2023 will be a turning point for the climate, for our species and for our planet. In 2022, it became brutally clear where we are headed. Although we’d been warned by climate scientists for decades, the Earth itself showed everyone unequivocally that climate abuse has consequences, and we ignore those consequences at our peril.

Superficially, not much seemed to change. The status quo appeared to hold everywhere. Climate abusing governments and corporations and tycoons continued as before. This was true in the United States, in China, in Russia, in U.K., in India, in Australia, in continental Europe, in Japan. Pretty much everywhere.

The standard excuses (and some slight variations) were rolled out by media, PR flacks, politicians and business “leaders.” And objectors were mostly visible in the actions of what appeared to be fringe groups like Just Stop Oil. We would continue to wait for our leaders to actually do something meaningful. Or believe their lies when they say they are doing something to preserve the Earth’s climate.

All the while, physics and chemistry and biology continue to operate as normal, climate collapse accelerates and clueless authorities continue their unprecedented planet-wide murder/suicide. It doesn’t look good.

Below the Surface

Things that are hard to see do still exist. In this case, it’s the fear and anger and concern and anxiety and desperate need to save the climate and our children. People FEEL this. Billions of people. Everywhere on the planet. Loving and caring for children is built into human evolution. It’s the rock solid base of our nature, an evolutionary necessity without which there would be no humans.

It’s not just a superficial cultivated characteristic, like limitless greed which is merely a cultural/political/economic artifact created and sustained by authorities—very stupid and short-sighted authorities.

All of this anxiety, and fear, and love is churning just below the surface. It’s not new. It’s been going on for years. Decades. We’ve been waiting for the authorities to come to their senses and now we can see that they never will. We see that our survival is up to us. But we don’t know what to do—yet. We have no vision and we feel powerless.

We Aren’t the First To Feel Powerless

In the U.K., in the 1600s, people were tired, overworked, underpaid and ridiculed by their own government. Only a small number of propertied men could even vote, much less be actually heard and taken into account by policymakers. That’s when the Chartists arrived, a small group of people uniting working people through a petition that they would present to the House of Commons. This united working people to fight for suffrage, and triggered a movement that eventually succeeded.

In the Soviet Union, the government seemed all-powerful and brutally suppressed opposition. Open revolt was rare because it was so difficult. But quietly, through self-published booklets—samizdat—ideas were formulated and circulated. The crimes of the regime were recorded and shared. The lies that sustained the Soviet Union were exposed, weakened and ultimately taken seriously and believed by nobody. And, ultimately, the people of the Soviet Union removed the system and the leaders who held them back.

We are in a bigger crisis, a worldwide crisis. But the body of latent revolutionaries is huge. It potentially includes all parents that love their children. And relatives, as well, who love their nieces and nephews. It could mobilize nearly every sane person on Earth—people who understand the climate threat, the threat that they increasingly see and experience personally. It includes so many people that the climate revolt, this battle for our children, could easily overwhelm world leaders—politicians, businessmen, dictators, tycoons—and send them all packing into a sudden forced retirement.

It is my intention to awaken this latent movement so they—and we—can ensure that our species and others who share the planet with us survive and rebuild, as well as we can, a safer and kinder and ecologically sustainable civilization. I want to be part of the small group that lights the spark. I feel certain that the dry leaves of anger and anxiety and love are already present.

I want to make this happen in 2023. Because we are running out of time and there is no other way.

What Can Be Done?

One thing that holds us back is that we do not know what to do. And we see the flaws in every tactic and discount the value of every tactic. We have concluded: we don’t know what to do and nothing will work.

This is a false conclusion. I can say this without a doubt because throughout history ordinary people have repeatedly found tactics that worked. Often it’s not one tactic, but a series of them. In our current situation, I envision a huge multiplicity of tactics taking place simultaneously in widely dispersed locations. Each action individually is small and by itself, not very effective. The the sheer volume and variety of tactics, and the never-ending onslaught of them is—in my view—how we will win.

But we must take action, inspire others to do the same, and never stop until we achieve complete success.

I’ve proposed and will be holding small online events—strategy sessions and social events called Virtual Climate Parties. I will begin publishing and distributing climate samizdat. I will invent and promote other tactics and encourage others to do the same. For example, I envision regular silent protests—sunset climate vigils—at various landmarks worldwide. For example, at the Eiffel Tower, the Alamo, the Love sculpture in Philadelphia. Your own local and perhaps less famous landmark.

These tactics, along with the number of activists will multiply. This is our task in 2023 and beyond. This is for us, for our children, for generations unborn. This is for more than survival. It’s for a new culture of love and respect and caring and realism. Yes, realism! Although many will dismiss us as unrealistic dreamers, it’s those who think they can defy Nature, defy physics and chemistry and biology, who are living in the dream world. It’s the climate abusers and their apologists who are woefully unrealistic.

That’s why I call us the Saners. We are in touch with reality. We face it square on. The authorities are in denial, believe in nonsense, and behave in a way that guarantees their own doom and the suffering of their own children. In fact, the only hope for the authorities is that WE STOP THEM and save them from their own foolishness.

We will do exactly that. In 2023. Happy New Year.