Thinking about our Climate Crisis

Facing our Climate Crisis Together 11.30.21

My background and beliefs

I am a 79-year-old white male with two careers—health and writing/publishing. I am a Quaker driven by the principles of Simplicity, Peace, Integrity, Community, and Equality (SPICE). The climate crisis is our greatest threat to humanity. As an elder I’m inspired to use my resources wholeheartedly in the cause of saving humanity from the climate emergency—the greatest threat to our human race.

My Inspirations

*Rachel Carson—60 years ago next year Silent Spring triggered the environmental movement.

*Desmond Tutu—tirelessly challenged apartheid’s brutality while staying magnanimous and lighthearted.

*Nelson Mandela—recognized we are all oppressed till all our oppressors regain their true humanity.

*Henry David Thoreau—Plant the seed of hope. Tolstoy learned from Thoreau, Gandhi from Tolstoy, King from Gandhi—and the civil rights movement made history.

*Vaclav Havel saw hope not just as a looked-for short term outcome, but as a spiritual leading—to take on challenges deeply uncertain, seemingly hopeless.

*Women, Civil Rights, LGBTQIA, Racial Minorities, Movements have all led humanity towards lasting goodness.

My Resources

*Faith—in universal peace, justice, equality, love

*Life experience

*Creativity

*Energy

*Economic privilege

Our Greatest Challenges

*The state of mind and spirit of many of us—fear, despair, helplessness, often enough cynicism. All fully understandable—but they impede our actively facing our current crisis

*The global majority of people live in impoverished communities and are at the pointed end of the spear that is human oppression.

*Corporate capitalism is sinking under the weight of its internal contradictions—but it is dragging us all down with it.

Next Steps

*Build relations with like-minded people of friendship and trust—across gender, age, ethnicity

*Identify our personal and collective resources

*Connect with and learn from like-minded organizations

*Think, commit and act together on projects that need us and fit our resources

*Move forward project by project

*Revisit where we have come from, where we are, and where we are going

*Enlist others along the way

*Balance in-person and virtual connections

*Relax and have fun together

In solidarity,

John Graham-Pole – john.gp@live.com