Dear Friends,
In less then 48 hours, the sun will rise in the far Pacific, and one of the last best chances to educate our civilization about climate change will be underway.
On 5/5, all around the world, we’ll be Connecting the Dots on climate change. The day will begin in the Marshall Islands, where our friends are taking their cameras underwater for a rally against the backdrop of their endangered coral reef. And we need you to join in — the images we collect in the next hours will be the bank on which we draw as we continue to wage the political fight to cut carbon emissions.
If you don't yet know which local event you're joining, click here to get involved: www.climatedots.org
We desperately need to put real human faces on climate change — to make sure that people understand it’s not an abstraction and a future threat, but a very present and very real crisis. And a crisis with solutions — in many places people are putting up green dots of hope, at their solar panels and windmills. (At my mom’s retirement home the residents are heading out to dig a big new community garden!)
So please: if you can spare an hour or two for the planet on 5/5, make sure you go to climatedots.org to find out where the nearest action is, and make sure you call a few friends and get them to come with you. We won’t solve climate change in a single day — but if we don’t manage to show our fellow citizens that it’s a problem, we’ll never solve it.
And here’s the thing — you’ll have a good time. On too many occasions we ask you to do really hard things, like get arrested. This action is crucial but simple — just lend your body for a little while to make the most important point we can make right now.
We’re asking everyone, at every local event, to take a photo of their “climate dot” and upload it to our website — and we’ll assemble those images into a global mosaic that puts a real human face on climate change. Our crew at 350.org will do everything we can to deliver your photos and stories to the media and decision-makers the world over. We can't let our elected officials pretend that this crisis is still in the future, and we’ll make sure our actions on 5/5 are a crucial first step to get global leaders to connect the dots on climate change.
Almost three years ago, on October 24, 2009, 350.org held our first international day of action. That day was like a global teach-in that helped the world understand a new fact — that 350 is the safe upper level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, and that getting back below 350 is the greatest challenge humanity now faces.
This year, our task is a bit different: now we need to to show the world that the impacts of climate change are already being felt — and that there is a powerful movement waking up to connect the dots. This Saturday, some places around the planet the rain will be falling, and some places the sun will be shining — but everywhere on planet earth we’ll be connecting the dots, and we hope you’ll be a big part of it. Please join us.
With gratitude,
Bill McKibben
P.S. Along with that photo, which is of paramount importance, it would be great if you could spread the word with whatever social networks you use. Email your friends, post on Facebook, tweet — do whatever you do to reach your community. To keep up to date with the latest goings-on worldwide, follow 350 on our Facebook, and on Twitter, where we’ll be posting updates all day. And, if you happen to tweet, use the hashtag #ConnectTheDots to keep in touch with everyone else taking
action around the world.
