Hi all,
It’s been a while. I have spent the summer doing what looked like nothing much but was in fact recovering from the Holyrood election campaign and from lockdown shutdown before that. I no longer need a stick to walk to the shops, Yay! Campaign season has begun again, yay! Just in time for it to start raining. Yay?
In Politics
The run for the Council elections has begun - I’m standing in the Southside Central ward, comprising Govanhill and Gorbals. One of these is becoming an enthusiastic Greens area, the other is … I’m not sure what, but we know that it isn’t Green. I’m guessing a mix of all the conservative parties, Tory, Labour and SNP.
I’m knocking doors and talking to people to ask how they think they might vote. I’m finding myself well received, and there’s a growing sentiment that voting Green isn’t a waste of time.
At the Circus
COP26 was definitely a thing this month. I had a gig in the fringe, a campaign workshop for the Feminist Economic Network. We looked at:
The most recent Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report and its results
Dig in to where the causes of climate change are coming from
Discussing what can be done about those causes…
A) politically
B) socially, and
C) individually
… and coming away with an action plan for the attendees.
We’re not going to change the world. A dozen people came. But it was a fun project, well received. I’m going to be on the FEN podcast next, talking about it. It’s worth talking about. There were marches and rallies and art happenings at COP and a whole bunch of politicians and diplomats doing politics and not doing diplomacy and achieving big wins … for the coal and oil companies.
Here’s the thing, scientists don’t do headlines. Before they will say anything for definite they have to make sure you know all the background and working first. Anyone who ever did a science - or any academic - degree will know this but it is not a style that suits fast news or anyone who thinks they’re too busy for anything but the bottom line. Or who demands that they should be briefed on no more than one side of A4 (Reagan), or via Fox News (Trump), or not at all (BoZo).
The IPCC reporting cycle happens every few years; this is the sixth. The fifth round was completed in 2014 and is available to read. The latest release is the first one of this cycle, the “Physical Basis” paper, i.e. the workings and how they reached their conclusions, the maths behind them and the confidence level they have in them. The other two main papers are the “Impacts” paper, i.e. what will happen, and the “Mitigation” paper, proposals to prevent it. Then there will be a “Synthesis” paper - about 200 pages of bottom line.
Happily, the IPCC prints press releases for the ‘bottom line’ folks and the journos who won’t read the actual briefs. The latest one says,
“Unless there are immediate, rapid and large-scale reductions in greenhouse gas emissions, limiting warming to close to 1.5°C or even 2°C will be beyond reach.”
They’ve ceased even considering the possibility of zero warming. We’re already past that. The more I consider this sentence, and what it takes for a scientific panel to even come out with it, the more terrifying I find it.
The report describes:
Increasing heat waves, longer warm seasons, shorter cold seasons - which we see already
Critical thresholds for agriculture and health - i.e. widening desertification, famine, and killing temperatures
More rainfall and flooding
Changing rainfall patterns; droughts and monsoons
Sea-level rising and 100-year floods happening every year - the Thames flood barrier is already operating far beyond its design capacity and frequency
Thawing permafrost, loss of snow, glaciers, and Arctic and Antarctic ice - not only more flooding but changes in storm cycles and increased severity of hurricanes and tropical storms
Ocean acidification and reduced oxygen levels - killing fish and marine life
“The role of human influence on the climate system is undisputed,” says the press release, which I believe is the first time the IPCC has made such a blunt statement, and which is almost unprecedented for a scientific body. However, since the changing climate is due to human actions, it can be remedied by human actions. “CO2 is the main driver of climate change,” and “Stabilizing the climate will require strong, rapid, and sustained reductions in greenhouse gas emissions, and reaching net zero CO2 emissions.”
So there you have it. Answers on a postcard for how we achieve those “strong, rapid and sustained reductions”?
In other stuff
I remain broke and unemployed but I’m getting really good at painting models. I had an interview with an energy charity who proposed sending me into people’s houses to tell them how to reduce their bills because they’re in fuel poverty. I have all kinds of sympathy for the project, but the BBC is busy telling everyone who’ll listen that I’m a sexual predator. I asked the interviewers how they would guarantee my safety and could I at least vet the visits beforehand for risk.
Didn’t hear from them after that.
So I’m writing a game, that I’ll post to itch.io and try to make some money that way. The principle is that the players are a group of activists who put on actions to protest climate change and try to sway the population towards a cultural revolution, away from using fossil fuels. I’m going to include all the real-life protest tactics that I can gather, and with a bit of luck get raided for being a dissident, like in the Cyberpunk Bust (That actually happened. Seriously.)
In Conclusion
I’m busy and getting busier, angry and getting angrier. This is a useful place to set out my thinking where I don’t have to contend with people who think that a Fox news soundbite is a compelling rebuttal. I’ll be writing more about local politics, national politics, Greens stuff and things that I actually know shit about, but not all the time because I have what passes for a life too. And hopefully get back to a regular schedule.
If you’d like to help me campaign, there are Scottish Greens gearing up for Council election all across the country, and the Green Party of England and Wales have just made a definitive statement that transphobes will not be taking power there. Let me know and I’ll point you in the right directions. If you would like to help support me, then tell folk about this newsletter and consider subscribing. There will be no subscriber-only content, any money will be helping me buy cat food and bus fare. Seriously, why do unemployed folk have to pay £5 a day to get about town? The buses are half empty most of the time, it's not as if the bus companies are going to miss the income.
Cheers, more next time
Elaine