Sunday, December 23, 2012
Unnatural Disasters
After Hurricane Sandy, power was restored in days in Manhattan, but in the Rockaways on Long Island, many are still without heat and electricity. Is it a coincidence that Manhattan includes Wall Street, and the Rockaways include mostly poor people of color and working class whites? Nicholas Mirzoeff, editor of Occupy 2012, doesn't think so.
Writing today, Mirzoeff says while people on Long Island are planning to rebuild if FEMA ever gets its act together, the politicians and the oil and gas companies that own them are planning how to make disasters like Sandy a regular occurrence. Using high tech fracking to drill where they previously could not, and drilling in the now melting Arctic, the energy companies are gearing up for a fossil fuel bonanza that will accelerate climate change and the unnatural disasters caused by their greed.
As the global elite seeks ever greater riches through the reckless expansion of carbon emissions, the rest of us will pay the price. As Mirzoeff observes, the question is how we respond to the change, who benefits from that change, and whether those impacted by it will have a voice. In other words, it's about freedom.
Writing today, Mirzoeff says while people on Long Island are planning to rebuild if FEMA ever gets its act together, the politicians and the oil and gas companies that own them are planning how to make disasters like Sandy a regular occurrence. Using high tech fracking to drill where they previously could not, and drilling in the now melting Arctic, the energy companies are gearing up for a fossil fuel bonanza that will accelerate climate change and the unnatural disasters caused by their greed.
As the global elite seeks ever greater riches through the reckless expansion of carbon emissions, the rest of us will pay the price. As Mirzoeff observes, the question is how we respond to the change, who benefits from that change, and whether those impacted by it will have a voice. In other words, it's about freedom.
