Fossil Fuels, War & Climate Justice

I want to pick up on your last observation with the differences of understanding with our colleagues in the Global North versus people in the Global South.

Just worth always reminding people that 88% of the world's population lives in the Global South.

And on this, I understand that Claude, ChatGPT, and DeepSeek all agree.

So hopefully it is right, 88%.

Maybe it's increased a little bit as a result of Donald Trump's deportations outside of the United States.

And what do you still think is missing from the way climate conversations happen in the global north? And then if you can also link that to what changes...

When we understand that climate change is not simply an environmental crisis, but a crisis experienced through different systems of inequality.

I would say that's exactly the thing that's missing in the conversations in the North and in some conversations in the South, right? So there's both of that where...

Climate change seems to be in some spaces talked about still just as an environmental issue, almost as if the wars, the militarization, the conflict across the world will not impact that.

But how are you meant to, as a country, negotiate towards a common goal of a just transition, which meant is meant to be a cooperative global goal when you're bombing each other and or being bombed really more by just one country in the middle of that and so we cannot divorce the environmental issue and the environmental problem from what's happening in this world because it is those very same powers that's causing the climate crisis and then we forget that when we forget that aspect of power inequality and injustices we start to come up with solutions that are band-aid solutions.

And that does not mean that they don't help.

When you do have a wound, sometimes you need a band-aid.

Sometimes you need a gauze.

But if the person who's shooting at you is still shooting at you, any kind of gauze and band-aid that you put will not do anything.

Well put.

I want to really pick up on the moment that we're in, right? And raise with you this challenge that we've had.

And I want to suggest to you that the climate movement, insofar it is a movement, has made a terrible error.

by going after the root cause of climate change, which is 86% of the cause is fossil fuels.

So the climate movement jumped on it and said, fossil fuel's bad because it contributes to climate change, which is absolutely true, biggest cause, 86% and so on.

But actually, I want to suggest to you that what we should have said fossil fuels bad because it's the biggest contributor historically and presently to war conflict murder destruction of livelihoods and so on fossil fuels is bad because every year seven million people die from respiratory illnesses as a result of uh emissions third Women's rights have been violated by fossil fuels practice.

Fourth, indigenous peoples have had their lands taken from them, dams built and so on.

And so for indigenous peoples, it's also bad.

But most importantly, you could say fossil fuels is bad because it undermines democracy because we see big corporate interests, including fossil fuels interests, buying off elections left, right, and center all over the world from Britain to the United States.

And these are countries that pretend that they are exporters of democracy when in fact their own democracies are suffering under terrible burden at the moment.

So fossil fuels still largely we go after it primarily as a climate issue.