Video: David Suzuki on how the environmental movement has failed fighting climate change

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it is time now though for ask me anything with David Suzuki [Music] [Applause] well I will be retiring from the nature

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of things you know the nature of things was different from almost all other nature programs because it had a very strong point of view that nature was the very basis for our survival and our

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well-being mornings have been coming you know ever since Katrina I thought gee maybe this is a moment of a shift [Music] the signs are all around us global

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warming has already started and we had better listen because what is at stake is how we will survive and if we will survive on this Earth [Music]

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was always great to catch up with David Suzuki I think anytime is a great time to catch up with David Suzuki but this week is an especially good one for all the wrong reasons the effects of climate change are especially visible right now just look out your window in many cases

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uh maybe don't open it though because you don't want that Smoky air to make its way and Environment Canada has issued special air quality statements across every region in this country over the past week fireworks displays this weekend were canceled because of smoke

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and fire bans and early on Friday morning Toronto had the worst air quality of any major city in the world well David Suzuki was the host of the nature of things for 44 years his last show was earlier this year he's been

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talking about climate change for decades on that show and elsewhere this summer you'll be able to hear for yourself starting July 11th ideas on CBC Radio is launching a series called Suzuki's

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Survival Guide now we'll be chatting um uh Suzuki's Survival Guide a retrospective you'll be uh able to hear some of his radio work from the 80s the 90s and 2000 thousands on the topic of climate change but right now David

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Suzuki is here to take your calls and answer your questions you can ask him anything it is the ask me anything call us at one triple eight four one six eight triple three or you can text your question to us at

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226-758-8924 David thank you so much for joining us today really appreciate it well it's great being here thank you so um let's get right into the Wildfire smoke I mean this lingering smoke was relentless this week at points in time I

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know even myself I was worried about not just taking myself out but taking my dog out for a walk in your view how much is this a sign of things to come like is this The New Normal well of course uh you know what's really

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scary is that we may next year look back on 2023 and say oh God it was so great last year every year it's uh going to bring us surprises and uh I don't think

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we have much uh to look forward to in terms of relief the uh the you know we've really gone over the The Edge now uh it's really undeniable that climate

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change is happening and the the tragedy to me and the reason I'm excited about the rebroadcast of some of uh it's a matter of survival which was a series that we ran in 1989 all the warnings

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have been here for so long when you uh hear the first show that will be uh broadcast on the 11th you hear Lucian Bouchard you know this hot environment Minister appointed by Brian

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mulrooney and when you hear him my God he sounds like a radical he's saying we've got to do something about global warming it threatens the survival of our

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species I mean this is 1989. and uh you know we I think the smoke now is finally uh how can you deny it I thought maybe Katrina hurricane Andrew floods in

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Calgary floods in Toronto I thought maybe that would do it but uh now uh the the quality of the air is something that I think has really shocked a lot of

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people how how do you hold on to Hope through all those Decades of the message that you've been giving how do you I mean how do you keep going through that is that not frustrating for you when you have children and grandchildren you have

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no choice you know hope he hope as opium is is not what we need uh we we have and by acting I think acting to try to make a difference is the hope hope without

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action is not hope that's just hopium oh well good things will happen don't worry no we have to act on the belief that if enough of us act we can make a difference and I think the first thing

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we have to do and what governments have been reluctant to do is to say we've got to stop making it worse now the government is saying we've got to start adapting to the changes yes we do but we

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have to stop making it worse which means for heaven's sakes we've got to get off fossil fuels as quickly as we can and the good news is there are all kinds of

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of Alternatives we just have to make the commitment that but my hope is action we've got to act I am here with David Suzuki he is of course a legendary CBC

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broadcaster he's the former host of the nature of things in a few minutes uh we are going to go to the phones to take your call in fact why don't we go to a call right now we have Dakota kelm on the line right now from Kamloops British

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Columbia hello Dakota hello how are you guys doing well what's your question for David Suzuki so being in cam loops you know 2017 we had like the worst air quality in Canada and

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um you know being a youth I'm very passionate about this I recently bought a tunberg's new book The Climate book which is like this all-in-one kind of book um but my kind of question is how as a youth can I amplify my voice Beyond

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just Kamloops in a community level to like a provincial National or even International level level like accredited well you know it's tragic that Greta who

