Our fight to slow down climate change, reverse global warming, and renew our Earth cannot happen without also ending racism. Racism is ingrained into every fiber of society. NY Times journalist, Somini Sengupta, recently interviewed 3 Black environmentalists, Mr. Sam Grant, Dr. Robert Bullard, and Ms. Heather McGhee. From Ms. Sengupta’s interviews with these environmentalists, she provided this succinct statement:
“Racism, in short, makes it impossible to live sustainably.”
In this post, I am going to review why fighting against racism is vital in our fight to slow down climate change. First, because of racism, people of color (Black, Indigenous, Latinx, and Asian people) are disproportionately affected by crises, including climate change. Second, racism hinders progress. Finally, fighting against racism and climate change, is fighting for all of us.
Racism makes Crises Worse for People Of Color
Racism intensifies the effects of crises for vulnerable communities because of racial inequalities. The ongoing COVID 19 pandemic is a harrowing example of how a crisis has a more devastating impact on communities of color.
Currently, Black people make up almost a quarter of those who have died from COVID 19 here in the US even though they make up only about 13% of the population. All communities of color are more likely than white people to be hospitalized from COVID 19. Indigenous and Black people are the most likely to be hospitalized, at a rate 5 times that of white people.
The CDC notes that there are 3 main contributors to the racial disparities of COVID 19 infections. They are living conditions, work, and health. One of the several reasons the CDC provides for the racial disparities of COVID 19 infections is connected to exposure to air pollution.
For living conditions, the CDC explains, racial housing segregation increases the likelihood of exposure to air pollution. People exposed to air pollution have higher rates of developing asthma, diabetes, lung and heart disease. These diseases increase the risk of severe illness when infected with COVID 19. Black people are exposed to 54% more air pollution than average. The racial disparity of exposure to air pollution is caused in part by the same industries that have fueled climate change.
Racial Disparities of Environmental Crisis including Climate Change
The term environmental crisis refers to the culmination of numerous environmental problems we are facing today. These include biodiversity loss, pollution of air, water, and land, and climate change. Communities of color have already been disproportionately affected by the environmental crisis through exposure to pollution and climate change.
Environmental Injustice: Exposure to Pollution
Air Pollution
The fossil fuel industries responsible for climate change, are also disproportionately located near Black communities. A fifth of Black people live within a half a mile of fossil fuel facilities exposing them to pollutants. A separate report from the EPA, released in 2018, found that Black and Latinx people are exposed to 1.5 and 1.2 times, respectively, more air polluting particulate matter than white people. People who are exposed to more air pollution have increased rates of chronic diseases. The EPA clarifies when exposure to air pollution is reviewed by poverty level, poverty level is “insufficient” in accounting for who of the population bears the brunt of pollution. However, race more strongly correlates to pollution exposure.
Water Pollution
The Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) completed a report in 2019 and found that 40 percent of the population in the United States drinks water that is not safe. In their research they found that race, ethnicity, and language vulnerability is strongly associated with both exposure to unsafe drinking water and the extended time the water systems were in violation of safe drinking water standards.
Lead Pollution
Flint, Michigan is a sobering example of lead poisoning that disproportionately affected Black communities and was avoidable. Black children are almost twice as likely to six times as likely of having elevated levels of lead in their blood compared to the rest of children in the US. The rate of elevated blood lead levels is highest for Black children living in homes built between 1950-1977, children age 2 and 3, and low income households. There is no safe blood lead level. Since lead can accumulate in teeth and bones, the health effects can last for years.
Climate Change: Extreme weather events
Extreme weather events, like strong storms and heat waves, are an effect of climate change. Like pollution, extreme weather events unevenly impact communities of color.
Strong Storms
Hurricanes historically affect communities of color unequally compared to white communities. The flooding from Hurricane Katrina in 2005 was 3 times more likely to flood homes owned by Black people compared to homes owned by white people. After Hurricane Katrina, Black homeowners were given $8000 less than white homeowners because of disproportionate home values. Due to insufficient funds, about 80 percent of the Black residents of the Lower 9th ward of New Orleans have not returned and homes have not been rebuilt. Superstorm Sandy in 2012 caused the most flood damage in New York communities with higher populations of Black and Latinx people. After Hurricane Harvey hit Houston and surrounding towns in 2017, the cities with the highest population of Black people received the lowest funding to rebuild.
Similar racial disparities have repeated, with Hurricane Matthew (2016), Hurricane Irma (2017), Hurricane Maria (2017), and Hurricane Florence (2018). Extreme weather events, like hurricanes, are predicted to occur more frequently as climate change continues.
