Tag Archives: strike

Breaking News, Climate Solutions, Earth and Ecology, News, Politics

Hundreds of Thousands Take to Streets Worldwide for ‘Uproot the System’ Climate Strikes

Greta Thunberg

Above: Photo Collage / Lynxotic

“The climate crisis has not disappeared,” said Swedish activist Greta Thunberg. “It’s the opposite—it’s even more urgent now than it was before.”

Young people by the hundreds of thousands took to the streets across the globe on Friday to deliver a resounding message to world leaders: The climate crisis is getting worse, and only radical action will be enough to avert catastrophe and secure a just, sustainable future for all.

“As emissions and inequalities increase, we rise up and demand climate justice.”

From Pakistan to Italy to Germany to the Philippines, the worldwide “Uproot the System” actions marked the largest climate demonstrations since the coronavirus pandemic forced campaigners to take their protests online last year. Climate activists in developing countries—where access to vaccines is limited due to artificial supply constraints and hoarding by rich nations—were still forced to limit the size of their demonstrations Friday as a public health precaution.

“Last time it was digital and nobody was paying attention to us,” Yusuf Baluch, a 17-year-old activist from the Pakistani province of Balochistan, told Reuters. “In the global north, people are getting vaccinated so they might be out in huge quantities. But in the global south, we are still limited.”

Above: Photo Collage / Great Thunberg – via Instagram / Lynxotic

Swedish activist Greta Thunberg, whose solitary sit-down strike outside her home country’s parliament in 2018 helped spark the global Fridays for Future movement, said that “it has been a very strange year and a half with this pandemic.”

“But of course, the climate crisis has not disappeared. It’s the opposite—it’s even more urgent now than it was before,” said Thunberg, who on Friday joined a large demonstration in Berlin, which was hammered by massive, climate-linked floods in July.

Watch Thunberg’s full speech in front of the Reichstag building:

Organizers said that more than 1400 climate strikes are set to take place in at least 70 countries Friday, with hundreds of thousands expected to attend demonstrations in Germany alone.

“As emissions and inequalities increase, we rise up and demand climate justice,” saidBerlin-based climate activist Luisa Neubauer.

The latest youth-led global action kicked off just weeks ahead of the pivotal COP26 climate summit in Glasgow, which many civil society organizations want to be postponed over fears that inequities in coronavirus vaccine access could prevent delegates from developing nations—those most vulnerable to the climate crisis—from attending.

Equalizing global vaccine distribution is one of the six demands that climate campaigners are aiming to put before world leaders during Friday’s mass demonstrations. The full list is as follows:

  1. The Global North needs to cut emissions drastically by divesting from fossil fuels and ending its extraction, burning, and use. We need concrete plans and detailed annual carbon budgets with roadmaps and milestones to ensure we get to net-zero with justice and equity in the time needed to address climate change.
  2. The colonizers of the north have a climate debt to pay for their disproportionate amount of historic emissions and that starts with the increase of climate finance to implement anti-racist climate reparations, the cancellation of debts especially for damage caused by extreme weather events, and providing adaptation funds that serve the communities.
  3. Work towards a genuinely global recovery from Covid-19 by ensuring equitable vaccine distribution worldwide and suspending intellectual property restrictions on Covid-19 technologies. This is an essential step towards a global, green, and just recovery.
  4. Recognize the tangibility of the climate crisis as a risk to human safety and secure the rights of climate refugees in international law.
  5. Recognize the invaluable impact of biodiversity on indigenous communities’ lives and culture, and commit to make ecocide an international punishable crime.
  6. Stop the violence and criminalization against indigenous peoples, small farmers, small fisherfolk, and other environmental and land defenders. Support the work they do. Respect and listen to our defenders. 

The worldwide demonstrations came a week after the United Nations warned that even if the 191 parties to the Paris Agreement meet their current climate targets, global greenhouse gas emissions will still rise 16% by 2030 compared to 2010 levels. The U.N. also estimated that the planet is on track for 2.7°C of warming by the end of the century, a level of heating that experts say would be cataclysmic—particularly for developing nations.

At the U.N. General Assembly in New York this week, the leaders of vulnerable countries pushed wealthy nations—the largest contributors to the climate emergency—to stop shirking their responsibilities to confront the planetary crisis.

