In the next 5 days tens of thousands of people around the world will be rallying for climate action from our world leaders. For those of us who work on fracking, we’re especially excited to see how folks are starting to connect the dots between extreme extraction and climate change.
In California, we’re watching folks here battle a historic drought that’s been inextricably linked to climate change. While citizens are being asked to curb their water use with shorter showers and not to water their lawn, we’re also watching fracking for oil get the green light. While this is all happening people like Governor Brown get to ride his own coattails from 20 years ago as a climate champion despite his current actions to give the go ahead to expand extraction.
We know that fracking for gas and oil only makes climate change worse. We know that we’re choosing to frack because we’ve gotten to the end of the line. Outside of just the climate impacts of fracking, we’re watching communities get sick, lose fresh water, and scramble to get answers from those they elected into power.
That’s why those of us who work to fight fracking are using the People’s Climate March as a rallying space for us to make sure our leaders hear stories from communities. We want to make sure on the day after the march, people know that climate leaders don’t frack.
There are events all week leading up to the big rally on September 21st that will give you an opportunity to hear from different folks from all around the world about how fracking has impacted them.
We’re going to be supporting our New York friends on Thursday afternoon and bird dogging the Governor of NY pushing him to keep the moratorium on fracking. More information here: https://www.facebook.com/events/734669846604843/
On Thursday September 18th, we’ll be hosting a panel at the MayDay Arts Space in Brooklyn at 7pm where impacted community members from all over the world will be sharing stories of what fracking looks like on the ground. https://www.facebook.com/events/293948137456267/
On the day before the rally, Saturday September 20th, there are multiple events that will be focused on fracking. Some of our favorites so far are a meet up of folks who’ll be marching in the Fracking Bloc!
We’ll be meeting at Tompkins Square at 3:30pm at the Gaia Tree, which is at the center of the square. The closest address is: 500 E 9th St, New York, NY 10009. For more information you can reach out to [email protected]
There’s also a great panel right after the meet up at the New School hosted by our friends at Idle No More and Frack Action at 5pm. #FRACK OFF: Indigenous Women Leading Media Campaigns to Defend our Climate https://www.facebook.com/events/1465144983761870/
If you’re getting to NYC early on Sunday- our friends at the Center for Biological Diversity are helping to host a discussion at 9:30AM on the 21st before the rally at Fordham Law School. Click here for more information
We also want to encourage you to come march with the fracking bloc at the People’s Climate March! We will be lining up between 80th to 81st St with our allies who fight Tar Sands and Mountaintop Removal. Make sure you get to the rally point early, the NYPD may need to close off certain meet up spots after 11am to make sure the march gets moving on time.
Looking forward to seeing all of you in the streets on the 21st!
-Linda
P.S. Our friends coordinating the Fracking hub put together this super handy list of all the events in NY this week. https://madmimi.com/p/fd6c45?fe=1&pact=25139966606