In pragmatic terms, our challenge is less to save the earth from ourselves and more to save ourselves from an earth that, if pushed too far, has ample power to rock, burn, and shake us off completely.
Naomi KleinEver since Steve Bannon was demoted, and drama started playing out between Bannon and Jared Kushner and the firing of Comey and "Is he going to get impeached?" we have been trapped in a classic Survivor reality TV show, like, "Who's going to get voted off the island?" And this has every single news show enjoying ratings never seen before. And it physically pains them to talk about the stakes of this administration, whether it's health care or climate change or the deregulation of the financial sector or social security. None of it can compete with this reality show.
Naomi KleinIt is our great collective misfortune that the scientific community made its decisive diagnosis of the climate threat at the precise moment when an elite minority was enjoying more unfettered political, cultural, and intellectual power than at any point since the 1920s.
Naomi KleinAnd if there is one thing we can be sure of, itโs that extreme weather events like Superstorm Sandy, Typhoon Haiyan in the Philippines, and the British floodsโdisasters that, combined, pummeled coastlines beyond recognition, ravaged millions of homes, and killed many thousandsโare going to keep coming.
Naomi KleinI think there is a danger that an environmental crisis can be used in precisely the same way as the terrorist threat can be used in terms of giving up freedom.
Naomi KleinThing that we wanted to do was redefine what a green job was, what a climate job was. We said: "Wait a minute. There's all these people out there who are doing low-carbon work." It's not just guys in hard hats putting up solar panels. Teaching is low carbon. Caring for the sick is low carbon. Daycare is a green workplace. Overwhelmingly, this is work that is done by women, overwhelmingly women of color, on the frontlines of austerity clawbacks.
Naomi Klein