Debate | Issue Four | Green

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I’ve been working at this magazine for two years, making this my third Green issue (I mean, technically my second since last year we called it the sustainability issue, but it’s the same gist). In 2022, I spoke to Te Herenga Waka - Victoria University of Wellington’s Fiona McBride about climate fatalism, and tendencies among young people to believe the climate’s already fucked, so there’s no point in trying to fix it. Last year, I wrote about Solarpunk - the utopian interpretation of cyberpunk where we get our shit together and beat climate change. I’m proud of both of these articles, especially the latter, and I really felt like I was contributing something semi-worthwhile to the climate discussion - even if it only ever reached a handful of AUT students.

It’s difficult to keep that positive morale up these days. I know I’m a bit of a hypocrite, considering how I criticised climate fatalism just two years ago - but fuck dude! The attitudes the coalition government have taken towards the climate, from re-establishing mining practices to kicking Auckland and Wellington public transport plans while they’re down like high school bullies, have been depressing, to say the least. Young people are still the strongest force against climate change, and more and more of us are slowly coming into power. Change feels impossible, but we can’t give up hope just yet.

I grew up on the outskirts of the Waitākere Ranges in West Auckland. Much of my childhood was spent exploring areas in the forests by my homes, being (sometimes literally) dragged on bush walks by my parents, and avoiding the sand during live music nights at Te Henga/Bethells Beach. The area is objectively beautiful - but I’ve always been a city slicker at heart, hence my moving into an overpriced flat in Grey Lynn during my second year of uni. About four days before I moved out, the Auckland Anniversary weekend floods hit, entirely destroying parts of the road that led to the home I spent my high school years in. It felt like a slap in the face, having Wayne Brown complain about “endless orange cones” in the CBD while it was literally impossible for some people to leave their homes due to road workers rushing to get the infrastructure in Waitakere back up and running.

I haven’t been back to Waitākere since my parents moved up north. I now live in Epsom, with a bright green feature wall in the lounge and Cornwall Park 15 minutes away. But I still think back to West Auckland often - it never truly felt like my area, but it’s still home to many of my childhood acquaintances and friends who have been forced to pick up the rubble

of a township torn apart by floods. Every time we drove up Scenic Drive, we passed the house of my brother’s childhood friend. Their house had to be demolished due to a cliff slip behind their whare during the floods.

These are the people who are affected by the climate crisis. While it’s easy for landlords in Devonport mansions to ignore the state of our rural communities, the truth is that nobody can outrun climate change forever. I’m tempted to finish this with some cliche line, like “We need to act now and act fast” - but you know that’s the case. The most important thing I can call for that doesn't feel like I’m beating a dead horse is to ask you all to get involved in local politics. You don’t necessarily need to become a council board member - but you can vote in the next local election in 2025, and you can go to akhaveyoursay.nz to learn about how the Auckland Council is aiming to distribute its funds and give feedback on what issues you think are most important for Tāmaki Makaurau - because otherwise, the only people being consulted by Auckland Council are the rich landlords in Devonport - in which case, we’re all doomed.

Illustration By: Younsoo (Chloe) Kim (she/her)

Palestine and the climate crisis

In the heart of the occupied state of Palestine, colonisation and war are making things so much worse for the climate. The occupier of this state, known today as Israel, is guilty of using environmental racism and injustice, as well as greenwashing, to distract from what it is really doing to the planet and the people whose land they are occupying. These offences are contributing massively to the climate crisis, and unless world leaders step in to stop them, it’s just going to keep getting worse.

Environmental racism means that marginalised groups, like the Palestinians, suffer more from the effects of climate change than others. Israel has used environmental racism towards Palestinians since they became an occupier nation in 1948. Instances of environmental racism towards Palestinians include the draining of the Hula wetlands, separation walls between Israeli and Palestinian settlements, massive destruction during settler attacks against Palestinian property, the illegal dumping of sewage on Palestinian farmland, the destruction of forests, the burning of trees, the loss of green land and natural resources, the contamination of water “sources”, and the destruction of beehives.

Environmental racism means that marginalised groups, like the Palestinians, suffer more from the effects of climate change than others.

These examples of environmental injustice have two major consequences, the first being that climate change disproportionately affects Palestinians. Their food security is threatened, as well as access to clean water and power, and they become exposed to additional diseases and health concerns. A 2018 study found that 92.6% of groundwater in the Palestine region was unfit for human consumption. So why are world leaders so passive and even supportive towards Israel? There’s a multitude of reasons, but let’s talk about greenwashing.

According to de Freitas Netto et al. (2020), greenwashing is when public actors, especially politicians, boast of their contributions to climate health, when in reality they are doing much more damage than they let on. Israel uses greenwashing to get world leaders on their side and draw attention away from the human rights violations they are committing. They engage in greenwashing when they talk about green development to various audiences, deliberately excluding the real-life experiences of Palestinians. Experiences that include displacement from their lands, Israel’s contamination of Palestinian groundwater and the destruction of solar panels, all of which are important environmental cases.