“We simply have no higher ground to cede,” Marshall Islands President David Kabua said Wednesday. “The world simply cannot delay climate ambition any further.”

Participants in Friday’s global action pointedly amplified that message. Valentina Ruas, a Brazilian activist, told The Guardian that “the global north should be developing climate policies that have at their core climate justice and accountability to the most affected people and areas.”

“Instead,” she added, “they continue to exploit vulnerable communities and recklessly extract fossil fuel, while bragging about their insignificant emission reduction plans.”

Originally published on Common Dreams by JAKE JOHNSON and republished under Creative Commons.

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Breaking News, Crypto

Crypto Crash on Bitcoin Day knocks $420 Billion off at Dip

Above: Photo by Michael Krahn on Unsplash with elements added by Lynxotic

Coming after a frenzied run-up the hand wringing is no surprise

On the big El Salvador day for Bitcoin to go live, for the first time as legal tender, naturally there were glitches. And the predictions for crypto in general and Bitcoin in particular to surge on the news were, backwards.

The longstanding stock market adage “buy on rumor, sell on news” once more proved itself as what is now being called a “crypto flash crash” knocked around $400 billion off the market cap of the previous 24 hour period, or almost 12%, as per CoinMarketCap at the time of this writing.

The president of El Salvador announced that his government used the dip to buy an additional 150 Bitcoin, above the 400 he had announced on the previous day, bringing the total to 550.

From CoinMarketCap:The global crypto market cap is $2.07T, a 11.91% decrease over the last day

  • The total crypto market volume over the last 24 hours is $227.12B, which makes a 66.15%increase. 
  • The total volume in DeFi is currently $30.41B, 13.39% of the total crypto market 24-hour volume. 
  • The volume of all stable coins is now $179.83B, which is 79.18% of the total crypto market 24-hour volume.
  • Bitcoin’s price is currently $46,893.62.
  • Bitcoin’s dominance is currently 42.55%, an increase of 1.17% over the day.

By 3:30 PM ET on Tuesday Bitcoin bounced back, the “discount” ended, for now, and recovered to around $47,000 after dipping to $42,870. The recent highroad been $52,732, with the all time high from April still intact above $63,000.

I many ways it seems as if Bitcoin and Cryptocurrencies appeared suddenly in 2021 out of the head of Zeus. Protean and fully formed, with billions and trillions in market caps, and all your sisters, brothers, cousins and even the Uber driver climbing aboard.

And the FOMO blog posts, where every hour an innocent reader is assaulted by a story, perhaps true, perhaps exaggerated and certainly foolhardy in retrospect, of an innocent putting their life savings into Dogecoin and suddenly having, theoretically, huge gains at their disposal.

Meanwhile, craggy faced, ancient stock market mavens would interject famous last words that now appear to be wise. However, all that notwithstanding, this week’s crash is nothing new or unexpected.

In reality, as can be seen from the graphic below, provided by Visual Capitalist, there have been so may crashes / corrections and doomsday prognostications since 2012 in Bitcoin that it seems like a miracle the there’s any thing such as Crypto at all.

There’s a reason it’s not dead and it’s in the DNA

The resiliency, far from a shock to those that have been around more than a fortnight, is kinda the point. When Satoshi Nakamoto built the system architecture of Bitcoin and since then inspired the over 8000 new crypto entities that have been developed, it was, just like the internet itself that was build to survive WWIII, supposed to be as indestructible as possible.

Like physical gold, which is considered have been adopted as a store of value partly due to its indestructibility and immutability (alchemy notwithstanding) the volatility and sometimes violent-seeming life story of Bitcoin is a necessary adjust to its role in finance, commerce and even individual monetary survival.

Not for the faint of heart, perhaps

While the mainstream and those forces opposed to the adoption or survival of Bitcoin and Crypto are out in force pointing to the “unsuitability” of Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies for any “legitimate” use as a trade or savings vehicle, the progress so far, in spite of the obvious fact that volatility has always been baked in to the situation, is an obvious refutation of that viewpoint.

Will the current drop in dollar values relative to Bitcoin end it’s popularity and strip it of the respect it has thusfrar earned among many? In a word, no. In essence what is happening is, as many have foretold, what happens often and repeatedly, the excess attention and dollars that were pumped into crypto by you brother, sister, cousin and Uber driver are now getting blown out, since those were more speculation and psychosis than any kind of vote for viability or permanency.

