It’s choking pollution, it’s a calamitous drop in biodiversity, with more than half the world’s species gone over the last 30 years. In short, it’s the 6th mass extinction. And it’s happening now. The Artic melted this summer like never before. The question is: Can we survive as a species?

The question is urgent. We can no longer afford to waste time discussing scientific facts with climate deniers. We need to consider what to do concretely to avert disaster – anything less is irresponsible.

That is the point made by a mild-mannered professor at a British university, Dr. Rupert Read who teaches at the University of East Anglia (UK) and self-describes as a committed climate and environmental campaigner. Most recently, he has been a frequent spokesperson for Extinction Rebellion and a member of their political liaison team. For anyone who hasn’t heard yet about the Extinction Rebellion, here is a quick video that sums it up:

Extinction Rebellion is a people’s movement that was launched in May 2018 with protests in the UK and is now active around the globe. Starting 7 October, and for two weeks, protests are planned in London (you can sign up here) and other major cities (to join, check this site). The movement has become truly worldwide:

It has already achieved one of its goals: It got the UK Parliament to declare on May 1st 2019  a state of “climate emergency”. Through the summer, the parliaments of other countries joined with similar declarations: Ireland, the Holy See, Canada, France, Argentina, Spain, Austria, in that order. Local administrations joined too, including New York and San Francisco in the US; Sidney and Melbourne in Australia; Paris and Mulhouse in France; most towns in Canada and Germany. The list is endless and growing.

At the moment of writing, Extinction Rebellion protesters are defying the London city ban on protests and nursing mothers target Google. Why Google?

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To find out why Google has excited the ire of Extinction Rebellion (and much more), read the rest on Impakter, click here. 

If you’re curious about my other articles published on Impakter magazine (I started in 2014), here’s a list, click here.