In order to justify colonial projects, Israel blames indigenous Palestinians for wasting the land’s full potential. Zionist theorists (a nationalist movement advocating for colonial projects

on Palestinian lands) assume the narrative that Palestine is a “land without a people for a people without a land” (Hughes et al., 2023), a barren desert ripe for settlers to salvage so they can revive the land themselves. Taking this argument at face value, we look at the effects Israel’s current siege on Gaza alone is having on the climate. According to AK (2023), the global military impression, including Israel’s military, on the climate accounts for an estimated 5.5% of global emissions. Only 35 days into Israel’s siege on Gaza produced an approximate of 60.3 million tonnes of CO2 equivalent. Now, over 160 days after Israel began its onslaught, you can imagine that number to be much, much larger.

Only 35 days into Israel’s siege on Gaza produced an approximate of 60.3 million tonnes of CO2 equivalent.

Even before this siege, the occupied state of Palestine was already suffering under Israel’s rule. The regional temperature rose by 1.5°C between 1950 and 2017 (AK, 2023) and with Israel’s ongoing siege, experts expect the temperature to rise by an additional 4°C by the end of the century. Israel’s bombings have also destroyed many of Palestine’s solar panels, proving that Israel’s war on Gaza is also a war on the climate (Saber, 2023).

With Israel’s ongoing siege, experts expect the temperature to rise by an additional 4°C by the end of the century.

The most important thing you can do to combat this issue is first and foremost to educate yourself. Use multiple trustworthy sources. Sources written by historians, scholars, and journalists who are there on the ground in Palestine. Look at both sides of the story, watch out for people who cite their sources and people who don’t. The second most important thing you can do is take action. There are plenty of communities who work right here in Auckland advocating and calling for New Zealand to hold Israel accountable, to stop the killing of innocent civilians and the destruction of Palestinian land. Communities like Palestinian Youth Aotearoa, Palestinian Solidarity Network Aotearoa and Auckland Peace Action. Join in these communities and engage in peaceful protest to advocate both for the lives of Palestinians, and the lives of every human being who lives right here on Papatūānuku.

Written By Audree Clint (she/her)

WRITER

The New Climate Strikes

Written By Caeden Tipler (they/them) @caedentipler NEWS EDITOR

The message of last September’s New York City climate strike was simple. “It’s about our future,” said teenage climate activist Helen Mancini. The strike came after a northern hemisphere summer of extreme weather events, and as United States President Joe Biden allowed oil and gas projects to continue despite pushback.

Democrat Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez spoke at the march, saying, “We are all here for one reason: to end fossil fuels around the planet.” She called the climate movement “too big and too radical to ignore”. An estimated 50,000 to 75,000 people turned up to the protest - a number of climate protestors the world has not seen since the pre-pandemic student-led strikes for climate.

Our own school strike movement is preparing for what they’ve said will be their “biggest strike ever” on Friday, April 5th. School Strike for Climate Ōtautahi said in a statement, “As the current government proposes climate-butchering policies like the repeal of the ban on offshore oil and gas drilling, as well as a possible treaty referendum, and in the wake of racist policies such as the recent abolishment of Te Aka Whai Ora, this is an especially important time to make our voices heard.”

Fridays for Future Tāmaki’s Pieta Bouma says the demands of the strike come down to three broad but “interconnected” points with more detailed policies underneath them. These are “Climate Justice, Toitu Te Tiriti, and Palestine”. Bouma says it’s important to note this is “one policy manifesting in different ways”. Speeches on the day will touch on each point, and “highlight how these are part of the same bigger issue.”

Bouma, a student at the University of Auckland, says the reason students should turn up to the strike is because “when [students] take action we feel a lot more hope. Students are educated. We know what’s going on. Showing up is much more empowering than sitting at home complaining about the government.”

Showing up is much more empowering than sitting at home complaining about the government.

When I asked her why it has taken the climate movement so long to come back, particularly here in Aotearoa, Bouma said, “People are putting their energy towards a free Palestine. These are such urgent and relevant issues which is why we didn’t want to just be doing a climate protest.”

Climate activist Rhiannon Mackie, speaking to her personal views on the youth climate movement, agreed. “In the past few years, Aotearoa has been experiencing a multitude of different crises. There are still so many politically engaged youth, and young people overwhelmingly care about climate action. But the number of social issues that are on our minds is also increasing.”

She emphasised that although there has been an absence of climate strikes, climate action has continued. “I think that mobilisation doesn't always have to look like big strikes. Mobilisation can be small and still impactful. Mobilisation can be community-led campaigns to protect local areas of importance, or campaigning to get the council to change local laws. It's easy to forget about the work that goes on in the background in order to make mass mobilisations a reality; the smaller, less glamorous elements of campaigning.”

It’s easy to forget about the work that goes on in the background in order to make mass mobilisations a reality

Mackie’s view of the current key goals of the climate movement are aligned with the School Strike for Climate demands. “Right now, we're facing a government that is hell-bent on overturning environmental protection laws and allowing polluting industries to continue to destroy nature. From allowing more mines on conservation land to bringing back offshore oil and gas exploration, it's a pretty dire situation. And that obviously pales in comparison to the attacks on Te Tiriti o Waitangi.”

Last year, hundreds, if not thousands, marched in Pōneke in a strike for climate, but Tāmaki Makaurau struggled to see the same numbers. Neither city was able to return to pre-pandemic levels. Whether this year's climate strikes will be as successful is yet to be known. However, the backlash against this government’s environmental policy we’ve seen so far could be an indication that this year's climate strike is going to be a lot bigger.

