One night in Jan. of 2013, a small group of students came together to discuss a new angle for the global climate movement. The previous fall, activist and 350.org founder Bill McKibben had announced the next major step in the movement — fossil fuel divestment. Divestment is the act of removing investments for reasons one finds to be unethical or morally ambiguous, in this case from the top 200 fossil fuel extraction companies, and McKibben began taking his campaign to university campuses around the country. There was a feeling of excitement in the air that night as we drafted our mission statement. We were joining something big.
Two years later, the voices in support of divestment have become stronger than ever. On April 9, 19 of 48 Yale University students participating in a sit-in to reopen the divestment conversation were arrested. Earlier this month, Syracuse University decided to divest from fossil fuel companies, joining others like the University of Maine and Stanford University. Last week, students from across New England converged in solidarity with Harvard Heat Week, as Harvard University students pressured their administration to reconsider its stance on divestment. Things are happening. Change is inevitable.
Since that first meeting, I have seen students leave Divest Dartmouth because they do not have the time or because they have begun to doubt its effectiveness. I, too, have doubted. It is hard and often unfulfilling work — but sometimes, you feel the electricity of progress. In the spring of 2013, Dartmouth Hall 105 was packed to a standing-room only crowd for a panel discussion on divestment. This was the first that many had heard of divestment, and the room crackled with excitement.
Dartmouth is a hard place to be an activist. Our student body and our administrators do not know how to deal with activism. Most of us are reluctant to join the fight even for a cause about which we care deeply. Students here are not apathetic. We care about many things, but we must choose very carefully where to expend our energy.
Students, faculty, staff, alumni and community members, if you think that climate change will affect you, your country or your children then why do you not speak out? This is not an accusation, but merely a question. Why do I not speak out?
Climate change doesn’t need more casually concerned consumers. It needs students and scientists and businesspeople who are active. There is no such thing as benign apathy, not when the consequences of silence are so real and so urgent. That is why I can’t silence my voice any longer. By all means, let’s continue to buy reusable water bottles and sporks at Collis. Rehearse the compost-trash-recycling routine until we can do it without thinking. Know, however, that these smaller, personal actions are meaningless unless we are also engaged beyond ourselves.
Let’s start with divestment. An educational institution should not be invested in activities that are ruining the climate. We no longer have the luxury of claiming that our college should not make meaningful decisions with its money. Divestment is a hugely political and hugely important action. It should not be taken lightly but rather as something that must be done.
Change needs to happen, and it is not happening fast enough.
I realize that I have immense privilege to write these words. I have the luxury of caring about the uncertain future because I do not worry about my immediate circumstances. Yet it is my greatest hope that I can wield the power of my words responsibly. This is why I continue to use my voice.
What good is any innovation or discovery if we cannot say that we did everything in our power to avoid wide-scale and massive destruction from climate change? Our institution is slow to change, and it needs our help. To think that we, as students, are not in a position to create change is naïve. We are important. We must get things done. Before I graduate, before the climate warms, before people forget, it must be done. We can not hide under the disguise of being paralyzed by the perceived impossibility of the task. The task is not impossible unless we make it so.
Amalia Siegel ’16 is a member of Divest Dartmouth and a leader of the Dartmouth Council on Climate Change.
