Richard Mellor
One has to respect George Monbiot who has been pretty consistent in efforts to bring awareness to the catastrophic consequences of life on Earth if the capitalist system of production is not put to rest. He only goes so far, stressing that "people" build society and its laws and people can change it. He's right about that but doesn't delve in to what we replace this system with and how we do that. This is not a crime, and his warnings should not be ignored because of it. The situation is dire and we are facing, or for many of us, our children and grandchildren especially, are facing the end to life on Earth as we know it. We are not talking centuries here but decades as huge swathes of the Earth become inhabitable.
We are witnessing movements throughout the world as the victims of a brutal social system, the so-called free market, fight back. The struggles being waged against market savagery must be and are being linked to climate change as well. In the last analysis, wages and working conditions and other immediate needs as important as they are, become less so when the reality of extinction looms. We owe it to our grandchildren to heed Monbiot's warnings and take some interest and action to resolve the crisis.
I think this short statement below by Mike Lynch, the leader of the Rail, Maritime and Transit Union in the UK, one of the numerous unions engaging in strike actions against a right wing government in the UK, are a breath of fresh air from a trade union leader and an example of some immediate steps that can be taken that open the door to seriously combating climate change. His comments linking public ownership of transportation to climate change and the environment start around 6 minutes in. His opening comments more directly relating to the strike are also interesting.
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