taproot earth

On climate and abolishing borders

/ Tracy Abell / 5 Comments

August 29th will be the 20th anniversary of Hurricane Katrina and I’m sharing a timely exchange between Emily Atkin (HEATED) and Louisiana native Colette Pichon Battle (Taproot Earth):
A CALL TO MERGE THE CLIMATE AND IMMIGRATION MOVEMENTS

As Atkin states at the outset:
Hurricane Katrina is widely remembered as the most expensive hurricane in U.S. history. But it was also the country’s largest-ever climate migration.

More than 1.5 million people were forced from their homes after Katrina pummeled the Gulf Coast, leaving 80 percent of New Orleans underwater and demolishing Mississippi’s coastline—and at least 40 percent were not able to return home.

Houston, TX, September 3, 2005- A giant message board helps people locate friends and loved ones at the Reliant Center. Thousands of displaced citizens were moved from New Orleans to Houson in a FEMA organized bus program. Photo by Ed Edahl/FEMA

What we’re currently seeing from the authoritarians is merely a preview of the mass-scale of atrocities in store as we head deeper into ecological collapse. We desperately need solidarity on ALL fronts, and that includes forging alliances with people all around the world. I highly recommend reading this article/interview in its entirety, and am sharing an excerpt that feels especially pertinent in this moment.

EA: You’ve called for abolishing borders altogether. Can you explain how that’s a climate policy, and how that relates to Hurricane Katrina?

CPB: Katrina was one of the largest climate migrations in the U.S. ever seen. Folks were displaced to all 50 states and several countries.

As someone who worked in immigration law, I watched that whole process of people being displaced, the title of “refugee” being put on citizens, and recognized that the conversation around climate migration is broader than immigration into the United States. This is going to be about people having to move out of harm’s way either for a short time, or for a long time. So we’re going to have to figure out dignity in movement when it comes to people being able to move across borders.

Borders are political. This is a question around your human right to traverse a political border to get out of harm’s way. When we talk about the movement of money, borders don’t seem to be a problem. Dollars don’t getting held up crossing the border, but people do. If there’s a free flow of money, why can’t there be a free-flow of people?

These are the kinds of philosophies and thought leadership that we’re trying to put in play, and it’s all part of a reparative approach to the climate reality. Because a lot of people are in a vulnerable situation, not of their own making, but because of a very long history of colonization, domination and extraction. They deserve their human right to migrate. They deserve their human right to remain in their home. They deserve the human right to return to their home. This is what we’re asserting at Taproot.

Thank you for reading.
#WeAreTheStorm
Free Palestine!
Solidarity!

Climate Movement Monday: in support of the Climate Justice Alliance

/ Tracy Abell / 3 Comments

Welcome back to Movement Mondays in which I typically highlight an issue and then offer a quick action or two you can take in solidarity with those most directly impacted. These frontline communities (those enduring the worst effects of the climate crisis) are usually poor people of color because the powerful elite are comfortable riding roughshod over them. They believe poor people don’t have the resources or energy to fight back.  Fortunately, there’s the Climate Justice Alliance which was created to do just that.

From their website: Climate Justice Alliance (CJA) formed in 2013 to create a new center of gravity in the climate movement by uniting frontline communities and organizations into a formidable force. Our translocal organizing strategy and mobilizing capacity is building a Just Transition away from extractive systems of production, consumption and political oppression, and towards resilient, regenerative and equitable economies. We believe that the process of transition must place race, gender and class at the center of the solutions equation in order to make it a truly Just Transition.

If you’ve read any of my previous Movement Monday posts, you know I’m all about people power and solidarity. CJA does amazing work and I encourage you to explore their website. For instance, you can learn about ENERGY DEMOCRACY (a shift from the corporate, centralized fossil fuel economy to one that is governed by communities, is designed on the principle of no harm to the environment, supports local economies, and contributes to the health and well-being for all peoples) and FOOD SOVEREIGNTY which includes CJA’s efforts through community gardens and worker-owned cooperatives. Scroll down to see a clickable list of Participating CJA Members, some of which may be in your own community!

CJA welcomes tax-deductible donations but asks that we first check out their CJA Alliance Members page to see if there are organizations working in our communities so that we may donate locally. I was disappointed to learn there are no member organizations in Colorado, but was glad to donate to Taproot Earth in Slidell, Louisiana (“Our legacy is rooted in the disaster recovery work in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina when the climate crisis was revealed in full force”) because Hurricane Katrina laid bare the array of injustices inflicted on the people in that community and forever changed the landscape of the region, and they deserve all the support they can get.

I hope you also find a member organization to support OR make a donation directly to Climate Justice Alliance. Our best hope in the face of this climate emergency is all of us coming together to unite for a livable planet. And if you feel like sharing an organization you support or something that you learned via CJA’s impressive site or if you donated to one of the member organizations, I hope you’ll share in the comments.  Solidarity! ✊🏽