BaCCC/Video Summaries/What Is Climate Justice? 3

Video Summary

What Is Climate Justice? (8:09)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y3s58Ang5qI

• Every year, the average American causes 16 tonnes of carbon dioxide emissions, almost 50 times as much as the average Kenyan, yet Kenyans are experiencing climate change much more than Americans.
• Since 1970, the majority of the 2 million deaths from hurricanes, droughts, floods and other climate disasters have happened in developing countries, and this disparity is only going to get worse as the planet gets hotter.
• These climate disasters are now happening four to five times more often than they were 50 years ago and causing seven times as much damage.
• Global inequality has grown massively over the past 200 years.
• The world’s richest countries have mainly been responsible for climate change.
• Colonialism and the Industrial Revolution are the major forces behind the inequalities we see today, as they have led to rapid economic growth and rising living standards in Europe and its settler colonies, such as the US, Canada and Australia, yet hindered development in other parts of the world.
• These injustices overlap between nationality, race, gender and social class.
• Intersectionality is an approach that looks at how multiple forms of social identity can combine to shape a person’s experience.
• People who experience multiple forms of oppression can be especially vulnerable to the effects of climate change.
• The lack of diversity in the climate movement, especially in the Global North, which is predominantly white and middle-class, can lead to blind spots, which is why intersectionality is crucial.
• We need a climate movement that includes and incorporates voices from the frontlines of climate change so that we can start to address the many faces of oppression that they face.
• Climate justice means confronting hard truths: the world’s richest countries are not just emitting too much carbon; they are also overconsuming.
• Humanity is consuming 70% more resources than it can regenerate each year.
• Rich countries have a moral duty to drastically reduce consumption to allow enough resources for poorer countries to reach a decent standard of living, in what is known as degrowth, which means that people in rich countries can continue to live well while consuming far less.