Climate Strike! Madison to the Globe

This September, millions of us will walk out of our workplaces and homes to join young climate strikers on the streets and demand an end to the age of fossil fuels.  [Veterans for Peace-Madison has endorsed the Climate Strike. ]

A walkout and actions at the state Capitol and at Madison Gas and Electric will take place on September 20.

Our house is on fire — let’s act like it. We demand climate justice for everyone.

“Madison strikers are demanding that Governor Evers, our county, and our city government declare a climate emergency. Our private sector demands to MG&E are that it divest and transition completely to 100% renewable energy by 2030 by closing the Columbia & Elm Road Coal Plants still in use.”

Wisconsin Youth Climate Action Team
Questions: general@ycatwi.org  |  or  |   GlobalClimateStrikeMadison@gmail.com

Schedule for Friday. 8/20:

  • 12:00 PM – 1:00 PM
    Concert for Climate (State Capitol Steps – State St.)
  • 1:00 PM – 3:00 PM
    MG&E Rally – Railroad Street (Teach-ins, Action Booths, Food Trucks, & more activities!)
  • 3:00 PM – 3:10 PM
    March to Capitol
  • 3:15 PM – 4:15 PM
    Rally – Capitol Steps, State Street (Speakers, Chalking, Action Booths, & more!)
  • 4:15 PM – 6:00 PM
    Rally – Rotunda (Free Pizza, Petition/Letter delivery, & more!)

Strike Planning Meeting  September 5 from  7 PM – 9 PM, Wisconsin Network for Peace, Justice & Sustainability office at 30 W Mifflin #702, Madison

Banner drops Sep 5, 6, 12, 13, 19

Extinction Rebellion Presentation

Sunday, September 8 from 12:30 – 2 PMpin
First Unitarian Society of Madison @ 900 University Bay Dr, Madison

Climate Strike-Madison Facebook Event

Global Strike Website

“Our house is on fire. The climate crisis is an emergency but we’re not acting like it. People everywhere are at risk if we let oil, coal and gas companies continue to pour more fuel on the fire.

Our hotter planet is already hurting millions of people. If we don’t act now to transition fairly and swiftly away from fossil fuels to 100% renewable energy access for all, the injustice of the climate crisis will only get worse.

We need to act right now to stop burning fossil fuels and ensure a rapid energy revolution with equity, reparations and climate justice at its heart.

But it’s going to take all of us working together to succeed. Join the Climate Strikes starting on September 20 – three days out from the UN’s climate emergency summit and continuing on September 27.

Millions of us will walk out from home, work, school or university to declare a climate emergency and show our politicians what action in line with climate science and justice means.
The climate crisis won’t wait, so neither will we.”

Labor Day – Support for the Climate Strike

Unions Around the World Showing Support for the

Youth-Led “Climate Strike” Calls

When Swedish middle-schooler and climate activist Greta Thunberg decided one year
ago—on August 20, 2018—to skip school and instead stand outside the Swedish
Parliament with a sign reading simply, “School Strike for Climate,” few could have
imagined that her action would help catalyze a dramatic expansion and intensification of
global climate actions led by young people, and a new wave of mobilizations under
banners like “Fridays for Future,” “Youth for Climate” and “Youth Strike 4 Climate.”
Her action caught imaginations around the world, much in the way that US Congress
member Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’ championing of the “Green New Deal” led to a new
burst of interest in that idea. Students have now issued a call for a “Global Climate
Strike.”

Unions are responding to the call for a “Global Youth Climate Strike” on Friday,
September 20th, and for a “General Climate Change Strike” the following Friday,
September 27th. The two Fridays fall on either side of the “UN Climate Action
Summit,” to be convened by UN Gen. Sec. António Guterres on Monday, Sept. 23rd.

One example of a U.S. union in support is the Massachusetts Teachers Union’s call for a
strike for a national teachers strike in support of the Green New Deal.

The submitters’ rationale noted that, “Maybe, when our grandchildren ask us how the
Green New Deal was won, we can say it started with students—and then with us. That
when the teachers went out on strike in 2019, others followed. First the nurses, then the
hotel workers. Next came the TV writers, the teamsters, and the flight attendants. A
general strike shut down the whole country until Congress passed a Green New Deal
that the president signed into law. Millions of Americans soon started at the kinds of
green jobs-with-justice that reshaped this country and saved the planet. We faced the
crisis, wrestled emissions to net-zero, and put out the fire…There are more of us than
there are of them. If only we’d remember that. If only we’d act like it.”

Many international unions are supporting the climate strike actions, including major
unions in Australia, Germany, Italy, New Zealand and the United Kingdom.

Sources:

  • Trade Unions for Energy Democracy
  • Labor Network for Sustainability
  • U.S. Labor against the War

 

Madison Teachers are fighting for a Cost-of-Living Wage Increase .