And, why not? Where was to concern, shock and hesitation by the masses when the prices seemed to only rise for weeks and even months across so many products and coins it was impossible to keep count? Why was to feeding frenzy and the mania-like piling on not ignored as an anomaly?

The herd does as the herd will do. Diamond hands and Paper hands will ebb and flow as long as the rivers flow to the sea and humans herd like buffalo. And, in all likelihood, dollars and euros and yen will be long forgotten when the last bitcoin is transferred to the final wallet in the sky.

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Breaking News, Business, Crypto, Observation

Bitcoin Nation? El Salvador is first to make it Legal Tender

El Salvador has officially legalized bitcoin as legal tender (alongside the U.S. dollar which is the country’s current national currency) starting today; September 7, 2021.

The day before the big day, President Nayib Bukele announced El Salvador had purchased 200 Bitcoins and later in the day confirmed that “we now hold 400 bitcoins”.  Given the current market prices, the country’s recent bitcoin purchases amount to roughly $20.8 million.  

In June this year, El Salvador’s Congress voted 62 out of 84 votes to establish the crypto coin as legal tender. This will make the small country is Central America the first in the world to recognize bitcoin as an official form of currency.

In a subsequent tweet Bukele’s translated tweet said 

Like all innovation, the process of #Bitcoin in El Salvador it has a learning curve. Every road to the future is like this and not everything will be achieved in a day, or in a month.

 But we must break the paradigms of the past. El Salvador has the right to advance towards the first world.

-President of El Salvador – Nayib Bukele

Bitcoin climbed nearly 2% to more than $52,680 as of Sept 6, and according to a market analyst with Reuters the cryptocurrency is on track to reach $56,000.

Salvadorians will now have the ability to use the digital coin in exchange for goods and services, and as an accepted form of tax payments by the government. Bitcoin is actually the second legal tender in El Salvador, with the US Dollar also having that status since 2001.

Upon its adoption, users who register with the country’s government supported Bitcoin wallet called Chivo will be awarded with $30 worth of currency pre-loaded (must have a Salvadorian national ID number). 

The overall impetus for legalizing bitcoin officially is, according to experts, that savings that will be possible for citizens to receive remittances – transfers, until now in US dollars, without intermediaries and the large fees they charge for international transfers.

Remittances account for more than 20% of GDP for El Salvador – mainly in the form of dollars sent by the approximately 1.5 million ex-patriots living abroad and wiring payments to families in El Salvador.

Western Union, for example, handles these transactions and charges a hefty fee. And those fees would represent a percentage (for small remittances up to 10%) of $5.9 Billion per year that flows into the small country from abroad, mostly from the United Stated, according to World Bank data.

Although there has been a lot of political rhetoric and expressions of opinion against the move, such an obvious adversary as the international wire transfer interests, like Western Union, and the large income from fees that may begin to dry up starting today, could easily explain at least a portion of the well represented opposition opinion.

That being said, the now famous price swings of Bitcoin do represent a real risk for people hoping to transfer directly into the country. Another risk is losing the coin due to lack of experience handling a digital currency, by people who are more likely to know the feel of paper dollars than digital screens, cryptocurrency exchanges and virtual wallets.

For observers, both crypto adherents and detractors, this is a very important opportunity to see what kinds of practical obstacles will arise and what benefits are realized by the El Salvadoran people.

It is also a kind of warning to those in governments, including in the U.S., that hope to stop Bitcoin’s seemingly inexorable rise, and to prevent what they perceive as threats to the public, and perhaps, to the U.S. dollar’s previously unchallenged hegemony.

The news that 400 Bitcoins were purchased by El Salvador was, naturally seen as a positive by the Bitcoin trading community, and there has been speculation of further pricing strength likely continuing going forward.

On the utopian dream side, various experiments have recently been announced related to Bitcoin and crypto. For example, in El Salvador there are emerging plans to make Bitcoin mining a state run operation with power being supplied by geothermal energy drawn from the country’s volcanos. How’s that for cheap, renewable resources?

A town in the U.S., fittingly called Cool Valley, MO has a mayor who recently announced that the city government is considering making payments to all residents of 1000 in Bitcoin. In this case, the idea behind the plan is to give citizens a crypto nest-egg, and the holders would be barred from selling, with the hope that, in the event the currency continues its exponential climb, the residents would benefit from holding it as an appreciating capital asset.

