Using Humor to Fight for Climate Mitigation

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Brian Lehrer: Brian Lehrer on WNYC. Now we turn to our climate story of the week, which we do every Tuesday on the show. We've talked a lot on this program about New York State's recent landmark climate law. New York State's Climate Act requires New York to reduce economy-wide greenhouse gas emissions 40% by 2030, and no less than 85% by 2050. That's compared to 1990 levels. Proponents of the law have touted it as among the most ambitious climate laws in the nation.

A new media campaign is aiming to shed light on the law, and more importantly, people who are aiming to thwart it from progressing. This campaign is called Shut the Fossils Up, and yes, that acronym is intentional, STFU. Its organizers are using humor to call out actions that could derail the climate law.

Joining us now are two members of this media campaign, two of the organizers. They are Marc Weiss, co-founder and steering committee member of NY Renews. That's a statewide multi-sector coalition of almost 400 groups working to transition New York State to a fossil-free economy. And Rahwa Ghirmatzion, former executive director of PUSH Buffalo, which is an organization that provides low-cost sustainable housing in the Buffalo area, and currently senior policy fellow at Just Solutions Collective, which identifies and promotes just solutions to climate change from a BIPOC perspective. Marc, welcome back. Rahwa, welcome to WNYC.

Marc: Thanks, Brian. Great to be here.

Rahwa: Thank you for having us.

Brian Lehrer: Let me start with a clip. This video on YouTube is called Booby, and in it, a concerned Southern-sounding mom gets recorded leaving a message on one of those doorbells that records video and audio. Remember, listeners, that the point here is that my guests are using humor to make points about organizations that are trying to thwart New York's progressive climate law.

The mom in this video is talking about her interaction with her small child named Booby, but there's something else on her mind too, as we will hear.

Clip 1: I said, "Booby, this makes me so angry, but we don't even live in New York." He said, "Mama, everybody knows somebody who lives in New York, or they know somebody who knows somebody who lives in New York." Booby was like, "Mama, when it comes to these multimillion-dollar corporations, what do we have, the common people, besides each other and the truth? We got to get out there and spread it."

"Booby, you cannot have a squirrel as a pet. I'm sorry. We've gone over this, honey." I just get so worked up when I think about what this gas company has done. They use their customer's phone numbers in an anti-electrification robocalling campaign meant to frighten them to the point where they call their elected officials and demand they stop climate change solutions. It's deplorable and it's all about money. Oh my God, I got to go. Booby just puked on a squirrel.

Brian Lehrer: All right. [chuckles] Rahwa, there's Booby, who is simultaneously-- or the adult in that video, simultaneously preaching the good word on climate solutions and also distracted by squirrels. What should we learn from that? Is it about the robocalling campaign?

Rahwa: Yes. I think what we are going to learn from that is that while we are all experiencing a global phenomenon, the worst impacts of climate change are happening throughout the world. New York is trying to be a leader and we passed this amazing climate law, and we want to transition off of fossil fuels as quickly as possible. Unfortunately, the fossil fuel corporations are doubling down to either stop or delay climate action.

Our goal here is that we want to expose these dirty tricks and let New Yorkers know that this is happening and to not fall for it, but also we want to have fun and be creative doing it.

Brian Lehrer: We'll play another one in a minute. You want to talk a little more about one of the issues, Marc, raised in that particular video? Once people see that and get a few laughs, what do you really want them to go away with in addition to what Rahwa just said?

Marc: Yes. Shut the Fossils Up is our effort to fuse laughter with organizing. We think laughter is an easy way in for people, and actually liberating to be able to laugh out loud. That's stuff that is really very deeply troubling. The point here is that the audio clip you just played was about this one woman, Donna DeCarolis, who's the president of a big gas utility in western New York. She's only one of dozens of people who are trying to slow down climate solutions in New York State.

We want people to know what they're doing, but we also want it to be able to push back at their efforts to influence legislation and policy in New York State. They have lots of money to spend, buckets of bucks, and they've actually announced-- Donna DeCarolis, another hat she wears, in addition to being president of National Fuel Gas, this gas utility, she's also the chair of something called The Business Council of New York, which is sort of like the Chamber of Commerce in New York. They've announced a million-dollar-plus campaign, which we think is going to be basically putting out a lot of scare stories.

Brian Lehrer: Let me jump in on that and follow up with Rahwa. Rahwa, the premise of this segment is the law in New York, the Climate Act, has already been passed. Since the law is out there, how can the business community thwart it? What is it that they would spend all this lobbying money on now that the law is already passed?

Rahwa: Well, we passed the overall law with these mandates. We also have to continue to pass other legislation that actually will help to implement and meet the requirements of those goals that you stated earlier, which is we need to be 100% electricity in-- Our economy has to be fueled by electricity by 2040. Overall, our economy has to go back at least to 85% of 1990 levels by 2050. In order to do that, we have to pass regulatory laws. We have to pass legislative laws in order for the implementation to be successful.