Climate activist Helen Mancini looked at the environmental crisis and asked, “How could you not dedicate your lives to stopping this?” Rhiannon Mackie says, “No matter what, we'll still be holding the line to protect people and nature.”

“No matter what, we’ll still be holding the line to protect people and nature.”

“As someone who's now outside of the youth climate space, although still a young person, it's not my place to tell the youth climate movement what it should be. I think there's a real need for older generations and more seasoned activists to support the youth movement - but that support needs to look like guidance, not making decisions for them. I have full faith in the youth climate movement to know what needs to happen next.”

Pieta Bouma says the next Fridays for Future event is the Earth Day event in Albert Park on April 20th. She described this as “An event for building community, making connections between different kaupapa and having some fun.”

Mackie explained the most pressing, “underpinning” issue of the climate movement is the new fast-track consent bill, which would allow decisions on projects that have the potential for environmental harm to be left to just three ministers: Chris Bishop, Simeon Brown and Tama Potaka. The new process would avoid the usual opportunities for iwi and public consultation and the checks and balances we are used to. “Right now,” Mackie says, “one of the biggest calls for action is for people to submit in opposition to the new fast-track bill. The more people who oppose the bill, the more chance we have of shutting it down.”

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April 12th at Whammy Bar with MOKOTRON, Caru, Big Fat Raro, Akcept, Netana, Hasji, DJ Oboe, GALOLEAFI, and Big Wā

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Dougfest Jr

April 20th at Big Fan

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April 13th at Whammy Bar with Soft Bait

Heavy, psych, alternative Tix $30 from UTR

Flowerstream EP Release

April 20th at The Wine Cellar

With Samara Alofa + TOOMS

dream pop, punk, indie Tix $10 from UTR

I blink as the golden sunlight bleeds through a slender gap in the curtains. Faint purple hues creep into the blue sky as evening approaches. Opening the curtains, I sit on my windowsill with a can of lemonade and watch as a plane passes overhead. Its vapour trail slowly turns from white to peachy pink. For a moment I feel like a Disney princess, expecting bluebirds to perch along my arms and sing to me. Wisteria’s sweet scent dances towards me from the trees outside my window. They whisper goodnight to each other and just past them, the tide sings a lullaby to the shore. The crescent moon watches silently, waiting for its turn to shine at us, only for us to shut our eyes against it and drift into another morning.

But when my eyes open they are not greeted by birdsongs or a flood of sunlight. No beautiful flowers or blue skies. Where did they all go? They lie in the depths of my memories where they cannot be touched or tarnished by this cruel world. Or maybe we were the cruel ones, finally facing the consequences of the many mistakes we all made. Storm after storm, we wait for something to change. Maybe it will all stop one day. Maybe we will make it to that day. They say to look to the stars for answers, but all I see is smog.

I stand up, finally, and rub my eyes. My small apartment room, the only inhabited one in this building as far as I am aware, acknowledges me with the creaking of a floorboard as I step toward my closet. Yawning and stretching my arms, I look over my three clothing options for today. A navy blue safety suit, a purple one, and a black one. Black. Next, I look at my accessory options. A brown oxygen mask or a green one? The 250L oxygen tank or the 500L? Gloves, safe shoes, earmuffs and good luck charms. My brother had gifted those to me three years ago on my birthday. All eight of them dangle off different parts of my outfit every day. They must be how I've survived so long. I attempt to shake the thoughts of him out of my mind, but they only seep further into it. Sometimes my thoughts are like parasites. The more I fight them, the more they intensify.

The sound of my footsteps echo on every step of the staircase. They are the only sound, other than my breathing. I check one more time to make sure there are no air leaks in my gas mask. Taking a deep breath of the purified air in my oxygen tank, I walk

through a large door onto the open terrace. My eyes wander, looking for hope, but it's nowhere to be found. It’s nowhere at all. My gaze settles on a patch of ground that is slightly cleaner than the rest. My brother used to sit there with me. I wish he still could.

Finally, I take a seat. My feet dangle over a thick, green, smog that engulfs what once was a beautiful home to so many people. The sky has greyed, like most of us, and not a bird is in sight. I’m not sure they exist anymore. Lights that once brightened this city now only cast shadows. Electricity many relied on for survival has long disappeared. The global blackout caused a lot of factories to be abandoned, sitting alone, diffusing all kinds of chemicals into the world until the air was too thick to breathe. It’s only gotten thicker. Storms, fires, droughts. Countless tragedies came and went one after the other, taking far too many people with them. I’m so tired of being alone, of rotting in a world that’s rotting away. A soft pain spreads in my chest as tears begin flooding my mask. Burnt houses littered across the city, my own somewhere in the midst, blur together morphing into the same grey abyss as the sky. Is this the end of the world?

Illustrations By Gabbie De Baron (she/her) @gabizzlesizzle

Written By Evie Richardson (she/her) @evi3m4y

The Great Auckland Public Transport Conundrum

Dismantle, repeal, abolish!

Current political commentary suggests that we’re living in a time of disillusionment. More or less - what the hell is going on? The current government has come in hot, dismantling and abolishing policies made by the previous Labour government.

The media has been saturated with examples of this, particularly as the incoming coalition government rushed to tick off all 49 items of their 100-day plan. Every single of those 100 days, it felt as though there was another item in the news relating to transport. Not something that I often find myself feeling thrilled about - but as an avid bus taker, I was curious.

