This weeks #GenGND newsletter is a somber edition.
We’ve been stuck in panic, in silence, in fear, in pain, and pure grief watching the entire West Coast of the United States go up in flames over the course of the last week.
We don’t really know what to say, so we’re just going to let people on the West Coast—or people who see what’s happening on the West Coast with CLEAR eyes—do the talking, in a slightly new style of extended Green(Orange)New(s)ReadingList…
First, we’ve seen this classic Mary Heglar quote floating around on Twitter a lot these last couple of days…
It’s very true, and we would just like to highlight an addendum to this point, and clarify that...
The whole west coast is enshrouded in smoke…
Let’s call it what it is…
And, call it LIKE it is…
…Especially journalists.
Great to see the ‘paper of record’ catch up to the times…
Here at #GenGND, the climate crisis has always been front page news.
No they don’t, Mary—no they don’t.
At this point—how the FUCK can we afford NOT to have a GREEN NEW DEAL?
Also, we can’t help but notice the East Coast media bias that’s showing…
Not to mention the generally shitty approach with which media has covered climate for decades now… “That’s not an accident—it was fossil fuel PR guys that really pushed false equivalence on climate,” says award-winning journalist Amy Westervelt. “Mobil’s PR guy used to say he could get the media to cover ‘Mobil’s point of view’ by attacking them, accusing them of bias or of getting the facts wrong. The reason people think of climate as an ‘activist’ issue, which has scared a lot of journalists away from it is that oil and gas companies spent a lot of money to push that idea.”
Which led people to believe that it was too expensive to save the planet, while we literally watch our society collapse...
It’s infuriating.
Here’s what we’ve been reading & listening to this week…
“A CLIMATE RECKONING IN FIRE-STRICKEN CALIFORNIA” by Thomas Fuller and Christopher Flavelle, in The New York Times
“WE LIVE ON ANOTHER PLANET NOW” by Shannon Stirone, in Esquire
“HOW THE FIRES STARTED AND OTHER ANSWERS YOU NEED” by Jill Cowan in The New York Times
“DRILLING FOR OIL WHILE CALIFORNIA BURNS” by Kate Aronoff, in The New Republic
“IN OREGON, A NEW CLIMATE MENACE: FIRES RAGING WHERE THEY DON’T USUALLY BURN” by Christopher Flavelle & Henry Fountain in The New York Times
“WHERE DO WE GO FROM HERE?” by Brian Kahn, in GIZMODO
“THESE CHANGES ARE NEEDED AMID WORSENING WILDFIRES, EXPERTS SAY” By Brad Plumer and John Schwartz, in The New York Times
“FIRE, FIRE, EVERYWHERE” by Emily Atkin, in HEATED
“THE FUTURE HAS ARRIVED. THESE EXPLOSIVE FIRES ARE OUR CLIMATE CHANGE WAKE UP CALL” by Peter Gleick, in The Guardian
“CALIFORNIA’S DARK, ORANGE SKY IS THE MOST UNNERVING SIGHT I’VE EVER WOKEN UP TO” by Rebecca Solnit, in The Guardian
“A SELF PERPETUATING CYCLE OF WILDFIRES” Friday’s episode of the The New York Times’ The Daily Podcast
“THE WEST HAS NEVER FELT SO SMALL” by Emma Marris, in The Atlantic
“I NEED YOU TO CARE THAT OUR COUNTRY IS ON FIRE” by Charlie in The New York Times
Nate Birnbaum is the editor-in-chief of the #GenGND newsletter.