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had uh such a profound impact uh covet kind of um put an end to that to the momentum that it built up but now of course it's going to build back up I think there are a couple of things that

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we all have to do one of course is that we're all contributing to the uh the changes that we have to to uh stop uh in terms of what we buy in terms of how we

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move ourselves uh we we have to re-look at that and and begin to change but I think where youth uh can do something is you can speak out as Greta has you've

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got every right to speak out and to say politicians have who are representing us have got to look Beyond just the next election and uh the the most effective

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way that youth can do that is to get mum and dad and grandma and Grand dad and aunts and uncles to be the warriors on your behalf to say that these damn politicians have got to look beyond the

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next election I was at a meeting where I met a member of parliament from the uh he's a liberal uh he's been a supporter of me and the David Suzuki foundation for many years and I said why aren't you

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guys declaring an emergency the way that you did with covid and he said well if we do that uh then the opposition will get in and they'll be way worse than we are

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so they allow a political thing to to keep them from acting now to do the right thing we can't go on doing that and your mom and dad and your relatives who care about you have got to be the

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spokespeople to say look stop fooling around get on this as an emergency because it's the future for our children and grandchildren that is now being held Ransom Dakota thanks so much for that

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question and for calling in uh Xander I Celine reached out through aircheck asking David have you ever changed someone's mind about climate change and spurred that person to take action if so

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how are you able to do that well I don't know I mean I've had the great privilege and opportunity of talking to Canadians on the nature of things for all of these years and I've

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had I've written uh columns weekly columns and newspapers for over a decade I've I've written many books and you know I've said in in many ways I and the

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environmental movement have failed we've failed of course we've raised issues we've got provincial parks and federal Parks now as a result of the the movement of the environmentalists and

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people that care but we haven't changed the way we see ourselves in the world and I think we're all trapped by the the feelings that rather than the fact that

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we are embedded in nature and utterly dependent on nature for our well-being we've come to think we're so smart we're at the top of a pyramid and everything

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below is is for us and uh you know we've set up economic and political and legal systems to guide us but we leave nature out of that and

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we've got to now recognize that we're a part of a web of relationships with all other plants and animals with the air the water the soil the sunlight that's the world in which we live and we have a

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responsibility and uh that's a hard thing uh a hard thing to see ourselves and that's where I I think the failure of the environmental movement has been a

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failure to shift the uh the the values and beliefs we cling to we had a prime minister for 10 years who said we can't do anything about global warming that's crazy economics and by saying that he

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elevated the economy above the very atmosphere that gives us air to breathe that gives us weather climate and the seasons so we've got to stop this idea that we we're in charge and our

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institutions our economies are are our politics and all of that are the most important thing if we don't embed nature you know where do we think we get pure air this is the thing though to get to

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that that point though David I mean we are um this this change you're talking about we are so far up that tree right we can't just let go so war and Roark has a question here for you that he got to us through aircheck asking what's the right level of personal sacrifice then

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to mitigate climate change how necessary is full system change well look it we're all a drop in the bucket right and so you it's very easy to say well what difference does it make what I do when

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the big corporations are doing that and all the billions of people uh around the world yes we are a drop in the bucket but if you get enough drops you can you can have a significant impact and I Look

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to to Japan in 2011 after the uh Fukushima disaster when they had the big earthquake and then the tsunami they you know their their entire electrical grid was threatened uh at

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that time the Japanese people without any legislation reduced their electricity use by 20 percent in a year and they kept that up

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over the years so it is possible for for people ordinary people when they're they're committed to make a a difference to each Act individually but still have

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a collective uh impact and so you know it depends on how you feel if you understand we're all contributing however insignificant we may feel we still collectively have an impact so we

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have to try to to uh to do something in our own lives and uh but we also have those who represent us who are have to make the big decisions and uh we've got to make sure they understand

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that this should be the highest priority and we're in an emergency now we need a mass movement of the of people to indicate to our politicians we want this

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done now to get started on an emergency well Dr Ishmael marani has called in to join the conversation called in from Ottawa Ontario hello Dr morani uh good afternoon and what's your question for

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David Suzuki David uh Dr Suzuki you know we signed on to the Kyoto protocols and we signed on to the Rio we signed on to Paris and we're we're still not getting

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anywhere you talk about what the federal government should be doing or our government so we should be doing but what can the individual do so that he

