STATEMENT ON STRIKING DURING THE CORONAVIRUS OUTBREAK
Yes, this afternoon, I’ll be protesting. I know it is not responsible, and I know 1 lot of you think we should cancel everything. Well, we’ve cancelled most of what we’d planned and we’ll be 100 instead of 10,000 as we wanted. This was supposed to be the best day of my entire life. It’s almost the worst. Everything that could have gone wrong went wrong.
You can’t imagine how desperate I feel right now. I honestly wonder if striking like that every few months makes any sense. The only thing that can cut emissions is a damn virus that’s killing a lot of people. This outbreak only shows how far we’ve gone in globalizing our societies and relying on fossil fuels and the "economy". Something that doesn’t physically exist.
We were not prepared for that pandemic and luckily, it has a killing rate of "only" ~3%. Just imagine what could’ve happened if it was worse. We would not have reacted quicker. Our leaders just can’t imagine shutting down the economy. Our specie is using too much resources, we will end up being wiped out by a disease one day or the other. If we don’t wipe ourselves out before, of course.
For the past one year and a half, I have built my entire life around climate activism. I’m fighting for my future, and that’s the only reasonable thing to do today.
We spent months planning this strike, making sure everything would be perfect.
I know from a health security point of view, we should not gather and I should not go protesting in Grenoble, an hour and a half away from home. This is ridiculous. But I’ve already spent half the day in class, and I can simply not stay there while my future is being destroyed.
I would never have imagined staying in class on a strike day. I'm not going to take a picture of myself and do that climate strike online. Climate strike is not online. It's in the street. It's always been, and it'll always be so.
I obviously respect the decision of the people who cancelled and I supported canceling our big protest. I spent hours yesterday trying to take a decision. But in the end, it's always the same idea. There's a strike, my place is out in the street. Whatever it takes. No matter the cost. Today is not the day I'm giving up.
Clement 🌍✊
02/13/2020 15:03
