Youth Climate Strike – Phoenix

The Kids Are All right

A couple hundred mostly young folks gathered on the State Capitol lawn in Phoenix yesterday as part of the Youth Climate Strike.

Let’s hope their movement continues to grow and expand beyond traditional tactics and challenge people to pursue more radical direct actions (e.g. see: Extinction Rebellion Week). Wouldn’t a real national general strike be awesome? If people shut down the economy, it would force policymakers to respond.

The message was that policymakers had denied or failed to respond to the climate crisis and that their generation – which will bear the brunt of the impacts – would rise to the challenge.

Many called for a Green New Deal. I suggested that they consider the history, politics, and policy of the original New Deal – including the pressure from organized labor and the left (including the Communist Party) that drove that compromise with capitalism.

I was impressed by the maturity, commitment and organization evidenced by the event.

Speakers included a State Senator Juan Menendez who railed against defenders of the status quo and urged folks to challenge his legislative colleagues and pressure them for real climate policies:

and Arizona Sierra Club Director Sandy Bahr, who focused on solutions.

sorry Sandy, I missed this shot!

Here’s a shot of the scene: