CHQ: We Can Actually Do Something

Bill McKibben

Here are the rest of the Chautauqua Institution lecture series, Our Greatest Challenges (That We Can Actually Do Something About) 

Wednesday, July 24: “The Chautauqua Climate Change Initiative welcomes environmentalist and writer Bill McKibben back to the Amphitheater stage, where he’ll be joined by journalist, Professor, and Executive Director of the George Washington University Alliance for a Sustainable Future and Planet Forward creator Frank Sesno as they discuss work both men are doing to catalyze climate action across generations.”

This was the liveliest talk of the week because it involved the interaction between McKibben, who I saw 30 or more years ago, and Sesno, who I’ve read. The bad news: Sunday, July 21, 2024, was the hottest day on record; worse news: Monday, July 21, was hotter.

Frank expressed optimism because of the young people he worked with at ASF. Bill became faux grumpy with Sesno’s “the youth are the future” tone. Faux because he notes that in his 350.org group, much of the fossil fuel divestment campaign took place on college campuses.

Still, that’s why he’s involved with  Third Act, a “community of Americans over sixty determined to change the world for the better. Third Act harnesses an unparalleled generational power to safeguard our climate and democracy.”

April 22, 1970
Some older folks were involved in the original Earth Day in 1970. They vote in large numbers, tend to know people in power, and are motivated to win back the lost gains. McKibben and Sesno both have grandchildren born in 2024. They may not be as robust as their young counterparts, so they sometimes participate in Rocking Chair Rebellions. While having an arrest record as a 19-year-old could be problematic, older folks don’t care nearly as much, notes McKibben, who had been busted recently.
Bill understands why young people may be sad and cynical. Frank countered that they are angry, outraged, and motivated.
McKibben touted California’s robust renewable energy infrastructure. However, he chastised New York Governor Kathy Hochul (D-NY) for putting congestion paring in New York City on hold.
Sesno, the journalist, believes storytelling is how to sway people. He tells of a Maryland farmer about how the rains have changed long, soaking events to “deluges that wash off the topsoil, wash off the seed.” He believes that intergenerational connection creates “lived history in context.
Sesno is still a working journalist, so he eschews speaking about specific political candidates. McKibben, by contrast, would be involved with a Kamala Harris fundraiser the following day. 
Being a parent

Thursday, July 25: “American Enterprise Institute senior fellow Timothy P. Carney will deliver a lecture based on his newest book, Family Unfriendly: How Our Culture Made Raising Kids Much Harder Than It Needs to Be. He argues that the high standards set for modern American parenting are unrealistic and set parents and kids up to fail—and that it’s time to end this failed experiment.”

Carney’s premise is that the declining birth rate in the United States is a result of “civilizational sadness.” “2007 saw the greatest number of births in the U.S. history, and people were calling it a baby boom.” Then, it fell so that it is below what demographers call the replacement level, a total fertility rate of 2.1. There are fewer people under ten than over 60.

He believes this is bad for several reasons. The number of retired people over the number of working people is skewed. While Social Security can continue to make payments, “if there’s no one there to answer the phone when you call the plumber about a leaky pipe, it doesn’t do you any good.”

Another point he made is that, according to Gallup surveys, American women still want between 2 and 3 kids. The birth rate is about 1.6. “If you ask women of childbearing age how many do you want to have, they say 2.3 is the ideal. How many do you intend to have?  They say it averages to about 1.9, so already there’s a gap…  between our ideal and our intention, and then the gap between our intention… These are not just simple deficits but a deficit of the most important thing: your family is the most important thing in your life, and we have a deficit of connection, flesh, and blood. That’s the real problem.”

Sidewalks

I  agreed with quite a few of his observations. Helicopter parenting leads to an epidemic of childhood anxiety. So-called free-range parents have been investigated for neglect in the 2010s because of how far they left their young children to walk on their own. Sidewalks are good. “Walkability does matter for kids to walk to school to roam freely and, importantly, safety… The challenges of raising a family in car-dependent societies are steep. One solution is to build towns for people, not for cars.” He also touts affordable starter homes and showed mild support in favor of immigration.

Carney believes communities and churches could have mixers for young adults rather than them using dating apps; it seems quaint. Ultimately, civilizational sadness can be addressed by another baby boom because “babies are good.”  He was at Chautauqua with his wife and most or all of their six kids.

His Catholic faith meant that he opposed IVF. I’ll admit to being annoyed; both my wife and I  felt that he was blaming women for infertility problems because they waited too long. He wasn’t particularly supportive of adoption or surrogacy. 

Ending violence

Friday, July 25: Chico Tillmon, the executive director of the University of Chicago Crime Lab’s Community Violence Intervention Leadership Academy, will speak to share stories of success and lessons learned from his work with the CVI Leadership Academy and throughout his career to effect positive change at a systemic level.”

Dr. Tillmon spent a LOT of time providing bleak statistics about the number of people, especially black people, shot every day. He asked, “Where do you feel least safe?” The school was relatively safe in his Chicago neighborhood of Austin, but the walk home could be perilous.  