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can feel good about doing his or her part in the climate crisis well I strongly recommend that you look at this group in England called jump uh you know about 15 years ago I toured

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across Canada with what we call the nature challenge which was try to get us to reduce our our footprint on the environment and there were 10 suggestions we made they were things

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like don't eat meat one day a week uh walk or take a bike or take a bus one day a week there were very simple things that we could do to have an effect where the the

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the challenge is far greater and jump has now said if you really want to reduce your impact significantly and if we do that individually collectively it could have a huge impact and so they

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look at things like our clothing our food our transportation our travel and it's a much bigger challenge now clothing for example uh you know where into consuming all of the the stuff that

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we buy whether it's clothing or whatever we use comes out of the earth and it comes at a cost to the environment and so our consumption is one of the major

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ways that we know are contributing to the degradation of the of the planet so in terms of clothing for example they say try to buy uh only limit yourself to

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buying three new articles of clothing a year and then for a lot of people apparently this is a huge sacrifice I just recently I talked to my wife I did a recent Mary condo cleaning of my

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closets and my goodness I I gave away all kinds of clothing but I've got enough clothing so I don't have to buy any more clothes until I die well I'm a lot closer to death than most people but

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uh so clothing that's one thing uh you know and you know I I've got a real hobby horse about this that when the war ended in 1945 we were impoverished my

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family was impoverished and clothing was uh something that we had to buy very carefully we always bought blue jeans and all my life I've worn blue jeans because denim Wears Like iron when I see

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people now buying brand new blue jeans already ripped to shreds that to me is an indication of what we uh what we think about the uh the environment that we want to look good I don't happen to

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think it looks good but apparently it's quite fashionable to have your clothing ripped it shreds but they're destined for the dump you know as soon as you're that fashion passes by what kind of an

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animal clothing is to keep you warm in in the winter and cool in the summer and I guess to look good but uh you know let's look at the function and let's be careful about our buying you know in

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terms of of uh uh travel electric cars in the long run are not the solution if you look at the carbon footprint of a an electric car over a lifetime from when

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you uh dig up all the minerals to then the manufacturing processing transportation and all of that the amount of reduction in greenhouse gas buy that car in an entire lifetime is

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only three percent of a reduction over a combustion engine so what's the future then for transportation well we've got to do a hell of a lot more of bicycling walking and public transit we

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the whole idea that every everybody should own a car but an electric car is ludicrous you know the biggest consumer of electric cars right now is China well do we want uh you know a billion Chinese

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with all their own personal uh electric cars that's that's absurd this is not the way that we should be transporting ourselves in terms of you know my biggest sin has been flying I've done a

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lot of flying on behalf of the nature of things when uh a few years ago I said to the nature of things I'm not going to fly anymore for uh to do interviews when we've gone Zoom we've got to start

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making programs in a different way but still they're you know there there are times when the hosts have to travel to to be at an actual location uh for me I've I look at what jump says and they

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say if you want to do a short haul flight let's say Calgary to Vancouver uh once fly once every three years if you want to do a long Hall flight from Vancouver to Toronto or Toronto to

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London once every seven years and and I ask you about the alternatives for transportation just because we know that this summer the first hydrogen-powered train in North America is going to be taking passengers through Central Quebec this is I mean just a demonstration for

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now but I wonder how optimistic you are about about that new technology that is no stop looking at that yes there are new technologies coming in but right now you can't take a bus from Vancouver to

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Toronto we have no bus uh grid across Canada buses have to be one of the major ways we electric uh powered buses have to be one of the you can only take one

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train from Vancouver to Toronto a week we don't have a system of Transport 80 percent of our trains now uh drain movement is to transport Goods a lot of

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oil and gas and stuff being but not people in in Europe 80 percent of the uh trains are to transport people and they have a grid that's electrified we have

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one train a week from Vancouver to Toronto if you're like me old and you need a compartment to do that for me and my wife to do that is eighteen thousand dollars this is crazy trains are not an

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alternative and not only that the carbon footprint of a train is greater than the carbon footprint of an economy class airfare because it it's pushed by diesel

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so we need big decisions now made by governments we need a grid for people to transport themselves but transport themselves efficiently but with a lower carbon footprint Jamie Drysdale has a