We stand in solidarity with all workers.

Madison Teachers

No Nukes in Madison ~ Physicians for Social Responsibility (PSR)

Back from the Brink Background

Back from the Brink Page – Physicians for Social Responsibility (PSR) Wisconsin

Physicians for Social Responsibility (PSR) Wisconsin is launching a campaign calling on Madison to support a “Back from the Brink” resolution.

The resolution endorses the 2017 United Nations ban of nuclear weapons, calls for specific steps to prevent nuclear war, and a commitment to nuclear weapons-free contracts and investments.

Support Back from the Brink  

 

In 1983, the Madison City Council passed an ordinance declaring the city a “nuclear free zone”. We are asking our City Council members (Alders) to pass a Back from the Brink Resolution which builds on this ordinance and commits the city to nuclear weapons free contracts and investments. Our City already has a socially responsible investment policy in place; it no longer invests in fossil fuel companies. We are asking the City do the same regarding nuclear weapons production.

Some say nuclear disarmament is an issue that should be taken up with our Senators and Representatives rather than our City Council members. But national policy has local consequences.

Plans are underway to expand the Truax Air Force base in Madison and bring in F-35 fighter jets designed to carry B61 nuclear bombs. If nuclear capable F-35’s were stationed here, Truax would become a nuclear target.

In the event of a nuclear-armed F-35 crash, Madison could be exposed to air, ground and water contamination with plutonium, even if a nuclear chain reaction did not take place.

No F-35’s – Safe Skies Clean Water Wisconsin

Back from the Brink: The Call to Prevent Nuclear War is a national grassroots initiative seeking to fundamentally change U.S. nuclear weapons policy and lead us away from the dangerous path we are on. The Call lays out five common-sense steps that the United States should take to reform its nuclear policy. We are asking individuals and organizations around the country to endorse The Call and build support for the U.S. government to adopt it as its highest national security priority. Join the effort and help build a safer world for our children to inherit.

 

The Gaza Freedom Flotilla comes to Madison July 24-25

Since 2008, the Freedom Flotilla movement has sent 35 ships attempting to break Israel’s illegal, US-backed military blockade that has devastated Gaza and denied 2 million people –half of them children — access to food, clean water, fuel, medicine, employment and basic human dignity for 13 years.

The Freedom Flotilla Coalition is composed of civil society organizations and initiatives from many countries. We have been challenging the illegal and inhumane Israeli blockade of Gaza for many years and are committed to continuing the struggle until the blockade is unconditionally lifted and Palestinian people everywhere realize their full rights.

On Wednesday and Thursday July 24 and 25th, the Madison-Rafah Sister City Project (MRSCP) welcomes the Gaza Freedom Flotilla’s North American Boat to Gaza campaign to Madison with two days of activities.

On Wednesday evening, a pontoon will give visibility to the crisis in Gaza on Lake Mendota offshore from the Union Terrace and The Edgewater. We will also be leafleting the crowd on shore.

 

Anyone interested in helping with these efforts in Madison, please email rafahsistercity@yahoo.com

 

On Thursday, former flotilla participants Kathy Kelly (Voices for Creative Non-Violence) and Kit Kittredge (NA Boat to Gaza Campaign) will talk about Gaza, the importance of the flotilla and plans for the next international sailing in 2020 at 7 pm at James Reeb Unitarian Congregation, 2146 E. Johnson Street, Madison.

This free event will feature a display of Gaza children’s artwork as well as refreshments & dessert including baklawa; donations to benefit the Flotilla and another Maia Project clean water system for kids in Rafah will be appreciated.

For more information, contact MRSCP at rafahsistercity@yahoo.com ,The Madison-Rafah Sister City Project, or check out the face book event, The Gaza Freedom Flotilla Comes to Madison!.

Welcomed by WORT RADIO. (Kit Kittredge and Kathy Kelly, fresh from the Freedom Flotilla’s activities in Chicago, will be interviewed live on WORT’s A Public Affair by host Allen Ruff from noon-1 pm on Thursday 7-25.

Kathy Kelly will also be a guest on The Morning Buzz with Jan Miyasaki between 8 and 8:30 am on Wednesday 7-24 … tune in at 89.9 fm or listen live on line.)

Note: If you can’t attend but would like to support either the Flotilla or the Maia Project, you can donate as follows:

Flotilla: Online donations here.
Or send a check payable to Nonviolence International with “US Boat to Gaza” in the memo line to:
Nonviolence International (for Ship to Gaza 2020)
4000 Albermarle Street, NW, Suite 401
Washington D.C. 20016.

Maia Project: Online donations here.
Or save the online fee and send a check payable to MRSCP marked “water” to:
MRSCP
P.O. Box 5214
Madison, WI 53705