The list included disbanding the Auckland Light Rail (ALR) project, removing fare discounts on public transport and a new transport policy plan (which in short terms is very road heavy and rather light on environmental outcomes). For a city where two million bus trips are being made by commuters weekly, the moves seem strange.

Surface Light Rail and Auckland Light Rail are TOTALLY different (well, slightly different)

Despite a move in the opposite direction by the government, 70 percent of Aucklanders are calling for investment in mass rapid transit (things like light rail, trams on the roads, more trains). They’re backed up by more than half of the local boards.

Despite this, in that new transport policy plan (which I referred to earlier) released earlier this month, no alternative to the recently axed light rail project was suggested. So, one group is aiming to change that. Surface Light Rail for Auckland is a new group lobbying for a stripped back version of the initial light rail plans.

Co-founder of the group, Rachel Bate, says they started the project to combat the persistent problems of congestion and emissions in Tāmaki Makaurau. Bate says the government has been aware of a need for mass-rapid transit in Tāmaki Makaurau since 2015.

“The problems that mass rapid transit would have addressed

are still there. We still have congestion in the city. We still have buses overcrowded, and buses so full they drive past you.”

It may seem strange that the group is pitching something that sounds extremely similar to the ALR project that just got slashed. Bate herself says the same, but the key difference is that Surface Light Rail is all about being simple. The group is pitching trains on the surface (on or alongside roads).

When talking about the axed ALR project, Bate said everyone had got really ahead of themselves, diverging from trains on the surface and expanding their plans to tunnels. And because of this, everyone I’ve talked to about the idea of light rail has told me the same thing. ALR was really really really expensive.

Bate says the simplicity of their project drives her optimism that it will avoid the same fate. “Our plan is to return to the original plans for light rail. Essentially, it’s a tramline on the surface of the road. Auckland roads are already built for surface light rail, they used to have trams running down them, so why not use that?”

Buses are expensive with a capital E

Beyond the government stats and transport policy plans, it’s strikingly clear that public transport in Tāmaki Makaurau is failing to provide for everyone.

I spoke to councillor Macron for Waitakere, Shane Henderson, to hear what the council has to say about the whole conundrum. Shane hit me with the hard facts. If you live a mere 15 km from the city centre (which is blank number of the suburbs in Tāmaki Makaurau) you are paying some of the highest public transport costs in the entire world. Simply put by Shane, “That’s not right.”

Public transport is not only a necessity for Aucklanders to live their day-to-day lives, but also a key player when it comes to improving environmental outcomes. As Shane Henderson put it, Tāmaki Makaurau is undoubtedly a “car-centric” city, something that’s not ideal for our climate.

“There are places that are beautiful jewels in the crown of

Auckland but you have to drive and contribute to climate change to get to. We see climate action as our duty and we have goals that we have to meet in terms of our emissions profile.”

Bate talked about those same environmental outcomes. “We have obligations under the Paris Agreement to reduce carbon emissions and I don't like our chances of meeting those, especially if the only viable way to get around Auckland is to drive.”

More than 80 percent of us are worried about the impacts of climate change. Nearly two million trips are being taken on public transport in Tāmaki Makaurau a week. These issues are affecting an entire city. So what can be done?

Put down this article - it's YOUR turn (actually, don’t put it down until you read this paragraph)

There’s long been preconceived ideas that local government may not be exciting. This was highlighted in 2022’s local body elections, where less than 30 percent of 18-25 year olds actually voted. Admittedly it may not have the same glitz and glamour of the general election, and there’s certainly no controversial comments from Winston Peters to keep things exciting. But the truth of it is, those lengthy council meetings are where the real stuff happens. The ground up, community organised and driven action.

Surface Light Rail for Auckland has pitched to the council multiple times, most recently on their long term plan. The long term plan comes around every three years and is open for submission each time. This means it’s a place for Aucklanders to tell the council exactly what changes they want to see in their city over the next three years.

Bate and Henderson put it the exact same way. If people want something and fight for it - it’s 100 percent more likely to happen. If these issues rile you up, you can have your say to the council.

Head to akhaveyoursay.aucklandcouncil.govt.nz to see which projects are open for submissions and feedback. Or join the People's Panel to take speedy surveys and spill all your opinions on topics that are affecting Auckland currently. Or sign the Surface Light Rail for Auckland petition. Or just do all three! Your options are endless.

Illustration By Ann Mariya (she/her) @@yourloveannnn

sustainability? Being a kid wearing gardening gloves too big for your hands and spending your time in a veggie patch? Do you reminisce about being in primary school and learning about the threes R’s for the first time? It’s okay if you answer no, I don’t think many people do.

Regardless of whether you fancied yourself a nature god, channelling your inner David Attenborough or Steve Irwin, we can all recall a time when sustainability was more at the forefront of our minds than it currently is.

This is why initiatives like AUT’s Green Impact help busy students implement more sustainability on campus, in the whare and in day-to-day life.

Green Impact is a sustainability programme and a fun competition all in one. Teams form together to complete a range of actions such as reducing the use of single-use plastic products to developing energy reduction campaigns for buildings around campus.

I had a kōrero with the Green Impact team, Sustainability Graduate, Amelia Adams and Head of Sustainability, Lucy McKenzie, to learn more about the programme.