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question for you he's calling from Ottawa hello hello David um I have a question um how do you feel that um we do you think that we'll be able to mitigate the

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effects of climate change and if so uh what do you think will be part of the solution in terms of our infrastructure uh and our society well I mean it means uh we have to

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change virtually uh every aspect of the way that we live mitigate we've we're we're past the edge of the cliff we're already uh on our way down we've Now set

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in motion uh changes that are going to take not decades not even a century but many centuries to equilibrate most of the heat that's been absorbed over the

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last few decades has been absorbed by the oceans and that's going to affect the currents and the movement of of uh heat and cold in profound ways that are going to take decades centuries to

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finally equilibrate but I would say the first thing we have to do is stop making it worse you know and that's the we've got to make commit Canada has never met a

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single International promise that we've made to stop uh increasing and begin to reduce our carbon emissions we've never met a single Target and now what are

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people in Ottawa talking about oh Net Zero by 2050. what kind of a commitment is that how many elections will there be between now and 2050 at least seven and probably more and every new government

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acts as if what the previous government did oh forget that we're going to do something different how many politicians in office today will still be in office by 2050. none so who can we even hold

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accountable when we fail to meet these kinds of targets Net Zero by 2050 is nothing it's not a political promise at all we've got to start reducing now and

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we've got to hold our politicians hold their feet to the fire we've got a question for you from Devin bartheon who called in and asked how do

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we change minds of the developing world to care more about climate change well you know you're asking a total failure that's what I've been trying to do now that's what I certainly tried to

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do in 1989 when we did a five-part radio series called it's a matter of survival got a huge response from the audience and in fact that's how we started the

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David Suzuki Foundation we got 16 000 letters this is before email in 1989 in response to our program it's a matter of survival and we're going to rebroadcast some of that starting July

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11th and and uh what we said there showed there was what could happen by the to the World by 2040 and it was a terrifying projection of where we were

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going but the the good thing was we said we don't have to reach that we that's 50 years away we don't have to reach that if we start now but we uh and we got a

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big public response we set up the David Suzuki Foundation trying to find Solutions uh we have for example we have shown after a three-year study with Scientists we've now shown that Canada

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could have a completely affordable a grid electrical grid powered by renewable clean energy and no new dams no new nukes we could have a complete

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renew Green Electrical grid by 2035. all it takes is a commitment of the so-called leaders that are leading us into the future we need an emergency declaration and get on with

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the the many solutions that are already out there environmental groups there are all kinds of groups out there trying to show what can be done once we make the commitment but the changes are going to

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be enormous and as I say uh our biggest impact individually now is as consumers my mom and dad got married during the Great Depression and because of that

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they hammered into me the lessons that they learned and one of the things they said is you know you have to work hard for the money to buy the things you need in life but don't run after money as if

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having fancier clothes or a bigger car or a big house makes you a better more important person you know you need the Necessities in life how much of what we

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now can assume is a necessity we uh we've got become profligated consumers to keep the economy going but this is this can't go on it seems to me in a

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carbon constrained world um we have Kyle walkup on the line from innisville Ontario hello Kyle not bad if we can get you to turn your radio down that'd be great because we can hear the other feedback of the

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background there but what's your question for David Suzuki my question for David Suzuki is um you know I I I'm inspired by him and everything you know it's like I'm I'm a

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Canadian artist myself I listen to CBC you know all the time um I guess my question for him is uh I know I could ask all the environmental questions I want but as as a person

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um as a Canadian artist what would he suggest me to do uh to to be the best person I could be uh to be even maybe even played on this station one day haha

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well I mean as an artist I I know a lot of artists that are are out there supporting environmental groups performing to help raise money for environmental groups artists

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musicians especially have been uh people that have uh very very quickly come to uh uh come to assist environmental groups I

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don't know why that is but music I think as well as uh art uh really touches people in different way I think if we continue to uh to talk about things in

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economic or political terms we get kind of bogged down but it says we need an Anthem we need an Anthem in the way that you know we shall

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overcome uh or uh imagine you have touched us and there you go Kyle you've got it from David Suzuki directly write an Anthem and put that Anthem out uh something like the the we shall overcome or that sort of thing thanks so much for

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your call Kyle and a massive thank you to uh David Suzuki thank you for being our guest today environmentalist activist academic and broadcaster David Suzuki the former host of cbc's the nature of things