The mythological figure Icarus flew with wings of feathers and wax crafted by his father Daedalus, but when he got too close to the sun his wings melted and he plunged to his death in the sea.
The ancient Greeks had a myth for everything.
2/n
Breugel's painting "Landscape with the Fall of Icarus" is also relevant. Note the man plowing in the foreground, totally oblivious to the fallen man in the lower righthand corner, whose legs are still visible above the waves. This is an allegory for business as usual.
2.5/n
More business as usual: the trade ship with its sails billowing out towards sea, totally ignoring and speeding away from the drowning man who they could easily save if they suspended their goal of profit-making and colonial exploration even just for a moment.
2.75/n
See also the man in the lower right-hand corner, doing his futile best to save Icarus by holding out a stick for the tragic man to grab.
Unbeknownst to him, he is shadowed by a vulture—a symbol for death, to be sure.
2.9/n
Bruegel wants us to ignore this man, the activist trying to save the man of hubris who thought he could fly. He wants us to ignore Icarus too.
The central figure, the allegory for the economy, is dressed in a vivid red, which grabs all the viewers attention.
2.99/n
We must fight every day to keep our & other people's attention on the #ClimateEmergency, vultures circling or not.
And one way to do that is to talk about the reasons you've given up flying as much as possible.
I'm excited to announce that I've restarted the @EndClimtSilence newsletter with a post on the main climate-communications opportunity I see in this difficult political moment: associating Trump's deep unpopularity with his support for coal, oil, and gas development.
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When we have focused on fossil fuels—in the Beyond Coal campaign, via divestment, in pipeline fights, or under #KeepItInTheGround—coal, oil, & gas have been called polluting, toxic, the greatest source of emissions, and profoundly unjust.
And they are all of those things!
2/n
But at the same time, fossil fuels have tended to retain their *cultural* associations with many things Americans like: industry, manufacturing, prosperity, modernity.
3/n
China's State Counsel has announced that provinces will be graded on their efforts to peak emissions before 2030.
"Authorities ranked as making unsatisfactory progress ... could be subject to disciplinary processes if issues aren’t rectified." 💥
🧵
In The Language of Climate Politics, I wrote about how this accountability was enacted in the 2021 "1+N Documents," China's whole-of government, whole-of-society policy to achieve net-zero emissions by 2060.
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This is the implementation of this provision in real time.
2/n
As happy as I am by that China (or any nation) might actually create a net-zero economy in time to halt warming at a relatively survivable level, I am also worried that the authoritarian country who controls key global supply chains seems likely to get there first.
3/n
@NoemaMag What is China's climate policy? Called the “1+N” framework, it's an all-of-government, all-of-society blueprint for the country’s decarbonization. Its foundational documents were enacted in 2021.
3/n
🚨Do NOT talk about solar geoengineering as a climate "solution."🚨
1/n
As people start to panic—and as others advance the next phase of the fossil-fuel agenda—we're now seeing a lot of talk about the need to research solar geoengineering (SG).
Fine. I actually agree that SG should be researched systematically.
2/n
But what that research needs to establish is precisely whether solar geoengineering is or is not a solution: if and how much it cools the planet and whether its dangers (or "trade-offs," if you're disingenuous) will allow for deployment or not.