What is Green Impact and what exactly do you guys do?

AA: Green Impact is a sustainability programme for students and staff who want to implement sustainability actions on campus and at home. It’s a free, fun competition where you form teams and complete a range of sustainability actions in your own time.

You can either complete predefined actions or create your own. Your actions earn you points, and at the end of the competition, teams get awards based on the points they’ve acquired.

Green Impact Express consists of 10 achievable actions students or staff can implement to reduce their carbon footprint considerably. A certificate of completion is sent to people who have completed all ten actions.

What are Green Impact’s goals for sustainability on campus and beyond?

AA: We aim to raise awareness about sustainability issues and encourage staff and students to incorporate sustainability actions into their everyday lives.

AUT has committed to the United Nation’s Sustainable Development Goals and has a sustainability plan, which includes several sustainability targets. These include targets around halving waste to landfill, reducing water consumption by 20 percent, and halving CO2e emissions, all by 2025.

to motivating people to be more sustainable?

AA: The problems that we’re dealing with climate change can’t be solved by individuals alone. Collective action will make a meaningful impact on the health of our environment and people. That's where Green Impact comes in – it's all about rallying staff and students to team up and take on actions that no single person could handle alone.

The competitiveness aspect of Green Impact encourages friendly rivalry between teams. Becoming the overall Green Impact winner at AUT motivates teams to incorporate more sustainable actions into their work, study and personal lives. Students who complete Green Impact or Green Impact Express receive a digital certificate and can incorporate this achievement into their CV.

What are some of the tasks that members have to do?

AA: The actions in the toolkit range from simple actions like reducing how many single-use plastic products you use, such as disposable coffee cups, choosing sustainable travel modes and growing your own herbs. There are also bigger projects that can effect wider change, such as working with the sustainability team to develop an energy reduction campaign for a campus building.

What are some proactive approaches that Debate readers can apply to be more sustainable?

LM: Use sustainable travel to access AUT’s campuses! Travel to campus by students and staff is our biggest source of CO2 emissions and one of the ways you can significantly reduce your carbon footprint. Once the 50 percent discount on public transport finishes this year tertiary students can apply for a HOP card concession and receive at least 20 percent off the fare.

Other actions are easy and when done by many, they have a significant impact. These include:

- Unplugging your devices once fully charged

- Using reusable plates and coffee cups at cafes

- Using a reusable drink bottle rather than purchasing water

- Turning off your laptop or device when you’ve finished using it

What can Green Impact hope for the future of sustainability within AUT?

LM: A key sustainability target is to halve our CO2e emissions by 2025. AUT’s draft strategy has been released and it highlights AUT’s aspiration to be a net zero-carbon university by 2030. Early CO2e emissions data indicates that AUT saw a 36% decrease in CO2e emissions in 2023 compared to our baseline in 2018.

the amount of waste we send to landfill, which involves sorting items in the bins to ensure we are recycling and composting the greatest amount possible. Work to expand this approach across all three campuses is progressing and we expect it will enable AUT to meet another sustainability target, which is halving the amount of waste we send to landfill by 2025.

What is AUT’s biggest problem regarding sustainability?

LM: Factors that make sustainability difficult include being based in a geographically spread city where there has been insufficient investment in public transport to support sustainable travel for our staff and students. Global factors include operating in an international market which means we must engage and contribute internationally, and attract international students, staff and partners.

Students, staff and nature gods alike can register at Green Impact by creating or joining a team. Teams can consist of three to ten people, and once registered you can start completing actions by logging progress to the toolkit.

For more info, get in touch with the sustainability team: sustainability@aut.ac.nz

Alternatively, you can register for Green Impact Express, the programme tailored for individuals. The express programme features 10 simple actions designed that incorporate sustainability into your life and shrink your carbon footprint.

I’ve always wanted to be a mum. Whether it was because of an expert-level marketing campaign by The Patriarchy™, or because I grew up in a child-oriented family, I just knew that I was looking forward to becoming a mother. The idea of creating and nurturing a new human being with infinite possibilities and potential seemed magical. Babysitting taught me so much about myself, a hint of my future parenthood to come. Patience, joy, resilience and the privilege of knowing someone while they’re still working it all out. I couldn’t wait to find the love of my life, finish studying, get a job and start the journey myself.

Growing up in the late 90s/early 2000s, I was aware of the looming climate crisis. The argument about its name (“It can’t be global warming if we’re still having all these crazy cold snaps!”). The scientists who warned us of how many degrees would tip us over the edge, and the estimation of which year would be the year it was too late. I accompanied my dad to Green protests, wore Nuclear Free Aotearoa t-shirts and went on school trips to pick up rubbish around waterways - I wasn’t clueless. Until the world news started looking overtly grim, my plans really hadn’t changed. Even after I’d gone through an angry feminist awakening in my late teens, I knew that if I was having kids I wouldn’t be putting up with any incompetent or sexist man as a co-parent. I’d focused on my studies, I got an abortion in my second year of uni because it wasn’t the right time yet. But then it all hit me.

In 2020, the news of raging bushfires in Australia was palpable evidence of climate change at work. On the 4th of January, the sky outside my Grey Lynn flat went apocalyptically orange. Admittedly, I had just dropped a tab of acid and I truly thought I was about to die (until I remembered how to check the news), but this was a strange and new revelation for me. The effects of climate change were getting closer to my doorstep. The immense dread and fear I felt about it was increasing. Why would I want to create a child who would be made to grapple with that?

