Climate change can feel so overwhelming that it's hard to know what one person can do.
But doing nothing is not an option. "Somebody else" does not have this covered. Our governments, whether municipal, provincial, or federal, are not yet doing enough and we are already enduring climate impacts - droughts, floods, fires - while on track for much worse.
The good news is that solutions, while hard, are feasible and that more and more of us are becoming concerned. If enough of us come together to push hard for those solutions, we can make them happen.
And this isn't really about personal lifestyle choices. While important (and check these out), those cannot scale fast enough to meet the challenge that faces us. We need robust policy reform. And fast.
Here is a three-part framework that you can get started on by yourself, or much better, by getting together with friends or neighbours. We'd love to support you, so please consider signing up below, along with where you vote locally.
1) Break The Silence
Studies show that most of us just don't talk about climate change. It's too overwhelming, or we don't understand it, or we don't want to upset others or be the downer at the dinner party.
It's a vicious circle, since the silence signals to others that it's not a problem. As a result, we are sleepwalking as a society in the face of our largest challenge.
Breaking the silence is the easiest thing we can do, and the more of us that do it, the more we create a virtuous circle instead. As an individual you can:
- Ask your family and friends if they are concerned about climate change and talk about it
- Post and share climate stories on your social media
- Write letters to the editor about climate change in the newspapers you read
If you join together with others you can:
- Put on a local event like a climate documentary screening and discussion
- Do other kinds of outreach like tabling at public events
2) Shift Our Money
We need to invest in the future we want, but many of us are unknowingly investing in making climate change worse.
If you are saving money and putting it in mutual funds, you are probably investing in fossil fuels. Even if you aren't putting money in mutual funds but are banking with one of the big banks, then your savings may end up being loaned to fossil fuel companies.
The good news is that there are alternatives - fossil fuel-free investments and/or banking instead with credit unions. As an individual you can:
- Ask your bank or credit union to shift your investments into fossil fuel-free instruments
- Move your business from a bank to a credit union
- As per number one above, tell people you are doing this!
If you join together with others you can:
- Work to shift the investments and/or accounts of organizations you are involved with
- Host a public workshop with a green investment specialist and wort to get a good turnout
3) Shift Our Politics
If we are going to head off the worst impacts of climate change, we need a social and economic mobilization on the scale of what we did during WWII. So far, our politicians have fallen well short of this ambition, and in some cases are actually making things worse by approving developments (like urban sprawl, pipelines) that increase emissions.
And guess what? A side-effect of number one above is that very few constituents make a point of contacting their elected officials about climate change. So, they conclude that few people care, and that they don't need to do much.
Shifting our politics will take sustained contact and pressure on our politicians - and if they don't change, then we'll need to replace them. As an individual you can:
- Write and/or call your municipal leader, MLA, and MP and ask them what more they can do on climate change
- As per number one above, talk publicly about their response to you
If you join together with others you can:
- Book in-person meetings with your elected officials and a small group of their constituents
- Host a public forum for your elected officials to talk climate change
- Do petitions to elected officials to demonstrate concern among their constituents
- Show up at candidates events and vocalize your climate concerns and questions
If enough of us start doing the things above, we will begin to see a shift. Again, you can get started right now as an individual, but you will have more of an impact - and engage in mutual support - if you join together with others and do things jointly. You may even have a bit of fun that way, and we can all use that given the heavy topic!
Let us know what you are up to. You can sign up below to indicate that you are on board and interested in acting. Mark off also where you vote municipally too, since part of this process is holding our local governments accountable.