|
We have spun around to Summer Solstice or Midsummer, once again, when one of the Earth's poles has its maximum tilt toward the sun. The sun reaches its highest position in the sky and is the day with the longest period of daylight.
As summer heightens so the rise of Extinction Rebellion (XR) gathers momentum, capturing the attention of many individuals joining force internationally with demands for truth about climate change, action now, and a citizens assembly https://rebellion.earth.
The collective call of XR and the young, truth tellingly powerful voice of Greta Thunberg leading children on school strikes, are having an impact: The government has announced ending UK’s contribution to climate change by 2050. There is still much to be done and a place for all kinds of involvement within XR for people who care and want to be part of a movement that’s making a difference.
As protesting and direct action is shifting from niche into mainstream, Extinction Rebellion and other environmental groups are recognising that not many People of Colour (POC) are engaged in the environmental movement, with meetings specifically to look at this. Articles are being written on the subject of POC and the environmental movement: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-48373540
Valuable questions are being explored, like at a symposium earlier this month in London Islington, Climate Change is a Social Justice Issue, ‘Why and how is climate change a social justice issue? Whose voices are unheard? Why? What actions can we take?’
If it's our sense of separation from nature that causes us to act in ways that aren't in harmony with the world around us and causes its destruction, we need to bring awareness to how and where we do this, and to re-engage those aspects. We need to recognise ways in which we have split off and disconnected, and what supports unification. This human-centric, domination dynamic with the environment, is similar to the often unacknowledged superiority in racial bias and racism in the UK.
Carl Anthony plays a special role in the environmental movement insisting on keeping the political issues surrounding race at the centre of discussions about the environmental crisis, saying, ‘An Ecopsychology that has no place for people of color, that doesn’t deliberately set out to correct the distortions of racism, is an oxymoron’.
We can use this solstice time to recognise that we need both the light and the dark to survive. Enjoying the sun’s uplift and energising capacities and opportunities to pause outside on longer sunny days, when we have them, yes. And maybe having an openness to take those times as a resource to then turn towards difficult and unseen aspects of ourselves, like the racial biases we mostly all have, and the legacies of slavery and colonialism within us. Personally, the processes of engaging both intellect to understand and embodiment practices to feel my pain, has been transformative.
We need willingness, investigation, reflections and kindness to bring awareness to aspects of ourselves and the systems we create, inhabit and uphold. Through our explorations, can we adjust and create new ways of doing things and being in the world that is more socially inclusive, and in alignment with a sustainable world?
Wishing you a Summer Solstice of heightened kind awareness, that leads to wisdom and clear action.
Salma Darling, on behalf of the Ning nurturers |
