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Today I have a guest post from Ruth Dawkins. Ruth is a writer and blogger who lives in Tasmania. You can find her at Dorky Mum.
It can be really hard to combine politics and parenting. It’s ironic really, because having children means that you care more than ever about the world around you. You want the education system to work well, for the health care system to be one you can rely on, and for the environment to be managed in a sustainable way.
But when it comes down to campaigning and advocating for those things, much of the heavy lifting is left to those who don’t have families. It is easy when you are a student with just a few hours of lectures each week to give up your time going on protests and lobbying politicians. When you transition to full time work and caring for your children, there is less time and less energy for clambering up lampposts with placards.
We are lucky that social media now allows us to have our voices heard even without taking to the streets, and the Guardian’s recently launched Keep It in the Ground campaign is a great example of this.
Keep it in the Ground is a brilliant campaign because it is very focused on a tangible outcome. It is calling on the world’s two biggest charitable funds – The Wellcome Trust and the Gates Foundation – to move their money out of fossil fuels. If the campaign was successful and this happened it would mark a genuine and significant step in the fight against climate change.
The campaign brings together many different kinds of content – videos, podcasts, news stories, opinion pieces, photography and even poetry. It provides so many opportunities for engagement and education that it will hopefully appeal to a broad range of people.
If you, like me, are a parent then I know you will want your children – and indeed all children across the world – to grow up in a safe and happy place. Tackling climate change is absolutely key to that.
More than 200,000 people have already signed the Keep it in the Ground campaign petition. Please take just two minutes to do the same.
Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
Image may be NSFW.Clik here to view.