In early 2023, the country watched record-breaking rains hit Tāmaki Makaurau, causing catastrophically damaging and deadly floods. I watched as the creek in my yard burst at its seams, and a tree fall on my car. I packed emergency kits and cat carriers in case we needed to evacuate. As the storm moved down the country, my flatmates and I were frantically calling and texting our friends and families to check they were safe. Again, I thought, my god, how could I possibly make a child suffer this?

As these catastrophes veer nearer and nearer to my lived reality, I’m forced to imagine the horror of escaping fires and floods with a baby strapped to my back. I’ve come face to face with the hypothetical future of those children, who I hope would outlive me, and what I’m leaving them to deal with. The anxieties and fears I’ve lived with for years, only bigger and scarier than ever? I hope I’d raise good protestors, good people with strong ethics and morals, for what? So they can spend days, weeks,or years of their life being outraged, and fighting what feels like a losing battle? I wouldn’t wish it on my worst enemy.

There is plenty to be said about the morality of deciding to have children. Is it ethical to bring a child into the world without their permission? Is it fair to create a new life when there are already children who are in desperate need of care? What does it mean for me to burden a child with my faulty genes, disabilities, intergenerational traumas and a predisposition to depression and anxiety? None of us chose to be born, and if I’d been given the option of tapping out, knowing everything I know, I wonder if I would have jumped ship. I may have chosen to reincarnate into a house cat and lived my life with a childless, double-income millennial couple.

To have children, or not to have children? That is the question. I’m decidedly pessimistic about the whole ordeal. With bad climate news being thrust at us through our phones and TVs non-stop, it’s easy to imagine many of our feelings about the future tilting towards panic. We can mourn together by validating each other's fears and lost dreams, and if we hold hands while we walk into the last, scorchingly hot, sunset, we’ll at least do it together. Hopefully, we can still turn this cursed ship around, and the weight of deciding will lighten just a little bit more.

Written by Tashi Donnelly (she/her) @tashi_rd

Songs to Listen To As Songs to Listen To As

A few days ago I dreamt that it was snowing in my backyard. The sky was a deep, leaving-the-house-at-5am kind of blue. A grey cloud decided to settle by me, before lightning struck three times. It was beautiful, but also eerie - like something was wrong, but it was out of my hands. Interpretations I found online were as vague as horoscopes – which I do enjoy indulging in, for the record – claiming my dream represented new beginnings and emotional turmoil.

Nevertheless, this scene of meteorological anomalies had me feeling a little more melancholic about the state of the world. Winds and droughts, accelerating wildfires, the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, increased rainfall and flooding buildings…

Last year we collectively broke a world record, but not the fun kind that they put in ‘Guinness World Record’ books. In 2023, the average global surface temperature was 118 degrees Celsius, making it the world’s hottest year in the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s climate analysis since records began in 1850. What’s more, there’s a one-in-three chance that this year will be warmer than the last!

In the wake of these feelings of powerlessness, depressing statistics and surrealist visions, I offer a pacifier. When I want to forget, or hyperfixate, music becomes my lifeline. I’m an optimist, but sometimes allowing yourself to feel bad holds catharsis.

I know that whole explanation was reminiscent of trying to find a recipe and getting some lady’s verbose backstory first, but I hope it made you feel less alone. The world is burning, so here are some of my top picks of songs to listen to as we breathe in the smoke.

“XS” - Rina Sawayama

You’re familiar with Sharpay Evans’ bop, “Fabulous”, yes? Well, “XS” is that song’s older sister. The title is a play on words, with “XS” referring to the clothing size, as well as the excess that comes with materialism and the insatiable pursuit of wealth.

Sawayama explains: “The earth truly is taking in as much as it can hold, and even though we have everything we need we want more, at the cost of finite resources and ecological balance.” Think flexing culture, fast fashion, and hallmarks that make you go: “Damn, so they have money money” (e.g. stacked Cartier bracelets). Of course, we can have nice things, but also have grace, and take care not to girl-boss too close to the sun.

“When the Fire Comes” - Kero Kero Bonito

Dude this song is so good it makes my inner monologue shut up. I don’t know what the heck that instrument in the intro is, but it sounds like one of those slider whistles or a pan flute. I digress. The band revealed that “When the Fires Comes” is about the “worldwide wildfires heralding the seemingly imminent climate change apocalypse.” It was partly inspired by their own experience during their 2018 tour when they got caught under smoke from North Carolina’s Camp Fire, which is said to have been the deadliest wildfire in the history of California. This is definitely one to listen to when smoke clouds turn the sky an apocalyptic orange - a throwback to January 2020, when the Australian bushfires did just that to our skies here in New Zealand. What a time to be alive.

“Wild Time” - Weyes Blood

Weyes Blood wrote this one for all of the overthinkers coping with the harsh reality we live in that is scattered with environmental crises. She wrote this with the perspective of longing for Mother Nature amidst chaos, articulating: “What if the world has always been ending? What if the sprawl of our cities are just as wild as the forests? We’re animals, we play out a very precarious drama of life… What if climate change and the destruction of our natural habitat is a reflection of the nature within us, however sublimely horrifying and hard to understand?… Maybe getting in touch with that as a culture and society would avert the worst-case scenarios of ecological crisis and existential dread.” Basically, she’s telling us to turn that #worrier energy into #warrior energy and embrace that a lot

As The World Burns As The World Burns

of our chaos is out of our control, occurring in our “advanced” world just as it does in our natural one. I suppose it’s a call to go wild and do some wicked inward reflection.

