The Musical Activist podcast

The Musical Activist XR Special #2: Autumn Rebellion 2019 Sat 12th Oct

On Sat 12th of the Extinction Rebellion protests in London, I trailed the Stroud Fringe Choir around Trafalgar Square, starting with Culture Declares & meeting a diverse range of people: a museum worker, a banker, a young man on his second ever protest, a man who'd brought a ‘barn’ from Somerset, a playwright, a mum, all mixed with music by Emily Hall (So Far), Blythe Pepino (Emergency) and Sophie Sterckx (The Last Tree).

The Musical Activist XR Special #1: Autumn Rebellion 2019 Day 1

On Day 1 of the Extinction Rebellion, I met a lot of mothers and grandmothers, several very committed protestors (one in a D-lock), two people who'd experienced the same Amazon rainforest school project 30 years ago, XR Baroque who were giving a concert by the Treasury and Rupert Read (XR Spokesperson).

The Musical Activist Episode 2: Inika Taylor

Inika Taylor works at the MET Office in Exeter, in the Climate Impacts team. The MET inform our government, so are a key part of our country's contribution to finding solutions to the climate crisis. She was a wonderful early mentor for me as I began my journey into understanding more about climate. The conversation ranges from actual climate science, to how it is being a parent of young children and a climate scientist. Inika says "I hope as scientists we can draw on our emotions more” and her gentle but determined approach comes through, as she navigates what she knows and what she hopes for.

• The MET Office Climate Impacts team
• 9 things you can do about climate change
• A recommended talk about the best thing we can do about climate: to talk about it!

The Musical Activist Episode 1: Julia Steinberger

In Episode 1, I talk to Julia Steinberger, a Professor of Social Ecology who I met on Twitter and who has written a persuasive and emotionally direct blog.  I hope you enjoy listening. Full references here:

1. The intro track Look at the Sky is from my first album We’re inside and outside: listen here https://sarahnicolls.bandcamp.com/track/look-at-the-sky and read more here http://sarahnicolls.com/recordings/
2. The IPCC Special Report, which is deemed ‘conservative’ by all climate scientists gives us only 12 years to completely stop emissions: https://www.ipcc.ch/sr15/
3. I mentioned an environmental arts charity I worked for in Brighton: onca.org.uk
4. Lamb, W. F. and J. K. Steinberger (2017). "Human well-being and climate change mitigation." Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews: Climate Change 8(6): e485-n/a.
   https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/wcc.485
5. Julia’s blog: https://medium.com/@JKSteinberger/an-audacious-toolkit-actions-against-climate-breakdown-part-1-a-is-for-advocacy-7baa108f00e9
6. Blog pt 3: https://medium.com/@JKSteinberger/an-audacious-toolkit-actions-against-climate-breakdown-part-3-i-is-for-individual-f510ee035e13 featuring the excellent tweet by Kate Aronoff
7. Kate Raworth Doughnut Economics https://www.kateraworth.com/doughnut/ and here, https://goodlife.leeds.ac.uk/countries/ ,you can see the 150 different doughnuts of countries around the world, including the ‘best case’ Vietnam.
8. 3D Interactive website: ‘Explore scenarios’ https://goodlife.leeds.ac.uk/explore-scenarios/ Where you can change life expectancy vs use of resources etc. 
9. George Monbiot: Out of the Wreckage https://www.monbiot.com/2017/08/01/out-of-the-wreckage-2/ If you’re time-limited, at least check out especially the bits about extrinsic and intrinsic values (pp.7-9) and the new story (pp.25-6).
10. https://goodlife.leeds.ac.uk/
11. Explore the different scenarios at: https://goodlife.leeds.ac.uk/explore-scenarios/
12. O’Neill, D. W., A. L. Fanning, W. F. Lamb and J. K. Steinberger (2018). "A good life for all within planetary boundaries." Nature Sustainability 1(2): 88-95.
    https://www.nature.com/articles/s41893-018-0021-4
13. The policy idea of Basic Income chimes with the idea of us spending our time doing things that are useful in different ways to keeping the current machine going. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basic_income
14. A nice, funny film about how to talk to people with different values about Climate Change: https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=1&v=aCZcphy4EkU from Climate Outreach https://climateoutreach.org/resources/public-engagement-1-5c-ipcc-sr15/
15. Molly Scott Cato MEP has a lot of brilliant ideas: http://mollymep.org.uk/
16. Corrections on numbers: The time to regrow branches of mammalian tree of life is vaguer than we thought: "millions" not "10 million" as Julia said. The time it's going to take us to roll back the planet's climate clock: 50 million years is actually 2100 under current emission trajectories, not 2050 as I said. 3 million by 2030 is correct.
17. Time-lapse film: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TBikbn5XJhg
18. The Day After Tomorrow https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ku_IseK3xTc Studio: 20th Century Fox Director: Roland Emmerich Screenwriter: Roland Emmerich, Jeffrey Nachmanoff. Cast inc Dennis Quaid, Jake Gyllenhaal
19. Sydney Azari quote
20. Kate Aranoff’s brilliant tweet in in Blog pt 3 above
21. The really nice decision tree “So, you’re ready to take action against climate change?” https://grandgather.com/2018/10/14/so-youre-ready-to-take-action-against-climate-change/ by J Fercrelli, also see below
22. https://rebellion.earth/ and local groups: see main website and facebook
23. https://350.org/ You can donate to help their fossil fuels divestment programme.