I had not heard of the Mothers Day marches.
Law suits first, then public support demonstrations. They know what
they're up against.
All best, kids.
Natalia
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2011/may/05/sueing-us-government-climate
Alec Loorz, the 16 year old who is sueing the US government over its
failure to act on climate change. Photograph: alecloorz.com
I am 16 years old. This morning I filed a lawsuit against the United
States of America, for allowing money to be more powerful than the
survival of my generation, and for making decisions that threaten our
right to a safe and healthy planet.
Our parents' and grandparents' generation have created a problem.
They've developed a society that depends on burning fossil fuels
<http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/fossil-fuels>, like coal and oil,
to survive. They never realized that there were any huge consequences to
running our lives with fossil fuels. But now, we do.
Our addiction to fossil fuels is messing up the perfect balance of
nature and threatening the survival of my generation. If we continue to
hide in denial and avoid taking action, my and I generation will be
forced to grow up in a world where hurricanes as big as Katrina are
normal, people die every year because of heat waves, droughts, and
floods, and entire species of animals we've come to know disappear right
before our eyes.
This is not the future I want. And I know that we still have a chance to
turn this picture around. But, it's going to take more than changing
lightbulbs and buying hybrid cars. I believe it will take nothing less
than a revolution... a revolution in our entire culture and way of
thinking, so that we value nature and the future of my generation with
every action we take.
And I believe this revolution needs to be led by youth. It's our future
we're fighting for, and we are some of the most creative, dedicated, and
passionate people on the planet. We have the moral authority to look
into our parents and leaders eyes and ask them, "Do I matter to you?"
Also, as youth, we are the last group of people in the US who don't have
any official political rights. We can't vote, we certainly can't compete
with rich corporate lobbyists... So we are forced to simply trust our
government to make good decisions on our behalf.
However, it's become clear that our government has failed us, by not
protecting the resources on this planet we need to survive. Even though
scientists overwhelmingly agree that CO2 emissions are totally messing
up the balance of our atmosphere, our leaders continue to turn their
backs on this crisis.
The time has come for the youngest generation to hold our leaders
accountable for their actions.
Today, I and other fellow young people are sueing the government
<http://cnsnews.com/news/article/climate-activists-target-states-lawsuits>,
for handing over our future to unjust fossil fuel industries, and
ignoring the right of our children to inherit the planet that has
sustained all of civilization. I will join with youth and attorneys in
every state in the US to demand that our leaders to live and govern as
if our future matters.
The government has a legal responsibility to protect the future for our
children. So we are demanding that they recognize the atmosphere as a
commons that needs to be preserved, and commit to a plan to reduce
emissions to a safe level.
The plaintiffs and petitioners on all the cases are young people. We are
standing up for our future.
But we will not only stand up in the courts. We will stand up in the
streets as well.
Starting this Mothers' Day weekend, the youngest generation will rise up
and march in our communities. We will unite together with a powerful
voice to call for action on climate change
<http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/climate-change>, and demand that
our society lives as if our future matters.
We will let the world know that climate change is not about money, it's
not about power, it's not about convenience. It's about our future. It's
about the survival of this and every generation to come.
The iMatter March <http://www.imattermarch.org/> is a series of more
than 100 marches in states all across the US, and in over 25 countries
worldwide, including Columbia, Gambia, Germany, Thailand India, on Mount
Everest (!) and there's even one being planned by the son of an oil
executive in Kuwait.
And it's about more than just these events. This is a movement. A mass
movement of young people standing up with a unified voice to tell the
ruling generation that we will no longer just sit idly by as they make
decisions that threaten our future. We matter. Our future matters.
Thomas Jefferson once said, "Every generation needs a new revolution."
Well this is ours. The time has now come for the youngest generation to
make a stand for our future.
This is our revolution. This is our time.
. Alec Loorz is the 16 year old visionary of the iMatter campaign and
founder of Kids vs Global Warming
<http://kids-vs-global-warming.com/Home.html>, a project of Earth Island
Institute. A climate change activist since he was 12 years old, he has
spoken to nearly 200,000 people in over 200 presentations, keynotes, and
panels
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