“Earth” - Imogen Heap

With a 6/8 time signature, and strictly acapella nature, this song is Owl City meets Pentatonix. The pitch-perfect vocals scratch an itch in my brain, and I haven't been the same since! It’s seemingly written from the perspective of the planet, as she scolds mankind for acting like we own the place when we’ve only just arrived. I watched Blog #36 on her YouTube Channel where she talks about her process and it was super refreshing. She is an artist. Regarding planetary issues and her role in them, she says: “We’re all a bit in the dark. You know, we take our recycling out and we do all these things, but really, really, really… is that really helping? And, you know, maybe… I don’t know. Anyway, there’s lots of questions and I’ve been doing lots of reading up and talking to people about it all.” This is the way to go. Keep learning and putting in the effort, in spite of the doubt.

“I Want Wind to Blow” - The Microphones

Now, this one doesn’t necessarily hold intentional ecological connotations, but I think that this song can help fill the void of helplessness. This song encapsulates the feeling of the word aftermath. As if disaster has struck and it’s put you in a state of inertia. It’s for the end of the movie, when the wounded heroes have made a mess of the city and may have lost their lifelong friends, scattered amongst the wreckage A song for cliffhangers, open endings, uncertainty, and living with “no night, no golden sun”. For when the mundane becomes excruciating and you want to shout: How dare the world keep spinning! Why must we be expected to keep fighting after all this loss, when the fruits of our hard work leave much to be desired? What do I do now? Notably, there is a 3-minute-long instrumental at the end of the song, giving you time to think - the credits roll.

“We Didn’t Start the Fire” - Fall Out Boy

I could not write this piece without mentioning this banger. If you’re not aware, Fall Out Boy recently rewrote the lyrics to Billy Joel’s “We Didn’t Start the Fire”, using references from 1989-2023. According to bassist Pete Wentz, they “felt like a little system update would be fun”. Concurring, I’d like to take this opportunity to thank Fall Out Boy, for the delicious lyrics, “Fyre Fest, Black Parade, Michael Phelps, Y2K”. I regret to inform you that their rendition of the hit is not in chronological order like the source material, but it is - I promise - an unhinged, wild ride. Both versions of “We Didn’t Start the Fire” show that strife in the present day is following a cyclic pattern settled by preceding generations; establishing that the tatters of the modern world aren’t a result of one single generation. And so, the song implores everyone to unify in our shared distress and experiences, as we see parallels between social issues and pop culture across time.

Honestly, even thinking about 2030 makes me feel a little sick, but I don’t think the future is bleak. Sure, Mother Nature may not need us, but for what it’s worth, we’re here, and we can help her. We’re here and we need each other. We’ve been through so much, yet time passes and we persist. All we can do is care and try – together !!!

I leave you with one of my favourite poems, “To Be Alive” by Gregory Orr:

To be alive: not just the carcass

But the spark.

That’s crudely put, but…

If we’re not supposed to dance,

Why all this music?

Written By Neena Contreras (she/her)

5 Green Movies and Hold the Ham

By Nathan Cosmic he/him @nathan.cosmic

CONTRIBUTING WRITER

Since the dawn of technicolour, the colours of cinema have told us many stories. Orange in Francis Ford-Coppola’s The Godfather (1972) foreshadows death. In Star Wars’s The Empire Strikes Back (1980), red symbolises evil. Pink in Legally Blonde (2001) symbolises an outsider and femininity that speaks to the patriarchal way the law is practised.

Green in film can have various meanings and no obvious clear-cut cinematic meaning. Yet, the movies listed here have all used it inventively. The list contains different but entertaining movies you must see. Showing a master class in filmmaking and story-making, the films listed contain ideas that can be engaged with in your own lives.

planet of the apes (1968)

The movie opens with our astronauts George Taylor, Landon and Dodge, who crash land on a desolate, deserted, dead world. The planet looks like the day after an apocalypse, with no signs of life, just rocky terrain and lifeless still rivers. The planet's environment is silent. There is nothing to be heard. The attention is squarely on the three crew members' survival.

The surviving crew have three days' worth of water and supplies. Towards the end of the third day, a plant is found, which signals civilisation. However, they find humans dressed in rags. Mute and primitive. Then, out of the grass, a fierce group of apes on horses erupt, treating the found humans as prey.

The movie's green motif marks the familiar. When the first sign of life is found, it is a simple weed growing out of the sand, which grows into a field of long grass where humans are hunted and caged by apes. The astronauts quickly realise the planet they landed on isn't as they thought. Instead, they've landed on an unfamiliar planet where the food chain hierarchy makes them dinner or a science experiment. The colour green marks this transition. Before, they were interstellar explorers, but the crew's place in the animal kingdom changed in that field of long grass. Their savage ape masters catch and kill humans for sport.

