The coronavirus has laid bare the brutality and injustice of our current economic system. It doesn’t have to be this way. The coronavirus has turned off the global economy. Now is our chance to change the system before we turn it back on. ✊🌏👭👫👬

Earth Day is Wednesday, April 22nd. This year people around the world are going online for a three-day mobilization to stop the climate crisis, starting on April 22nd. Activists, performers, influencers, and thought leaders are coming together to host a 3-day digital event full of teach-ins, performances, and more.

Stay tuned and sign up at 👇👇
https://www.earthdaylive2020.org/

In this hard time of uncertainty, confinement, and crazy health crisis it is very easy to feel overwhelmed, anxious and scared. Here's another way to look at things...
An Imagined Letter from Covid-19 to Humans:
Stop. Just stop.
It is no longer a request. It is a mandate.
We will help you.
We will bring the supersonic, high speed merry-go-round to a halt
We will stop
the planes
the trains
the schools
the malls
the meetings
the frenetic, furied rush of illusions and “obligations” that keep you from hearing our
single and shared beating heart,
the way we breathe together, in unison.
Our obligation is to each other,
As it has always been, even if, even though, you have forgotten.
We will interrupt this broadcast, the endless cacophonous broadcast of divisions and distractions,
to bring you this long-breaking news:
We are not well.
None of us; all of us are suffering.
Last year, the firestorms that scorched the lungs of the earth
did not give you pause.
Nor the typhoons in Africa,China, Japan.
Nor the fevered climates in Japan and India.
You have not been listening.
It is hard to listen when you are so busy all the time, hustling to uphold the comforts and conveniences that scaffold your lives.
But the foundation is giving way,
buckling under the weight of your needs and desires.
We will help you.
We will bring the firestorms to your body
We will bring the fever to your body
We will bring the burning, searing, and flooding to your lungs
that you might hear:
We are not well.
Despite what you might think or feel, we are not the enemy.
We are Messenger. We are Ally. We are a balancing force.
We are asking you:
To stop, to be still, to listen;
To move beyond your individual concerns and consider the concerns of all;
To be with your ignorance, to find your humility, to relinquish your thinking minds and travel deep into the mind of the heart;
To look up into the sky, streaked with fewer planes, and see it, to notice its condition: clear, smoky, smoggy, rainy? How much do you need it to be healthy so that you may also be healthy?
To look at a tree, and see it, to notice its condition: how does its health contribute to the health of the sky, to the air you need to be healthy?
To visit a river, and see it, to notice its condition: clear, clean, murky, polluted? How much do you need it to be healthy so that you may also be healthy? How does its health contribute to the health of the tree, who contributes to the health of the sky, so that you may also be healthy?
Many are afraid now.
Do not demonize your fear, and also, do not let it rule you. Instead, let it speak to you—in your stillness,
listen for its wisdom.
What might it be telling you about what is at work, at issue, at risk, beyond the threats of personal inconvenience and illness?
As the health of a tree, a river, the sky tells you about quality of your own health, what might the quality of your health tell you about the health of the rivers, the trees, the sky, and all of us who share this planet with you?
Stop.
Notice if you are resisting.
Notice what you are resisting.
Ask why.
Stop. Just stop.
Be still.
Listen.
Ask us what we might teach you about illness and healing, about what might be required so that all may be well.
We will help you, if you listen.

- Kristin Flyntz

San Diego City Council voted to declare an Climate Emergency yesterday! 🌏🎉
“Climate change in San Diego is not a what-if, it’s a what-now,” she said. “Sea levels are already nine inches higher in San Diego in the last 100 years of record. It’s well past time to sound the alarm.” - Councilmember Jennifer Campbell (sponsor of the declaration)
Thanks to all those who sent emails to the Councillors encouraging them to vote yes.

https://www.kusi.com/san-diego-city-council-declares-climate-emergency-in-san-diego/

We're launching a Reading Group!
The first meeting will likely be the second week of Spring Quarter. If you're interested in taking part, please fill out the poll to let us know when you are able to meet. (Note meeting may be online given recent university policy re gatherings).
https://www.when2meet.com/?8869849-PdYMT
Please get in touch with Luke (lstroth@ucsd.edu) if you want to join the group!

The reading for this meeting will be:
1. UCSD Climate Action Plan - https://actionnetwork.org/user_files/user_files/000/039/860/original/UCSD-Climate-Action-Plan-2019-final.pdf

2. UCSD Senate Task Force on the Climate Crisis Report - https://actionnetwork.org/user_files/user_files/000/039/859/original/climate-crisis-task-force-report-02-03-20-final.pdf

3. Resolution 109 (Federal Green New Deal) - https://actionnetwork.org/user_files/user_files/000/039/858/original/BILLS-116hres109ih.pdf

4. Regional Climate Action Planning Framework - https://actionnetwork.org/user_files/user_files/000/039/857/original/ReCAPframework.pdf