Sneakers on pavement under a burning sun, people crowded on the streets of New York City. Surrounded by tall, metal skyscrapers with glass windows mirroring the heat, just a large sign in hand to block the rays. Thousands packed together, making the air stifling. But they stood, hydrated, ready to march forward. No matter what, this crowd would not back down.
Did you know there was a march to end fossil fuels recently?
On Sunday, September 17th, I stood and marched with people from all walks of life. Folks from all over the United States and from out of the country, on these few blocks in New York City.
Honestly, I didn’t know what to expect. I was both nervous and excited. Farther from home and on a much bigger scale, it was the first time I’d ever gone to a march of this magnitude.
The whole event was loud and impressive. But there was one particular moment that stood out for me when I was helping hold up a banner. It was a moment we all had to stop and wait. I stood in the middle of a large crosswalk, between the crowds. Perhaps it was just my being tired due to lack of sleep, but for this long moment it seemed like around me went silent except for an exchange of words, stated loud and clear in unison, between a person with a microphone and all of us in the crowd of determined humans:
“What do we want?”
“Climate Justice!”
“When do we want it?”
“Now!”
“And if we don’t get it?”
“Shut. It. Down.”
These powerful and intense words echoed across the city that day. After hours of walking and standing to complete a march of less than a mile and a half, people were tired, some were likely dehydrated or aching. But the words continued to be shouted, sung, and chanted.
You could feel the power of those words, vibrating through the feet and up into the chest. The emotions were felt: exhaustion, anger, determination, hope. All with the knowing that, here we all are and we are many.
But before I go further, let me fill you in on some context and background on what exactly had been going on.
We are now a couple of weeks after climate week, which perfectly coincided with the United Nations General Assembly meeting in NYC and their UN Climate Ambition Summit. Given the timing of these events, at least 175 organizers from across the nation took this rare opportunity to send a message to President Biden:
End fossil fuels and declare a climate emergency.
Now just to be clear, I won’t be going into the full details of climate change, the fossil fuel related demands, and what declaring a climate emergency entails in this particular post. That will be for another day and I've linked related sources down below! So let’s continue.
I had a wonderful opportunity that Sunday to join the Climate Action Rhode Island group. I was a little concerned earlier that week about hurricane Lee hitting, but that didn’t deter anyone! Hurricane, rain, or sunshine, we were going to New York. And really, it would have just driven the message home harder. Either way, I got ready at the crack of dawn, hopped on the bus at 7 am with 51 other people, and on our way we went!
Once we arrived in the city, there was a whirlwind of people.
The crowds were lining up in order, filling up the street from sidewalk to sidewalk with banners, signs, and giant props. (These are just a very few that were near me.)
I think we were towards the back of the line; I couldn’t really see where the line started or ended. They had water stations set up for people to fill up water bottles. It was unexpectedly hot, but I suppose it wasn’t too surprising.
We were told to line up to start marching before 1 pm. We all stood there, with our signs blocking the sun, sometimes taking turns to sit in a chair or plop ourselves on the pavement. Closer to 2 pm, some of us were wondering why we weren’t moving. One of the marshals outside the line told fellow protesters that the front was in fact moving, there were just so many people that the line hadn't caught up to us yet.
But of course, it eventually did. While we moved forward, I chatted with my fellow protesters. One lovely soul, a woman who has seen far more protests than I and has seen the same fight for many years now; had voiced her concerns similar to others, hoping that this march would do something. I understood. I felt the same. After all, we’re still here, after decades now with the same discussions, the same marches and protests, that had so far resulted in some minimal action (once everyone agreed there was a problem), but more empty words from world leaders than the action promised.
But to my friend I want to emphasize these words: we’re still here. While surrounded by crowds of singing and chanting people, I asked her: in those climate marches in the past, were there this many people? I imagine there are more people involved, more now than ever, in our climate action fight. More of us who are aware, are more informed, who want to protect our home and children, our lives and planet, and we want action.
Bigger and louder than ever, we are still here.
Everyday folks, politicians, students, mothers and their whole families with babies, grandmothers and grandfathers. People that were here before, and many of us that were not. People came out in droves, as peaceful as they could be despite being a rightfully angry, demanding, and fed up crowd.
And just how many people were there, you may ask?
It was predicted that maybe 10-20,000 people would show up. Those predictions were wrong.
An estimated 75,000 people protested in New York City that day.
As a matter of fact, it turned out that people were protesting around the world. It was estimated that about 600,000 people came out that day across 65 countries, demanding those in power take responsibility through action for climate justice.
That’s a lot of people.
Think about how many people went out of their way to show up that day.
Now imagine those people each knowing at least one other person with similar feelings not at a march.
And then very likely, each of those folks knows at least one other similar person that didn’t show up that day. That’s 1.8 million people, at the very least!
(Yes, that is a pipe prop made into a snake monster with two heads. And I see you world flag guy!)
And maybe you heard on the news about the protests in New York that continued through the week, with handfuls of protesters being arrested for civil disobedience (the news really likes to focus on the arrests with little details). But perhaps you did not hear the results of what happened during that week in the political offices:
A new UN Ocean Treaty was signed by 67 countries to conserve and protect the oceans and seas.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres told world leaders to end fossil fuel expansion and develop policies for adaption and to phase out fossil fuel reliance.
President Biden and other leaders were prohibited from speaking at the UN Climate Ambition Summit for their lack of climate action.
Some didn’t bother showing up. Biden didn’t sit at the table that day, saying he felt “unprecedented" pressure from the global and national level. Other major world leaders who didn't show up include China’s President Xi Jinping, France’s President Macron, and the UK’s Prime Minister Sunak.
These are just a few of the major events that happened so far, and they speak volumes. Of course, things are far from over. But this is a good start.
People have come out, people have spoken, and they’re paying attention. Our leaders are feeling the pressure. (And you would hope so. They live here, too, right?) People around the world have taken action together, unified. And it shook the ground of those in power. This gives hope. Look at the living proof of how many are in this together and what we can accomplish. If you ever need to feel like we have a shot, it's in moments like these, surrounded by people demonstrating that we care and demand change. Showing that we are smart, adaptive humans, working together to stop greed or anything else from harming us further. And if you take away anything from my post, I hope you take this:
We are stronger together, stronger than you think. Thousands of voices are hard to ignore. This is power.
Stay strong and stay well. Cheers!
Here are a few sources for the information mentioned above! Feel free to read more and get more details:
Note: There’s also a lot more resources out there! (Some repetitive, of course.) If you aren’t satisfied with the info here, feel free to message me or a quick internet search will find a lot of coverage. I wasn't planning on going hardcore on my second post but I felt this was important. I promise my next posts will be softer! Thanks for reading! :)
Photo: "Defend the Sacred. Stop funding fossil fuels"
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