Apologies for the less-than-punctual blog posts, but I do hope you’ll believe me when I say that things have been a bit crazy over here in the COP 15 Bella Center bubble. I haven’t been outside of the center for more than 3 hours a day since the conference began on Monday and am beginning to understand in more depth what people mean by ‘fried’ when referring to a mental state. Politics are endless, exhausting, circular, absurd – especially on this level.
The past 5 days have been packed with all sorts of action. The topic of conversation within the US youth recently has been the statement made by Lord Monckton of the UK at an Americans for Prosperity meeting which we crashed a couple days ago (video here) calling us 'crazed Hitler youth' - this has been projected everywhere from the UK Guardian to Now Magazine in Canada and the YouTube video has 18,000 views. I'm kind of proud that something that I filmed has been viewed so many times (even though I really am not a fan of the edit, which I didn't do). Although ideally the youth climate movement would get this kind of attention for the action that we're taking towards it's great if we can put a face to the climate-denier movement. I'm really interested to see how things pan out over the next few days.
One thing that I’ve found really challenging since I’ve been here is trying to grasp the scale of the process that I’ve found myself somewhat in the middle (but really watching from the edges) of. The realization that around 200 people are supposedly representing the views and desires of 6.6 billion is absolutely absurd, not to mention the fact that in reality about 20 of those 200 are really pulling the strings in the game. This frightens me, and to be frank, it's just plain fucked up.
One thing I love about this blog is that I can be entirely (sometimes probably too much so...) honest. That's what I've done in the past and that's what I will continue to do. That being said, I have to say that being here in Copenhagen and understanding more about the weight of the decisions being made here is really freaking me out. I will likely never be able to grasp the process of international politics in it's entirely (and am beginning to think that everyone who says they understand it is just a really good bullshitter), but what I do feel like I understand is that this issue ('climate change' or however you want to call it), it's causes, effects and implications essentially encompass every issue that we face and every issue that we will deal with for the next century. Now I hate being told what to care about or what kind of action I should take on a particular issue, but to be honest this is one thing that I want every single person in the entire world to be thinking about. This is not an issue of climate change. This is not about green jobs, aggressive mitigation, saving climate refugees, ensuring food security or even saving the environment. How can I say what I feel in so many words? I likely never will be able to. But I guess what I'm realizing is that this 'movement' (I hate that term...) is not about one thing, or even 5 things - it is about the system that we exist in, the system that created us and the system that we depend upon intrinsically. I don't know. This is just what has been on my mind as of late, and at the moment I feel so fried and ready to give all this critical thinking a rest that I might just leave it at that. All I know is that we have created a system in which a two week period of time and a gathering of 200 people is going to decide much of the future of the world, and that is just plain bass ackwards. This world is so much more beautifully complicated than we give it credit for.
I cannot imagine what will happen over the next week. Oh lawdy. This world is so strange. I promise to blog more this coming week, as I really want you all to know what's going on inside this absurd bubble I've found myself in. How on earth did I get here?
Also, if you have something you think the US should be doing regarding climate change, please tell me. The youth have an amazing line into the Obama administration at this point and it seems as though they are actually listening to us (I wish I had made time to tell you all about the fucking awesome presence we have had in every single State Department debriefing and the meetings we've been having with Jonathan Pershing and Todd Stern...holy lord...) and I want to know what you guys think. Just saying.
Looking forward to enjoying the tail-end of the holidays with you all. Nothing like coming home.
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