Climate Change is Literally Killing The Party
Crazy storms, canceled festivals, and homeless ravers: Climate Change is killing the party.
Climate Change is without a doubt the most pressing issue of our time. Carbon output is at an all time high, the rate of severe weather irregularities continues to soar, and just recently the United Nations released a report that we have about ten to twenty years before we reach irreversible and catastrophic carbon levels that will trigger the climate apocalypse.
YIKES.
But what does this have to do with EDM? This has EVERYTHING to do with EDM!
Because Climate Change is already killing the vibe!
In the last year alone we have witnessed tons of examples of severe weather across the globe shutting down festivals, flooding communities, and bringing the party to a standstill. Out in the fields I have heard tons of personal accounts, heart-wrenching and frightening stories about personal loss and damage to the Earth.
Last EDC Orlando I met a few ravers from Texas who lost their homes to the flooding of Hurricane Harvey. They were dancing their butts off in the pit, but they admitted they knew full and well after EDC was over, they didn’t have a home to return to. I also met a nature photographer out of Denver who told me about a rocky shelf in Yellowstone that had risen about a foot from the ground, an eerie indication of sub-level activity, which some suspect is related to oil fracking in the mid-west.
And lets not forget the running list of festival cancellations and near-misses either! Such as Sunset Music Festival in Tampa, Florida which had to cancel their stacked 2nd day due to tropical storm Alberto. Or Imagine Music Festival which was threatened by Hurricane Florence earlier this year. Or Hurricane Irma which ran out of steam, narrowly missing Lost Lands.
At Imagine, which took place just after Florence, I ran into a friend of mine who I had traveled with to France just last summer. Tired, sick, and stressed, she had lost her voice, and through a string of text messages explained to me that they had left for Imagine just before the Hurricane made landfall: And only that day discovered that her home was under 8 feet of water. She had no home to return to. As I made my way through the campgrounds I took notice of flags and totems all over that read “Florrence Evacuees”. It was difficult to comprehend, being in a place of so much love and joy, to think that so many among us had lost everything while we partied on carefree.
After all that has happened in the last year, it would be a foolish assumption to say that these cancellations and natural disasters won’t affect music festivals in 2019. Because what is happening with Climate Change right now is a very real and tangible threat. Climate Change is wrecking the planet, and definitely killing the party. And it is our responsibility as both sensible humans and relentless ravers to play our part in healing the globe. If not for the globe sake, if not for our sake, then for the sake of the party. For the sake of the music that has saved so many of us. For the sake of our children, and giving them the opportunity to go to a festival, and listen to that sweet, sweet beat.
It’s time for the Festival community to step up its game. Festivals need to find ways to convert their power structures to portable and renewable energy resources, implement strict recycling programs, and give back to the local environments and communities. Ravers need to recycle responsibly, use non-toxic/non-polluting make up and glitter, and generally uplift and encourage each other, spreading the word of the great impending Green Revolution. Because we can have PLUR among ourselves, but can we practice PLUR with the PLANET?
It’s time to save the planet: are you ready Ravers?