Ice-Free Arctic Summers Sooner than Predicted

Cover of a new book, Unikkaaqatigiit: Perspectives on Climate Change from the Inuit in Canada. The book can be downloaded as a .pdf file; text in Inuit, English, and French.

Living in Canada has made me much more aware of the arctic: its people, its animal life, its proximity and preciousness. When you find out that polar bears are symbols on local beer, great grey owls are winter visitors to your neighborhood, narwhals are real, and Inuit people and their art are an everyday part of your culture, it's a lot harder to ignore this vast part of North America.

These new projections point to ice-free arctic waters in summers as early as 2013 - prior predictions were more like 2050 - which would be absolutely disastrous. When, when are our leaders going to wake up and start acting decisively on this issue that impacts every living creature on earth? I've been getting lots of mailings from outraged young Canadians this week, after Canada was awarded a global "fossil" award for being a "worst offender" on global warming, and trying to sabotage the UN climate change talks in Bali. There's a petition to sign:

"Prime Minister Harper's short-sighted, undemocratic and big oil-driven policy on climate change is damaging the world and destroying our image as a good country. We're supposed to be the nice guys, who try to do the right thing in the world.

The vast majority of Canadians are hopping mad on this issue -- we can win this. We just need to show Harper how serious we are that he change course. Sign up now and forward this email to everyone you know - we've got just 3 days to hit 25,000 signatures!"

I've become dubious about the effect of petitions in the U.S., but this one probably has a chance of making a difference. Please sign it and make your voice heard.

Comments

[marja-leena]

Thanks for this very important post, with great links, Beth! I signed that petition yesterday and just a little while ago happened to listen to Al Gore's inspiring speech in Bali : http://pol.moveon.org/standwithal/?id=11782-7862793-q6mUve&t=3 It gives us hope, but only IF every country will participate in change.

[udge]

Signed. "I'm mad as hell and I''m not going to take it any more."

[jzr]

I've signed this petition and like you am really disgusted by both government's disbelief in the need to take action and change our ways. I was in the Canadian Arctic this past summer and found the Inuit people to be delightful and wish I could send a few of our leaders up there to meet them and talk about the issues.

[Jack Ruttan]

It's fun to say "Unikkaaqatigiit."

Oh yeah, online petitions don't do squat. You have to march around, write actual letters, organize, etc.