PLEASE NOTE: Roger was unable to get permission to enter the U.S. so he’s Skyping in!

What can we all do to avert catastrophe and avoid extinction? Roger Hallam has answers. In his new book, “Common Sense for the 21st Century: Only Nonviolent Rebellion Can Now Stop Climate Breakdown and Social Collapse,” Roger Hallam outlines how movements around the world need to come together now to start doing what works: engaging in mass civil disobedience to make real change happen. The book gives people the tools to understand not only why mass disruption, mass arrests, and mass sacrifice are necessary but also details how to carry out acts of civil disobedience effectively, respectfully and nonviolently. It bypasses contemporary political theory, and instead is inspired by Thomas Paine, the pragmatic 18th-century revolutionary whose pamphlet Common Sense sparked the American Revolution. “Common Sense for the 21st Century” urges us to confront the truth about climate change and argues forcefully that only a revolution of society and the state, similar to the turn that Paine urged the Americans to take into the political unknown, can save us now.

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About Roger Hallam:

In April 2018, Roger Hallam met with a group of 15 activists, environmentalists, and scientists in a café in Bristol. Along with Gail Bradbrook and Simon Bramwell, he and others founded Extinction
Rebellion.  A former organic farmer and long-time climate change activist, Hallam has been on successful hunger strikes, been arrested 10 times and has served a prison term, all in the service of preventing a climate catastrophe.

He holds nothing back: “Life as we know it is over, hell is on the way, and the only half decent thing to do now is to rebel against the governments which are planning the death of our children.  What scientists have told us endlessly for 30 years is now coming true. Climate breakdown is now everywhere.  We face social collapse, war and starvation–and extinction.”

Roger inspired Extinction Rebellion with his paper “Pivoting to the Real Issue,” which argued that a mass nonviolent rebellion against the regimes leading the world toward destruction was now both possible and necessary.  Extinction Rebellion has chapters in more than 70 countries.  Extinction Rebellion/Capital Region is one of them. 

Roger is coming to the United States to tell the American people that life as they know it is over–climate and ecological breakdown and the collapse of our weather patterns is now inevitable.  He says that huge fires, massive floods and new diseases will only get many times worse. The only sane response in his view is immediate nonviolent mass civil disobedience against the governments responsible for this outrage, and to promote the mass mobilization plan of Extinction Rebellion in
America.

He will be speaking to activists and supporters but most importantly to ordinary Americans to remind them of their own rebellious history and what democracy really means–government by the people for the people.

This talk by Roger Hallam at The Sanctuary for Independent Media is made possible by volunteer labor, thousands of small donations and invaluable support from many organizations.

The Sanctuary for Independent Media is a community media arts center located in an historic former church in Troy, NY.  The Sanctuary hosts screening, production and performance facilities, training in media production and a meeting space for artists, activists and independent media makers of all kinds.

We are committed to lowering the barriers to access for events at The Sanctuary for Independent Media. For people who are hard of hearing or deaf, blind or low-vision, or whose physical limitations can interfere with a satisfying experience, let us know two weeks in advance so we can make appropriate arrangements.