Moreover, he pointed out the disparate response from the country. After the Parkland High School shooting, there was so much support that it was overwhelming. Meanwhile, Chicago on the 4th of July weekend, with a like number of fatalities, and it’s business as usual. 

However, a cookie-cutter approach will not usually work. It should be targeted to that particular area, its people, and its needs. He was proud that President Biden recognized him in a Rose Garden event.

I believe he ran out of time to get to more concrete solutions.

Lydster: climate change advocate

New York State legislators have agreed to include a single-use plastic bag ban, the second state, after California, to do so.

Climate MattersMy daughter left for school on the Ides of March about 7:30 a.m.. At 7:53, she called me and said that she’d be taking part in a strike against climate change.

I had already known about the worldwide event. Students in more than 100 countries were to stay out of school to attend rallies to highlight the looming and very real danger to their futures.

I asked her about ruining her perfect attendance record at school. She said she didn’t care; this was more important. I said OK. Laissez-faire parenting, no doubt. Heck, I even brought her lunch at the state capitol, where there were about 100 students.

It’s good that kids around the world are “taking the lead on battling what they see as apathy among too many adults about climate change.” Or antipathy, it seems sometimes.

I was genuinely shocked that the US Environmental Protection Agency STILL has the statement, “The Earth’s climate is changing, and people’s activities are the main cause,” at its site. And it’s on a page geared toward children.

Subsequent to the worldwide rallies, someone asked me about the efficacy of the action. As a participant in numerous rallies for peace, civil rights, the environment and other causes, I said that a single person at a given event, maybe not much. But over time, it often inspires greater work in the process, such as bugging your local officials.

I’m sure it’s unrelated to the rallies – or IS it? – but New York State legislators have agreed to include a single-use plastic bag ban, the second state, after California, to do so.

With fewer options for the third R, recycling, there needs to be more emphasis on the first two, reduce and reuse.

My daughter said she felt energized to take more actions. I’m very proud that she’s making these decisions without prompting from her parents.

August rambling #2: Fibonacci sequence music

Robert Mueller’s Indictment Song

A friend wrote: “Suddenly, it all makes perfect sense to me. Tubby all grown up=?”
Boston Globe, 22 August 2018: “It’s hard to come up with a satisfactory explanation that doesn’t end up with ‘because he got his hand caught in the cookie jar.'”

The drift towards autocracy continues

“That’s Obstruction of Justice”

How the National Enquirer helped DJT’s fixer keep scandals off the front page

‘Like a State Dinner’: Huge White House Event Honoring Evangelical Christians and he lied to them that he got rid of a law

The 47-page indictment against California Congressman Duncan Hunter and his wife Margaret details a shocking list of improper uses of campaign funds and financial mismanagement. The Hunters are accused of spending $250,000 of campaign funds on expenses that no reasonable person would believe were legitimate campaign expenditures

Why peace doesn’t last without women

Trade: Last Week Tonight with John Oliver – Jared is to blame

Commission on State Fragility, Growth and Development

Another deadly pandemic is coming — and the United States is not ready

Cancer: It’s Not Always What You Eat, But When You Eat It

Climate change will be deadlier, more destructive and costlier for California than previously believed, state warns

Life After Quitting; Five people on addiction, in their own words

America Soured on My Multiracial Family

Elizabeth Warren stakes out her message

Court Backs Activists Who Feed Homeless

The interwoven systems that shape our destiny even though we rarely pause to think about them

TV debate between William F. Buckley and Groucho Marx

When a Stranger Decides to Destroy Your Life

While We Sleep, Our Mind Goes on an Amazing Journey

Meet The People Who Spend Their Free Time Removing Fake Accounts From Facebook

Ken Levine interviews Peri Gilpin of Frasier, Part 1 and Part 2

A mouse walks into a bar

Jaquandor geeks out

Pulp Empire – “A Tarantino inspired Star Wars mashup and remix”

The insidious lure of nostalgia

Fonts of knowledge

Who needs the Kwik-E-Mart?

Snapping dry spaghetti into just two pieces

Mean Hetty Green

Scrambled eggs in a microwave

Now I Know: Why Bird Poop is White

MUSIC

Music from the Fibonacci sequence

Robert Mueller’s Indictment Song -James Corden

René and Georgette Magritte with Their Dog After the War – Paul Simon (2018)

The Cedar and the Palm,”symphonic picture” Vasily Kalinnikov

Bobaflex – Hey You (Pink Floyd cover)

SEUNGRI – ‘WHERE R U FROM (Feat. MINO)’

A Pentatonix kind of day

Kaze no Torimichi (The Path of Wind) from From My Neighbor Totoro – Joe Hisaishi, adapted for chamber performance

Coverville 1229: The Madonna Cover Story III

The Mamas and the Papas “If You Can Believe Your Eyes and Ears”

overture to Les Horaces – Antonio Salieri

Inspecta – Jain

The evolution of Dragon’s “Young Years”

Do songs of the summer sound the same?

Inductee insights: Moody Blues

Dirty Prank Calls, Done For $250,000

Newly Released FBI Files Expose Red-Baiting of Woody Guthrie

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