Sustainability Sunday: Racism and the Environment
by Hannah Paul
Hi everyone!
This post might be a little longer than usual, y’all, but I think (hope) it will be worth the read. Given the current events, or…well… to be more accurate, the greater attention paid to events that have ALWAYS been current, but widely ignored or suppressed by white America, I wanted to take this week to amplify some Black voices who speak to the relationship between racism and environmental justice.
To any white folks reading this post, we have been called out on a national, and now even global scale, and it’s about dang time. It should never have taken so much frustration, sorrow, dehumanization, and death in the Black community to inspire white recognition and action. Now that we are FINALLY here, we cannot allow ourselves to get caught up in the moment only to let justice fall to the wayside as we move on with our lives – again. We must be in it for the long haul – all of us. We’ve got A LOT of (long overdue) work to do in the way of tackling widespread systemic racism and learning to be anti-racists in every aspect of our lives and our society. It can and must be done.
So, that being said, I’d like to challenge all of us, as people who claim to care about sustainability and the environment, to prove our commitment by taking the time to really listen to these and other Black voices and to be inspired to action by their words. I’ve picked out a few quotes from their work, but to really get the full message, I would encourage you all to read the full articles. The truth is, there can be no climate/environmental/sustainability movement without addressing racism and environmental justice. This is an issue that even many major environmental organizations (often white-dominated as well) have often ignored or failed to address, but, considering it is centered around basic human rights, it is one of most, if not the most, important issues we must address as we move forward.
I should also note that Black people only make up one (albeit very significant) portion of the BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, and People of Color) community, and we cannot ignore the voices of rest in this process either. However, in this post I am choosing to highlight Black voices. Also, as a white woman, I am always learning, and my privilege often limits my understanding, so I sincerely apologize if any part of this post is inaccurate or ignorant and therefore detrimental in any way to the Black community. I encourage anyone to call me out if you believe it is warranted and have the emotional capacity and will to do so at this time. Okay, enough from me… now for some words from:
Ayana Elizabeth Johnson Ph.D., Founder and CEO of Ocean Collectiv
Dr. Ayana Elizabeth Johnson, Ph.D. (from ayanaelizabeth.com)
From her Washington Post article: I am a black climate expert. Racism derails our efforts to save the planet.
“As a marine biologist and policy nerd, building community around climate solutions is my life’s work. But I’m also a black person in the United States of America. I work on one existential crisis, but these days I can’t concentrate because of another.”
“How can we expect black Americans to focus on climate when we are so at risk on our streets, in our communities, and even within our own homes?”
“Black people are significantly more concerned about climate change than white people (57 percent vs. 49 percent), and Latinx people are even more concerned (70 percent).” To put that in perspective, it means that more than 23 million black Americans already care deeply about the environment and could make a huge contribution to the massive amount of climate work that needs doing.
“People of color disproportionately bear climate impacts, from storms to heat waves to pollution.”
“Look, I would love to ignore racism and focus all my attention on climate. But I can’t. Because I am human. And I’m black. And ignoring racism won’t make it go away.”
“So, to white people who care about maintaining a habitable planet, I need you to become actively anti-racist. I need you to understand that our racial inequality crisis is intertwined with our climate crisis. If we don’t work on both, we will succeed at neither. I need you to step up. Please. Because I am exhausted.”
Dr. Robert Bullard, Father of Environmental Justice
Dr. Robert Bullard, Ph.D. (from drrobertbullard.com)
From his website: drrobertbullard.com/
“Today, zip code is still the most potent predictor of an individual’s health and well-being. Individuals who physically live on the “wrong side of the tracks” are subjected to elevated environmental health threats and more than their fair share of preventable diseases. Still, too many people and communities have the “wrong complexion for protection.” Reducing environmental, health, economic and racial disparities is a major priority of the Environmental Justice Movement.”
And from his article: African Americans on the Frontline Fighting for Environmental Justice
“Researchers have found environmental injustice maps closely with Jim Crow housing segregation, bias decision making, and discriminatory zoning and land use practices. America is segregated and so is pollution. The equity lens is a useful frame for understanding the intersectionality of environmental, climate, economic and racial justice issues in the United States.”
