自治会会長と話して、ウイルスでイベント中止の動きに揃いましょうって。ご了承下さい、近い内に… I talked to the head of the neighbourhood association and we decided to cancel this event to help contain the corona virus (many public events are now being cancelled) we’ll reschedule once things have calmed down…
I’ll be doing my next Climate Emergency presentation at my local neighborhood association, it’ll be in Japanese but please come if you can, the more people show up the bigger the impact, and the bigger the impact the greater the chances of it leading to real action.
[Follow-up comments, written the morning after my Nerd Nite presentation]:
Firstly I want to thank everyone who watched my presentation last night. Despite how I look once I’ve got a mic in my hands (somehow being in the limelight lends me a lot of energy), I’m not a naturally outgoing person (I’m terrible at small talk) so I was very nervous: you were a wonderful audience and made it easy for me to give my talk. Thank you.
I have a few follow-up comments, things I might have said if I’d had more time and/or if I had been quick-witted enough to have thought of them in the moment:
I’m in a caustic mood today (“caustic mood” = 暗くて皮肉的な気分). I mean this post is humor and sarcasm though with a serious point. Enjoy:
How to think things in the 21st century (a guide for beginners):
1) believe in X(ism) and define it as you choose.
2) compare EVERYTHING to your definition of X – all opinions, people, news, documentaries, politics, perspectives, science, EVERYTHING
3) denounce EVERYTHING that is not EXACTLY “X” as you define it (and all people who do not exactly believe this X as you define it) as wrong/stupid/ignorant/immoral/evil
Climate Reality Project (気候現実プロジェクト）、とClimateStrikeOki（気候ストライキ沖）、tensaimon（天才門！）は美浜アメリカンビレッジで２０２０年１月２４日（金）１８時からフラッシュモブをします！歌の題名Staying Aliveは「生き残る、死なない」って意味だから、気候危機にすごくふさわしい：踊るが死ぬかといえば、踊りましょうね！ The Climate Reality Project, Climate Strike Oki, and Tensaimon (me!) are going to do a Flash Mob in Mihama on Friday 2020-01-24!! Please come and join in, because if it’s dance or die we should probably dance!!
As you know I follow this story quite closely, and I can confirm that these figures are an accurate representation of the science. The problem of course is politics: right now it is looking very unlikely we will avert this. Which basically means most humans are going to die in the next few decades.
However there is a silver lining (if you can call it that): at 1.5-2.0 degrees the massive crop failures and resulting famine, whilst leading to enormous suffering and death (from starvation and war) in the short term, will lead (once enough humans are dead) to a collapse of the world’s civilization: at that point carbon emissions will drop to (near) zero, and since nature abhors a vacuum, trees and animals will take over again – those trees will absorb CO2 which in time will cool the earth again.
EDIT 2025/10/01: During my visit to the UK this summer I had a conversation with someone who in recent years had a very similar experience to mine (it seems we share the same nickname). In that conversation, they alluded to, but did not speak out loud, the racist slurs that were said to them. When I originally wrote this post in 2019 I included the slurs in full because this is a traumatic story from my childhood, and I felt I could not tell the story properly without including the language used towards me at that time. But here in 2025 I’m no longer comfortable with writing the racist slurs out in full in this post, so I have edited them out. The rest of the post remains unchanged, including the warning. Thanks for your understanding, and for reading.
WARNING: this post contains (quoted) racist language
People often comment that I am of a somewhat darker complexion than the average white England person. In the mid-eighties, when my family moved to the white largely rural-working class village of Charfield in South Gloucestershire, I started attending the local comprehensive school (Katherine Lady Berkeley’s school, or KLB) and this quirk of my appearance quickly gained me a new nickname, a derogatory slang term for someone of east Asian origin.
Katharine Lady Berkley’s School, photo taken by me in 2017 – by complete coincidence this photo is almost the exact location of an incident I describe below.“a story about racism from my childhood” の続きを読む
This is happening, in Naha in front of the Kencho building and Pallet-Kumoji. Here are the flyers, please share, print, and distribute. Then bring your friends, family, co-workers, bring everybody!! Also, if you want to edit and re-use the design, download the .svg files posted below – it’ll open best in Inkscape though it will open in Illustrator. Also, the event page on FB is here.