Heat Waves
Heat waves kill hundreds of people every year in the United States alone. Over ten years of heat waves in New York, from 2000 to 2012, about half of those who died were Black people. While temperatures are predicted to rise with ongoing climate change, there are concerns of the racial disparities of heat waves.
Pregnant women of color are disproportionately affected by both exposure to pollution and extreme heat. Elevated temperatures (an effect of climate change and heat islands) and air pollution increases the chance of pregnant women having babies who are premature, have low birth weights, or stillborns. A recent study found that Black pregnant women and their babies are disproportionately affected overall. In addition, Black and Indigenous women are twice as likely to die from pregnancy related causes as white women, and often their deaths are preventable.
Racism Hinders Progress
In the multitude of interviews and articles completed soon after Mr. George Floyd’s murder, Black people often described feeling tired or exhausted. The continuous trauma of racism, violence perpetuated by state institutions, widening chasms of racial inequality, and centuries of racist oppression, erode the energy and shorten the lives of Black people. Racism hinders Black people from progressing on work important to them, whether it is bird watching, education, or climate change.
Dr. Ayana Elizabeth Johnson, a marine biologist and co-creator of the Blue New Deal explained, in The Washington Post and in Heated, the weight of racism prevents Black people from doing their work. She notes several climate change related items she left incomplete as a result of addressing racism. She quoted Toni Morrison, “The very serious function of racism … is distraction. It keeps you from doing your work. It keeps you explaining, over and over again, your reason for being.”
Referring to a recent study of who is concerned with climate change, she notes that 57% of Black people and 70% of Latinx people are concerned compared to only 49% of white people. She continues, to effectively take on climate change we need people of color because with majority of people of color already concerned they could make a significant difference in addressing climate change.
She ends her article with an earnest request for white people, “…who care about maintaining a habitable planet, I need you to become actively anti-racist. I need you to understand that our racial inequality crisis is intertwined with our climate crisis. If we don’t work on both, we will succeed at neither. I need you to step up. Please. Because I am exhausted.”
Fighting against Racism and Climate Change, is Fighting for Us All
Both racism and climate change affects all of us. To effectively fight climate change, we have to fight the root of the problem, racism. The data about the disproportionate effects of the environmental crisis and climate change is a glimpse of the connection between racism and climate change. In a recent interview, Ms. Elizabeth Yeampierre, co-chair of Climate Justice Alliance, reviewed how the connection between racism and climate change began with the origin of the United States.
Roots of Racism and Climate Change
She explained climate change is the consequence of the extractive economy built on the foundation of racism. The economy of the United States was constructed by extracting the land of its resources like gold and fossil fuels, on the backs of Black people, from stolen land of Indigenous people. The extraction of resources from land built wealth for those in power, all while Black and Indigenous people continued to suffer. Decisions were made by those in power to control and prevent Black and Indigenous people from having power. Racism perpetuated the suffering of communities of color, including the racial disparities of environmental exposure. While the extractive economy grew, it resulted in the devastation of the environment and climate change.
Racism costs us all.
Not only has racism led to the suffering of communities of color, racism has negative effects for all of us, including white people. Ms. Heather McGhee, an expert in public policy and political analyst, explained in her recent TED talk how “Racism has a cost for everyone.” Ms. McGhee found with her research that, in the United States, racism has led to bad policymaking, less investment in infrastructure than most developed nations, and worsened the economy.
In the 1960’s, when towns across the country were ordered to desegregate, some instead closed public parks, schools, and even pools to everyone, rather than desegregate. The subprime mortgages, which led to the financial crisis in 2008, were three times more likely to be sold to Black and Brown people, even with good credit. The economic downfall was not because Black and Brown people purchased unaffordable homes. Rather, Black and Brown people were targeted victims of low quality loans. These communities of color were not informed that the new subprime mortgage included higher interest rates and prepayment penalties. Eventually, the mortgages were sold to white people too as the lenders continued to profit from the subprime mortgages.
The Great Recession was caused by subprime mortgages made to profit lenders who targeted communities of color. From this, the country lost $19 trillion dollars in wealth. The US has not been able to regain the home ownership rate since. Racism costs us all.
Fighting against climate change alone is not sufficient, we have to fight against racism too. Ms. McGhee summed up well what our path forward should look like. These are Ms. McGhee’s closing statements to her TED talk, “So we can keep pretending like we’re not all on the same team. We can keep sabotaging our success and hamstringing our own players. Or we can let the proximity of so much difference reveal our common humanity. And we can finally invest in our greatest asset. Our people. All of our people. “
Your commentary linking climate change with current issues brings to the forefront the urgency of acting now beginning with oneself.
Thank you very much MC! You are right. Our fight against racism and climate change begins with ourselves.