choose people over fossil fuels

For more than 20 years a handful of profligate fossil fuel companies have dominated the field of global warming messaging with a playbook of time-wasting disingenuousness and disinformation. And while fossil fuel companies are obviously not the whole story, the battle lines between the sustainability of all human civilization and the profits of this microscopic cabal of industry barons is getting very crisp very fast.

They are extraordinarily well funded, hire very savvy snipers in the messaging wars, and have an overpowering battalion of lobbyists. Witness the fact that the US is the only major climate player on the planet not to have ratified the Kyoto Protocol. Or the seemingly insurmountable quagmire of points and counterpoints in the annual stalemate at the UNFCCC + COP.

The Earth is in life-threatening triage. It’s time to put hard, direct pressure on the main artery to stop the fastest blood loss.

7 billion people vs 7 fossil-fuel companies. It’s us or them. Period.

I sketched out the concept below after reading McKibben’s powerful Rolling Stone article, which goes a long way to clean up the remaining disinformation out there. My billboards also dovetail nicely with 350.org’s awesome Do The Math tour and their brilliant new Fossil Free divestment campaign — the strategic tip of a clever new spear.