“Polluting industries such as toxic waste facilities, high-risk chemical plants, oil refineries, and coal fired power plants have turned many African American and poor communities into environmental “sacrifice zones.” The nation has 150 refineries located in 32 states. People of color make up over half of the residents who are at greatest cancer risk from oil refinery pollution.”
Hop Hopkins, Director of Strategic Partnerships at the Sierra Club
Hop Hopkins (from sierraclub.org)
From his Sierra Club article: Racism is Killing the Planet
“It’s no exaggeration to say that racism and white supremacy harm all of us, because in addition to robbing us of our humanity, racism is also killing the planet we all share.”
“An idea—a long-overdue realization—is growing in the environmental movement. It goes something like this: ‘We’ll never stop climate change without ending white supremacy.’”
“You can’t have climate change without sacrifice zones, and you can’t have sacrifice zones without disposable people, and you can't have disposable people without racism.”
“When we pollute the hell out of a place, that’s a way of saying that the place—and the people and all the other life that calls that place home—are of no value.”
“Devaluing Black and Indigenous people’s lives to build wealth for white communities isn’t new. White settlers began that project in the 15th century, when they arrived in North America.
“How does this all connect to today’s environmental crises? It’s all part of the same story of dehumanization. The pollution-spewing global mega-corporations that created Cancer Alley are just the latest evolution of the extractive white-settler mindset that cleared the forests and plowed the prairies. And just as the settlers had to believe and tell stories to dehumanize the people they killed, plundered, and terrorized, today’s systems of extraction can only work by dehumanizing people.”
“By dividing us up into racial categories and economic classes, the one-percenters keep us from seeing that 99 percent of us share the same problems.”
“You can choose—we as a society can choose—to live a different way. Indeed, we must. If our society valued all people’s lives equally, there wouldn’t be any sacrifice zones to put the pollution in. If every place was sacred, there wouldn’t be a Cancer Alley. We would find other ways to advance science and create shared wealth without poisoning anyone. We would find a way to share equally both the benefits and the burdens of prosperity.”
Sam Grant, Executive Director of MN350.org
Sam Grant (from MN350.org)
From the New York Times article: Black Environmentalists Talk About Climate and Anti-Racism
“A few days [after Sam Grant called for the prosecution of the officers involved in George Floyd’s death], leaders of national and international groups issued their own statements of solidarity, including the heads of Greenpeace and the Natural Resources Defense Council, followed by the World Wildlife Fund and the World Resources Institute.”
“Mr. Grant called it ‘a positive signal to build on’ but he said he wasn’t convinced that the solidarity would be sustained. ‘It’s not been the norm that mainstream environmental organizations have ever had our backs,’ he said.”
“Police violence is an aspect of a broader pattern of structural violence, which the climate crisis is a manifestation of,” he said. “Healing structural violence is actually in the best interest of all human beings.”
Heather McGhee, Senior Fellow at Demos
Heather McGhee (from demos.org)
From the New York Times article: Black Environmentalists Talk About Climate and Anti-Racism
“It’s essential to have anti-racism baked into the goals that even white-led organizations are pursuing because both political racism and environmental racism are drivers of our excess pollution and climate denialism,”
“An anti-racist climate movement, Ms. McGhee said, should be led by ‘a real multiracial coalition that endorses environmental justice principles’ and its goals should seek to uplift the most vulnerable. That means, she said, the creation of green jobs, rather than cap-and-trade policies that allow companies to keep polluting in communities of color as they have been able to do for decades.”
“This conversation is a police brutality conversation on top of a COVID-19 conversation, and it all adds up to a devaluation of black life,” Ms. McGhee said. “That’s what climate change is as well, because of environmental racism. We’ve got to divest from systems that are killing us and costing us, and invest in our people and our planet.”
These are only a handful of the many voices out there, but I hope they offer a good starting point. And, as you keep learning, here are some more resources to learn about environmental justice:
Intersectional Environmentalism: Why Environmental Justice is Essential for a Sustainable Future
Read Talia Buford's work on environmental justice in ProPublica
Look up “racism and environmental justice” on YouTube - lots of great videos there!
Follow @wastefreemarie, @intersectionalenvironmentalist, and @greengirlleah on Instagram - and keep searching for others because I know these aren’t the only awesome accounts to follow, but they’re a good place to start.