Brooklyn’s Children’s Crusade for climate justice marched through Downtown Brooklyn and across the Brooklyn Bridge today to Foley Square in Lower Manhattan.
And as they passed, the youngsters stopped on the back steps of Brooklyn Borough Hall where Borough President Eric Adams cheered them on.
“Let me tell you why this moment is so important. It will go in history because the Earth has never been changed by adults, it has always been young people,” said Adams as the crowd erupted in cheers and applause.
“This is the moment. It is so important that you say, ‘We are not going to destroy our planet, we are not going to allow big corporations to continue to pollute, we are not going to allow gun violence to destroy our friends and our people,’” he added.
The Climate Strike is a youth-led week of action to demand lawmakers around the world take aggressive steps to avert climate catastrophe.
Among the schools represented in the march included the New York City College of Technology; Park Place Community Middle School; PS 54 The Magnet School for Environmental Science, Technology and Community Wellness; PS 676 Red Hook Neighborhood School, and Khalil Gibran International Academy.
Building upon rally cries, hundreds of students holding signs chanted slogans like “As students united we’ll never be defeated!”
The Climate Strike is particularly crucial considering the current national political environment where the Trump administration, in addition to pulling the United States out of the Paris climate accords, continues to roll back environmental protection regulations.
Timothy Hunter, Student Government President of New York City College of Technology and a CUNY United Senate Delegate told Kings County Politics it’s really inspiring to see the youth taking posters, picket fences, blow horns, and going to the forefront of this movement because New York City is an extremely evolved place.
“If we’re not a beacon of hope for the rest of this country and this whole climate movement, then all hope will be lost not only for this whole entire country but the entire world. So I’m really grateful for all the youth that came out today, and I’m pretty sure that when we meet up with the rest of them in Foley Square it will be a sight to behold,” said Hunter.
The rally participants were to join several young climate leaders around the country and the world including 16-year-old Swedish activist and inspiration behind the protest, Greta Thunberg at Foley Square.
But for Adams, the site of the young marchers were inspiration enough.
“I’m fired up! I’m not gonna let them destroy the Earth anymore,” he chanted.
“When I’m concerned, when I believe we are in a state of despair, when I believe that no one can change the way, the only thing I’m gonna say to my young people is ‘Take control of this and let’s make it happen.’”
