This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2015, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.
Some violence is immediately visible. When ISIS stages beheadings online, we respond viscerally to the obscene spectacle. But other kinds of violence are harder to trace.
Scholar Rob Nixon describes "slow violence" as a "violence that occurs gradually and out of sight, a violence of delayed destruction that is dispersed across space and time, an attritional violence that is typically not viewed as violence at all." The conquest of Native America by European settlers clearly featured moments of haunting violence, but is perhaps better understood as slow violence; it is not simply over, but is a multi-century process that continues to this day, resulting in pain and loss that reverberates in hidden corners — in the intergenerational relay of trauma, in structural policies, and in cultural exclusion.
Climate change, too, is not easily televised or traced (occasional superstorms notwithstanding). ISIS grabs headlines, but many argue that the Syrian crisis — and the Arab Spring more broadly — was driven by drought that raised regional food prices. When resources are scarce, pre-existing enmities and conflicts re-emerge. As the slow violence of climate change proceeds, we can expect more problems: wars, refugees, and displacements, not to mention ecosystem destruction and species loss.
Unfortunately, the problem is worsening. The activist group 350.org is named after the carbon concentration (in parts per million) considered safe by scientists, but we recently passed 400 ppm. Meanwhile, scientists maintain that limiting global temperature rise to 2 degrees Celsius — as agreed upon at the 2009 Copenhagen summit — requires us to leave 80 percent of known fossil fuel reserves underground. But fossil fuel companies currently spend millions looking for new sources.
With Paris climate talks approaching in December, the time for gradual change has passed. As Lakota solar engineer Henry Red Cloud puts it, we can't take small steps anymore; now is the time to "run like buffaloes." To begin with, we should pull our money out of fossil fuel companies which continue to profit from climate disruption and have knowingly obfuscated climate science.
On Nov. 10, more than 50 activists gathered at the Utah Natural History Museum to present a petition signed by almost 55,000 people asking the museum to divest its holdings in fossil fuels. Any museum that stands for science should be willing to tell the truth: that we must stop burning carbon. Sarah George, the museum's executive director, may support us, but maintains that the decision lies within the University of Utah system. Museum leaders may not have decision-making authority over university investments, but they can publicly support divestment in order to energize a university-wide dialogue, and we urge them to do so. Although the university website champions a "sustainable and just society," the university still invests in companies who flout sustainability and justice. For three years, activists have asked the university to divest; we need more public pressure.
Naomi Klein, author of "This Changes Everything: Capitalism vs. the Climate," spoke at the event, labeling climate disruption as not merely a crisis, but as an opportunity to rebuild a carbon-free world that is also fair and just. She highlighted indigenous groups resisting fossil fuel development, and advocated reinvestment in renewable energy, green jobs, and public transportation that will benefit poor and excluded people.
To succeed, we must convince people that while investment in carbon (like Utah tar sands) might bring short-term profits, it will not bring long-term well-being. Because of the slow violence of climate disruption, our actions today will reverberate across the globe, and far into the future. Let's stop digging ourselves deeper in the hole, and start reinvesting in the new world.
Paul Wickelson is a resident of Salt Lake City and a co-founder of the Fossil Free Utah Natural History Museum Divestment Campaign.