Ahead of World Environment Day, in its meeting of over 30 faith leaders representing Luton’s diverse faith communities, Luton Council of Faiths (LCoF), supported by GRASSROOTS Luton, reflected on the theme of “Climate Change and Racism”.
Jeremy Williams, Luton based Writer-Campaigner-Award winning Blogger https://earthbound.report/ (named Britain’s best green blog by the UK Blog Awards) shared his thoughts, which can be summarised as following.
Climate Change is big on the Agenda for this year, least because the UK will host the 26th UN Climate Change COP26 Conference in Glasgow on 1 – 12 November 2021. However, in the light of Black Lives Matter movement, Jeremy said the two big crises of racism and climate change that we face in the 21st-century are actually intimately connected.
People often wonder and question how can climate change be racist? It is about structural racism, where outcomes of climate change are different and much harder on people of colour. Jeremy said his book “Climate Change Is Racist: Race, Privilege and the Struggle for Climate Justice” tries to encapsulate these issues.
The book can be purchased at these links
https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B08YK1285V/ref=dp-kindle-redirect?_encoding=UTF8&btkr=1
In his presentation, Jeremy shared colour-coded images of the world map showing how the world’s richest countries of white populations have the highest carbon footprints and the poorest countries of black populations have the least carbon footprints. This is a major social justice issue he said. People most responsible for the climate change are going to be least affected and the people who have contributed the least to the climate change are facing the greatest risks.
Climate change has been disproportionately caused by the white people and it will be disproportionately suffered by people of colour and the places that will suffer most will be in Africa and also in Caribbean where people are confronting the risks of the rising sea levels and in the Equatorial regions, because if you live around the equator then global warming is naturally going to be much more dangerous especially if you live in a hot country. If you live in a temperate country, where we are or in other Scandinavian countries, the rising levels of heat may not be bad in the same way but if you live where it is already very hot like in North Africa and the Middle East or in South Asia, the rising temperatures can be harmful.
Therefore, it is crucial that we see climate justice issue also as a racial justice issue.
The continent of Africa is going to suffer the most as a result of the climate change and it is the same continent that Jeremy said my ancestors exploited throughout the age of slavery, imperialism and colonialism and now through climate change.
Jeremy said I want to take up responsibility and ownership of such difficult history and raise awareness that why it is always people like me who end up on the top and it is always people like the ones I grew up with in the countries of Madagascar and Kenya end up at the bottom.
Jeremy’s book can be found on these links
https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B08YK1285V/ref=dp-kindle-redirect?_encoding=UTF8&btkr=1
GRASSROOTS Luton has committed to work alongside Luton Council of Faiths to continue promoting compostable cutlery amongst Luton’s different faith communities. Considering Luton’s 78% population is religiously affiliated, there are numerous faith events held in a year, which can substantially reduce our plastic waste. As such the UK sends much of its plastic waste to poorer nations where it is often burnt, which reinforces how climate justice issue is also as a racial justice issue. It is about structural racism, where outcomes of climate change are different and much harder and are at times by choice directed towards poorer countries
https://www.greenpeace.org.uk/news/plastic-recycling-export-incineration/
The book can be purchased at this link.
https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B08YK1285V/ref=dp-kindle-redirect?_encoding=UTF8&btkr=1