Date/Time
Date(s) - 10/09/2025
8:00 pm – 9:30 pm
Categories
https://www.veteransforpeace.org/take-action/climatecrisis/wake-climate-crisis-tour
Laudably, we UUs have long been working to reduce our own emission and those of our families, congregations, and communities. As perilous as our current climate situation is, we might benefit from asking ourselves if we are missing something. Gary Butterfield, a long-time UU and air show protagonist and tour co-organizer from San Diego, points out, “While private citizens are implored to reduce our carbon footprint, the number one emitter continues unchecked and unnoticed. How can this be?” With that in mind, UUJEC will be holding this webinar and also cosponsoring the Veterans For Peace’s month-long California “Wake Up to Climate Crisis & NO MAS (No Military Air Shows) Tour.
Why Military Air Shows, one may ask?
While caught up in watching fighter jets skillfully maneuver in formation, one can, perhaps, be forgiven for not considering the impacts on public health from the hundreds of tons of emissions polluting each and every air show location. However, the existential threat of out of control climate change demands we examine what steps can be taken to protect youth and future generations. That the US Military is the largest institutional user of fossil fuels in the world and also the world’s largest institutional producer of Greenhouse Gas emissions should offer a clue about where we can turn our attention if we wish to ensure their protection.
This webinar will, hopefully, serve to inspire and promote the changes needed as tour organizers share relevant information, as well as the reasons why a tour was decided on as an essential means to meeting climate objectives. The on-location webinar coming to us live-streamed from California’s Bay Area, and will feature Dr. Jim Rine, among others. Jim is not only a Vietnam era U.S. Army veteran and an adjunct professor in the Department of Environmental Science and Geology at Wayne State University, but also a long-time climate activist. “In the last election, he states, “I was frustrated that voters from young to old were more concerned about the price of eggs than a livable planet for their children and themselves in their old age.” Therefore, one of the tour’s goals is to encourage communities and campuses to consider and prioritize the climate crisis in coming elections.