Which leads to the observation that, over the last few years, a fog of confusion appears to hang above the media regarding coverage of cryptocurrencies.

Price speculation is off the charts and there’s a kind of mania afoot. But the biggest confusion seems to come from one simple truth, that the U.S. dollar has gone only in one direction for more than 100 years, since the Federal Reserve was established in December 1913, down.

Against any measure of buying power for goods and services the dollar is continuously worth less, far less, on a yearly basis.

Although many headlines scream “Crypto and Bitcoin are Worthless” the same could be said of the U.S. dollar, in relative terms, against a basket of goods and services which is the traditional measure of “inflation” and against other assets, for example, now that Bitcoin provides a second measuring tool, dollars are worth less over time against bitcoin.

With prominent people and companies around the world and in the U.S. already supporting the idea of Bitcoin and Cryptocurrencies with their dollars and by choosing to hold crypto, it will be very interesting to see what transpires as these “currency wars” mutate and expand around the globe.

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Climate Solutions, Entertainment

Greta Thunberg is back in Hulu Documentary: rise of Acclaimed Young Climate Activist

Video

An intimate look inside the life and rise of the remarkable Ms. Thunberg

At the 2019 United Nations Climate Action Summit, a young girl made headlines as she condemned world leaders on destroying the climate and leaving the younger generation to deal with the environmental repercussions. Her heartfelt speech received much attention from fellow activists, celebrities and leaders.  During the UN Climate Action Summit, she said “We are in the beginning of a mass extinction and all you can talk about is money and fairytales of eternal economic grow – How Dare You!”  

Read More: “Kiss The Ground” Documentary Offers Hopeful Remedy To Climate Change Focusing On Soil Regeneration

The, then 16 year old, soon became the inspired voice for the youth, a next generation’s leader, as she has continued her mission in raising awareness of the global climate emergency. Last year, Time Magazine named her ‘Person of the Year’ and she has also been nominated two years in a row for a Nobel Peace Prize.  Her name, if you already didn’t know, is Greta Thunberg.  

The upcoming “I am Greta” documentary which will stream on the Hulu platform November 13 follows the teenage climate activist during her rise to prominence and how she sparked a global impact with her school strikes and protests.   The doc gives viewers a deeper look and will include never-before-seen-footage, capturing meetings with government leaders, public appearances and global protests. 

The film will also show the young lady behind the scenes and how she lives her daily life, including scenes of being with her family, her process of writing speeches, how she deals with the stress of nonstop travel and her Asperger’s syndrome. The doc also features footage of Greta having to deal with the public scrutiny, from climate-deniers to hangers-on and the toll taken from being the “face of climate change”.   

https://video.twimg.com/amplify_video/1304701344415129600/vid/1280x720/LWOEJ8Yt8M4wXdPf.mp4?tag=13

The documentary culminates with Greta’s extraordinary two-week journey on a wind-powered sailboat. Her voyage across the Atlantic Ocean starts as she leaves the UK  in order to reach the UN Climate Action Summit in New York City.  Thunberg took to the sea as she no longer flies to any events due to the high carbon emissions caused by air travel.

Nathan Grossman, a Swedish director, told press when asked what he hopes viewers will take away from the film, “Greta and other young people demand a safe future and that leaders listen to the science – instead they are met with empty words from politicians, and ridicule or even death threats from individuals. This is the source of so much of her frustration and I hope viewers will leave with a lot of that frustration as well.”

No One Is Too Small to Make a Difference

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The groundbreaking speeches of Greta Thunberg, the young climate activist who has become the voice of a generation, including her historic address to the United Nations 

In August 2018 a fifteen-year-old Swedish girl, Greta Thunberg, decided not to go to school one day in order to protest the climate crisis. Her actions sparked a global movement, inspiring millions of students to go on strike for our planet, forcing governments to listen, and earning her a Nobel Peace Prize nomination.

No One Is Too Small to Make A Difference brings you Greta in her own words, for the first time. Collecting her speeches that have made history across the globe, from the United Nations to Capitol Hill and mass street protests, her book is a rallying cry for why we must all wake up and fight to protect the living planet, no matter how powerless we feel. Our future depends upon it.

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