What National Fuel and all these other fossil fuel corporations, and now The Business Council of New York is doing, is they are using all kinds of tactics to either stop the implementation process and/or delay us meeting those mandates by those years that we've set. Additionally, what we are hoping to do is really bring attention to more New Yorkers to become more engaged. That they should call or email their legislators or attend direct actions so that we can continue to pass the law so that we can change New York's economy.

The law itself has opportunities for people that we've never experienced in New York State, where tens of thousands of new good-paying union jobs will be available. We're able to also transition current workers that are working in the fossil fuel industry to the new fossil-free economy in New York State. That's what we are trying to do. Of course, a lot of these fossil fuel industries have been around for 100-plus years, and some of them do see the writing on the wall and they are changing their business model. Unfortunately, too many of them are not.

Brian Lehrer: Let's listen to one more clip from this series of funny videos that are meant to spread public awareness about these business interests trying to thwart the implementation of New York's groundbreaking Climate Act. This is a Twitch Stream parody, you might say. The first thing listeners will hear is a gamer getting wasted or basically losing in a video game.

Clip 2: Dad, I am wasted. That is it for me on Apex Legends. My name is Todd, host and creator of the only carbon-positive Twitch Stream fossil fuel - fossil fuel [trumpet] - powered by the coal plant I built in my backyard. I love fossil fuels for lots of reasons. They look better, they smell better. Like, that is unleaded and that just smells-- It's like a-- [falling sound]

Brian Lehrer: Yes. The guy collapses because that sweet smell of unleaded gasoline [chuckles] has just caused him to faint. What point are you trying to make of that video, Marc?

Marc: Collectively, just to give an overview, we worked with what we call a creative cohort of 15 creators, and each one of them has their own distinctive style and approach. There's a collective story that these videos are telling. It's not so much the specific story of one video. We would urge people to go to our website, stfu.team, where there are links to all of our social media accounts, and YouTube you can see all 15 of the videos.

The collective story is the industry in New York, as Rahwa was saying, is doing everything it can. It's spending a lot of money and it's doing behind-the-scenes influence lobbying and so forth, but it's public facing campaign is pretty scary and it's meant to scare people into calling their legislators and say, "Stop this." We want to not just build public awareness. It's not enough to do that. We also want to try and enlist people to be part of the effort to push back at these industry efforts to undermine climate progress. All of us, we've heard this over and over again, "I get pretty depressed at the climate news that I've stopped watching a lot of it."

This is not about the bad news. This is about actually how people can get engaged and have some fun along the way but still take on this industry. Brian, you've done a lot of coverage of this. This is decades-long that the industry has been trying to stop climate action. We don't have time. We've run out of time. We've got to push back in an effective way and take away their social legitimacy, their social license, and make sure that the state legislators know what they're up to. Make it very, very visible.

Brian Lehrer: If they've got more money to spend, then the pro-climate side-- I'm presuming that's the case but, Rahwa, you can correct me if I'm wrong. Does this funny video campaign kind of culminate in a call to action, where if they're trying to scare people with their commercials and their other advertising, scare people into calling their legislators asking them to reassess the law as they call it - there's a word - reassess the climate act, that you want ordinary New Yorkers to contact their legislators and say, "Don't let them thwart this?"

Rahwa: You are absolutely right, Brian, and that is exactly what we are trying to do. This issue around climate we know is really important to young people, and we don't want them to feel like they're powerless. That they can be empowered. We are using social media because that's what this younger generation is really into, and it's a really good way to meet the 18 to 35-year-olds as well as others, of course, and that we want to show them-- It seems so simple and so easy, but really calling your elected official, sending them an email, that will go a long way.

I also want to remind the listeners that the passage of the CLCPA happened because every day New Yorkers, after superstorm Sandy, got together and we did the People's Climate March. We didn't want to lose the energy and the momentum of the People's Climate March at that time. Over 400,000 people, the largest climate march in the world. So many of us after that climate march got together and created the New York Renews coalition. These are frontline leaders all the way from Long Island to Brooklyn to Buffalo.

It was hundreds and thousands of people that gathered over several years to not only write the law, but to go in the halls of Albany and meet with their elected officials that then eventually passed the law. The most ambitious climate law in the country.

We still have a long way to go. We are not done yet. [chuckles] As we continue to do that, we need more people. The power that got us the CLCPA was the power of the people, and I think the power that's going to get us to the finish line is going to be the power of the people. That's where our resources lie. Unfortunately for the fossil fuels, yes, they have a lot more financial resources, and they're able to keep these kinds of campaigns going. I don't think that they should underestimate what people power can do. That's the message we're trying to spread.

Brian Lehrer: Rahwa Ghirmatzion and Marc Weiss, two of the people involved in a new media campaign aiming to shed light on the New York State Climate Act and the people who are aiming to thwart it from progressing with this funny video campaign on social media called Shut the Fossils Up. Thank you both.

Marc: Thank you, Brian.

Rahwa: Thank you, Brian.

 

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