Ordinary Hero: Abigail Borah, her COP 17 plea heard round the world

Screen shot of Abigail Borah speaking out at COP 17
Democracy Now! video

This week in Durban, South Africa, the United Nations concluded its seventeenth conference on climate change. Abigail Borah, a Middlebury College Student, flew to Copenhagen to attend the talks, along with many other youth concerned about their future.

Disturbed by the failure of the United States and other nations to address the immediacy of the situation, Abigail penned a short statement, stood up, and "with trembling hands," read it to the assembly.

2020 is too late to wait

The conference chair told her "No one is listening to you." Todd Stern, the United States delegate about to address the assembly waited with rather a condescending pose. (I want to believe he was secretly glad for her stand.) Abigail, an ordinary person who could not and would not be afforded an officially sanctioned microphone at these talks, persevered, determined to be heard. Here is her statement.

I am speaking on behalf of the United States of America because my negotiators cannot. The obstructionist Congress has shackled justice and delayed ambition for far too long. I am scared for my future. We need an urgent path to a fair, ambitious, and legally binding treaty. You must take responsibility to act now, or you will threaten the lives of youth and the world's most vulnerable. You must set aside partisan politics and let science dictate decisions. You must pledge ambitious targets to lower emissions, not expectations. 2020 is too late to wait.

Why I stood up and spoke out

Despite the ultimate failure of the talks to take action now, it gives me some small ray of hope that the audience applauded Abigail as she was led from the hall.

Immediately after Abigail's impromptu speech, Todd Stern hastened to call a press conference, where he refuted Abigail's assertions regarding the US do-nothing approach.  In this Democracy Now! video titled, "I'm Scared For My Future": Student Disrupts Speech By US Climate Envoy Todd Stern in Durban" (7.3 minutes), watch and hear Abigail read her statement, followed by an excerpt from Stern's press conference.



It is important to note that one day following Stern's assertion that the United States was not standing in the way of a legally binding agreement, the State Department issued a statement saying otherwise.

You can read the whole story, in Abigail's eloquent words, here, in Why I stood up and spoke out.

Ordinary Heroes Award
© L Kathryn Grace

Abigail Borah, in speaking out as you did, you risked arrest, potentially putting your reputation and your future in jeopardy, yet you acted. Rather than become immobilized by fear, you used your fear to take a dramatic stand and to power your voice--a voice literally heard round the world.

For your courage, for your commitment to making change, for speaking for millions who feel as you do, for being one of the thousands, perhaps hundreds of thousands working to create a better world, a good world, you are an Ordinary Hero and my hero. I bow to you in deepest gratitude.

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We make peace in a million small ways every day.

All text and images, unless otherwise noted, copyright L. Kathryn Grace. All rights reserved.

Good News Friday: U.S. gasoline consumption drops 5 percent

Rusty petro pump
a morgueFile free photo

To be truthful, I never thought I'd see the day, while there was any oil left, but the U.S. is guzzling less gas than it did four years ago. Five percent less, according to Lester R. Brown of the Earth Policy Institute.

Even better, in yesterday's news release, U.S. Gasoline Use Declining: Keystone XL Pipeline Not Needed, Dr. Brown cites four reasons we can expect to see U.S. gasoline use continue to slip. They are:

1. We're buying fewer cars.
2. We're driving fewer miles.
3. We're demanding Congress mandate more fuel-efficient vehicles.
4. We're demanding and buying more electric cars.
   

This doesn't mean we're out of the carbon emissions woods by a long shot. Between us, you and I and the rest of the nation are still pumping more gas than the next sixteen gas-slurping countries combined. That's right. We use more gasoline than China, Japan, Russia, Germany, Brazil and eleven more high-use countries, combined.

We Americans have a long way to go before we are doing our fair share to curb emissions, conserve energy, slow other petro-chemical pollution, and just possibly save the planet for future generations.
Still, I'm heartened by this news. And there's a bonus. Dr. Brown believes we can expect further declines as more and more of the populace move to cities, where public transportation is readily available.

Teenagers, for example, no longer need shiny, new pickups--or old farm trucks for that matter--to socialize. Dr. Brown says,

On top of urbanization, we also have a change in the manner in which young people socialize. For teenagers in rural communities a half century ago, getting a driver’s license and something to drive—a car, a pickup, or even a farm truck—was a rite of passage. That’s what everyone did.

This too is changing. Today’s teenagers, most of whom grew up in an urban setting, socialize through smartphones and the Internet. For many of them, a car is of little interest. The number of licensed teenage drivers in this country—the car owners of the future—has dropped from a peak of 12 million in 1978 to 10 million today.

I call that cause for celebration. Homemade ice cream anyone?

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We make peace in a million small ways every day.

All text and images, unless otherwise noted, © L. Kathryn Grace. All rights reserved.

44 pounds, 80 minutes

Are you planning to watch TV tonight? I encourage you to spend 80 minutes watching 44 pounds instead. It's hauntingly beautiful, sweetly silent, save for muted voices, the occasional footfall on rock. If you don't have 80 minutes to spare, watch the 2-minute time-lapse version. Viewing it was enough to make me want to see the whole thing. Afterward, please take time to tell me what you learned, what you felt, how you might respond.


44 Pounds from water.org on Vimeo.


44 Pounds, 2 Times a day

Berhane makes this trek twice a day, every single day. Imagine hauling water this way when you are sick with the stomach flu, or your children, whom you must leave at home, have chicken pox.

How did you feel when you saw that young woman climbing down into the well, clinging to the wall, and lifting out the jerry can to her friend? What do you think would have happened if the second well had been too dirty, like the first?

Give water, Save lives

Nearly one billion people lack access to safe water and 2.5 billion do not have improved sanitation. The health and economic impacts are staggering.

Water.org

Every minute, four children die because of water-borne illness. Every minute. Organizations like water.org and Water Charity, are working hard and fast to help villagers in Ethiopia, India, Haiti and many other countries dig wells, install pumps. They show parents how to save their children's lives by using some of their precious fuel to boil water.

Can you help? Will you spread the word through your blog, Facebook, or Twitter? It takes only a moment if you use the buttons immediately below this post. If you have a little extra cash, will you take time to donate? Both sites linked to above have easy to use donate buttons on their home pages.

Why it matters

Apart from the sheer humanitarian need to help when we learn of another's distress and have the means to be of use, why should we care so much about water?

We in the developed West are fortunate to have all the water we need--for now. According to many scientists, the world is in a planet-wide water crisis that may result in water wars sooner than any of us imagine. Very likely you and I will live long enough to experience the first wave of these. Crazy as it sounds today, our children and grandchildren may face much worse.

For now, we are the lucky ones. Beginning to know and understand the problem is an important first step. Lending a hand to the real people already experiencing the crisis is an equally important second step.

What can you do to help the one-sixth of the world's children who do not have safe, clean water to drink? Can you help save a few lives today? Will you help spread the word? Spare a few dollars? It's the Ordinary thing to do.

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We make peace in a million small ways every day.

All text and images, unless otherwise noted, copyright L. Kathryn Grace. All rights reserved.