København Climate Strike

My best effort at correct pronunciation: “Ko-ben-hound”

Many of you probably heard about the youth climate strikes happening around the world Sept 20th to Sept 27th.

As a former climate movement organizer, I’ve personally become mostly cynical about protests and rallies and their impact.

But in this particular case (and honestly in many other protest and march opportunities I do attend), I commit to going because I feel strongly about supporting young people in their efforts to address the climate crisis. Many of whom are refer to themselves as “The Last Generation.”

For anyone interested, there’s a beautiful digital storytelling project about The Last Generation of the Marshall Islands.

A few weeks ago I looked to see if there was a climate strike in Kobenhavn. There was, scheduled for Sept 27th.

I RSVPd.

But declined to sign up for email updates.

Next step: Invite the oldest and the youngest to go with me.

Over the years they’ve gone to a number of protest – when they were younger they didn’t have much of a choice (plus we had strollers).

But as they got older, they became more annoyed at protests and marches that started late, and lasted “forever” with “boring” speeches and loooong, *very tiring* walks.

And although I was once an enthusiastic marcher and protestor (and even got arrested blocking methane shipments once) and wanted them to be too, I realized that in order to not turn them off of activism entirely, I need to just ask them if they want to participate, and then respect their answer.

Especially for these youth climate strikes. I get very angry when adults claim to *support youth climate strikes* but don’t take any action to support the youth.

I call these LSS “Lip Service Supporters.”

I get especially angry when adults ask and expect young people to take care of the climate crisis. They didn’t create it, but they are inheriting it. Adults should NOT EVER be asking them to shoulder the burden.

As far as the adults being horrible and trolling and attacking and criticizing these young people?

There is a special spot, in a very very hot place, for those people.

Anyhow, for the Kobehavn strike on the 27th, the youngest said “sure” right away.

The oldest was non-committal…

Until Thursday, the day before the strike, when a bunch of her friends decided to go. Then she asked me to please submit an absence request form to the school for her. Which I did.

A big thank you to Copenhagen International School for their position on, and support of, the strike yesterday.

Monday, the school’s director sent out the following message: “As a school that educates champions of a just and sustainable world, we support the aims of the “global climate strike” on Friday and understand that our students are passionate about climate change.… we will record absences as usual but there will be no consequences for students who decide to attend the event at Ofelia Plads”

I needed to find poster board for our signs. Not as easy here as it is in the U.S. where I can either walk to the CVS 5 minutes from where we live and buy poster making supplies or drive to [any big box store or grocery store ] to buy them at a cheaper price.

Getting poster board in Copenhagen required a bus trip to the city center to meet my friend Jessica. I could have biked, but since I figured out how to use my Personal Rejsekort Card (and the 4 weather apps I use cannot seem to accurately predict the downpours) I’ve gotten much much lazier and prefer buses and trains.

The public transportation here is amazing.

Plus, the walking required helps me meet my 10,000 daily step goal. Biking does not.

Anyhow, we found the poster board. And I decided to not buy any markers at $3 each. I knew we had at least a black and a blue one at the apartment. That would suffice.

The youngest and I made our posters Thursday evening.

The oldest started her poster. Aimed to finish it Friday morning, but ran out of time. So I finished it for her. She drew/wrote this one. All I did was trace it with blue marker.

Just as I was about to leave to meet the youngest at school – she texted me “mom, can my friend come with us?”

Me: sure, as long as it’s ok with her parents.”

youngest “ok, she texted her dad, it’s fine.”

So I met them at the school at 11am and we walked to the nearest train station. Nordhavn St.

Waiting for the train. It was pouring rain, so we got a bit wet.

About the red sign “Chequitania, Bolivia is burning! Save the Forests!”

Several weeks ago, news about the horrendous wildfires in the Amazon Rainforest, caused by farmers clearing land for crops and cattle, made headlines around the world.

Brazil’s forest fires received lots of media attention, Bolivian forest fires less so.

Having a sign is pretty important – a visual for photos and the media, but creativity and witty sign slogans aren’t my strong suit. So I had turned to social media for suggestions.

I asked friends if there were signs we could make to support their work. My friend and former colleague Ana, who is Bolivian, wrote this “Neely, Please make ones for the Amazon forests:
“Bolivian forests are also burning!”
“Save the forests, save the air”
“Chiquitania, Bolivia is burning. Save the forests, save democracy”
We’re in dire need of international attention and support. The forests and people are dying, and the government is not helping, it’s condemning this area to its death. We need as much awareness as we can get!!!!!🙏🙏🙏🙏”

So I did.

And Ana sent me this heartfelt message when she saw my posts on social media ” Neely, I took the liberty of sharing this image on my fb wall. I was so excited to see this, and let my friends and family back home know there are others creating awareness of this in Europe. As you can see if you visit my fb wall, I’ve been posting as much as possible about this disaster. It’s really impacted me, it’s affected me so much, because I know what’s at stake. These forests have always been a source of pride for me, a source of marvel. Seeing them burn has struck my heart… It does bring hope that our crisis is being heard and supported, even if we have a ferocious government refusing to ask for international help. They don’t want attention brought to their man made disaster. Thank for from the bottom of my heart!!!!

If you’re not sure how/what you should be doing for any cause you care about, simply ask friends and colleagues how you can support them and their work.

Then follow through.

We transferred at the Norreport Station and all over the station were these ads:

A word about the red poster message. Greta Thunberg, the young climate striker from Sweden has received an enormous amount of attention (and hate too – which she has handled with dignity and courage) and has become a leader in the climate movement.

But before Greta, there have been young Indigenous, Black, Latina, African and other non-white people fighting for their land, their communities, their futures, for climate, for clean water, around the world, who have been largely ignored.

I think it’s incredibly important to acknowledge what Greta has done for the climate movement. It is equally, if not more important, to recognize those who have been doing the work for even longer but who have not received the same media attention.

Here are a few articles that do just that.

• “5 Indigenous Youth Activists to start following” [on social media]
• “Meet the New Generation of Black Climate Leaders”
• “Why Students of Color are stepping up to lead climate strikes.”
• “The Flint Water Crisis began 5 years ago, this 11 year old activist knows it’s still not over.”
• “This 13 year old Indigenous girl has been nominated for a Global Peace Prize.”
• “It is our very governments who are killing the earth” A Brazilian indigenous leader speaks out on Deforestation in the Amazon.

We found the oldest and her friends – who had left school at 10:30am to make sure they got to the rally on time (about a 30 minute trip via train and metro from school).

Although my eyebrows raised a little bit at these plans, I didn’t say anything about really not needing to be so early.

I did not want to dampen her enthusiasm.

But there was this text exchange at 11:30am:

Oldest: “Mom there is no one here. There are more crew members than people.”

Me: “You’re 30 minutes early.”

Oldest: “Yeah, but still.”

me: “People don’t go to protests early.”

Protest Lesson #1 (no one arrives early) learned. (maybe)

Give me your best glare….

Family photo time

Me: “My love, no smiling please, climate change is nothing to smile about. You need to look serious.”

MBH:

As someone who thinks constantly about what humans have done/are doing to this planet, and about how much suffering climate change is already cause, and will continue to cause, it can feel wrong to laugh.

But we have to live our lives and laugh and smile when we can.

The photo above was one of those moments.