From its messages of ignoring scientific opinions to its allegory of human treatment of the environment, the Planet of the Apes is a prophetic depiction of the modern world.

atonement (2007)

Atonement tells the story of a girl who trusts her own eyes and accuses those around her of what she believes to be true. Her accusations lead to the changing fates of those around her. She’s filled with guilt for causing such harm.

The film begins in the countryside of an expansive estate. The sun is beaming down on green rolling hills, summer flowers, and the glistening water of a lake. With its bright meadows, the English countryside is backdropped by a rare bright blue sky. The estate’s tenants are bathing in the sun and swimming in the lake. Others are running in the fields of the floral array. It was all peace before the storm. The English countryside melts into the night while our tattle tale of a character (Briony) begins telling the untruth. Night falls, and doom approaches.

Chaos erupts. Scandals begin with love affairs, violence and arrests, all spring out from her lies. These crimes have repercussions, and their effects ripple throughout the film. Briony must live with this fate, and the oncoming events of the Second World War worsen these wounds.

There is a stark change in scenery once the movie fast-forwards into the Second World War. The wartime scenes are bleak, grey and cold. The film’s environment has all the joy and colour wrung out as if that summer’s day had just been a long-awaited dream.

Portraying the consequences of Briony’s actions, the movie’s astute narrative structure presents a heart-breaking and subversive ending. Atonement is a modern, thought-provoking tragedy.

green for danger (1946)

This may be the greenest movie on the list; however, it is too bad the director chose a black-and-white filter to put over the whole movie. Jokes aside, the black-and-white early 20th-century film aesthetic does not distract from the tension and pure mystery this film exudes.

Set in 1940s Britain during the Second World War a postman suffers a non life-threatening injury during an air raid. They subsequently die on the surgery table, but the procedure was meant to be straightforward. Foul play is afoot. The suspects? Three nurses, a surgeon and an anaesthetist. As the movie unfolds a nurse gets killed, and another nearly dies of gas poisoning. The likely suspect is the anaesthetist.

In Green for Danger , green symbolises life painted over by black. Like a surgery room, the colour green, which is typically associated as a sign of safety, is turned on its head as an inspired indicator of death. The patients and the doctors thought they were safe, for they were not on the front lines of the world war, yet never were; there was always someone watching with a motive to kill.

shutter island (2010)

Green is not a commonly used colour in the prison thriller Shutter Island , directed by the legendary Martin Scorsese. Still, the few times it was used, it was done thoughtfully and ingeniously.

Our main character, Teddy Daniels (played by Leonardo DiCaprio), is a US marshal tasked with investigating the escape of one of the mental hospital’s patients on Shutter Island. When Daniels dreams of his dead wife throughout the film, green is in the background. The colour becomes more noticeable when he starts seeing his wife after a multi-day storm. Tree debris is all around him. Now, the meaning is revealed. Green is the sign of what is real, and the plot twist is shown through it.

Through this colour, the movie tells us a story of what we need as humans. A reality, an identity. If who we are as humans is based upon dreams, our reality becomes confusing and challenged, proposing maybe our lives are just what we imagine.

Martin Scorsese’s masterful direction puts us through an immersive journey with cunning storytelling tricks and camera work. The smartfully induced immersion creates an atmosphere where you are one with Daniel’s understanding of the world and what you believe. You trust him and distrust who he distrusts even when the evidence points to the opposite. But in the end, you want to separate yourself from Daniels. Shutter Island speaks to the human drive to always accept the reality we want, not the one we have.

predator (1987)

Full of cheesy lines, unbelievable stunts and over-the-top acting, Predator is a cult classic for a reason. The movie makes you want to stand up, go “Hell yeah!” and hunt down an invisible alien in the Central American jungle.

Waging through the jungle, our rag-tag group of muscled commandos are unafraid of the natural elements. Instead, they fear an invisible, unknown alien who scans them from afar with infrared eyes. The green jungle acts as a heavy, mysterious cloud. Within it lurks the Predator, stalking its prey. The thicker the jungle, the denser the mystery and panic. All the characters can do is hide.

Beware what lurks in the green of the jungle. You don’t catch the Predator; the Predator gets you

a conversation with: Christopher Dews

Christopher Dews is a Tāmaki Makaurau-based artist who mainly uses oil paints, while also dabbling in mural work using spray paint. He often captures concepts with his art that are around sustainability and the impact of colonisation. These topics have been at the heart of Chris’ work for the past three years – however, art has been a key part of most of his life. In this discussion, we touch on the very relevant themes he explores, his experience as an artist within Aotearoa and his passion for an eco-conscious future.

Your art often explores the concept of an environmentally conscious and, I would say, optimistic future for the country. How do you balance this optimism with the realities of environmental degradation and social injustices?

To get to a point where you want to make improvements, there must be something wrong already. From my time living in Auckland CBD for five years, I had become quite accustomed to the walkability of it all. Everything I needed was within the same sort of three to four kilometres. However, while having gained that familiarity, I became more conscious of the problems that those areas faced. Every place I lived around, all those little bubbles had their issues which, unfortunately, seem to be mirrored across the whole world.

Written By Stella Roper (they/she) @stellyvision | Arts Editor

Cities often tackle things such as traffic, pollution, homelessness, drug abuse and just general violence. When you're exposed to that constantly, you want to try and help improve it. So I often paint landscapes in the way that I think it has the potential to be. So it's a better place for you to live and then hopefully it's better for everyone else as well. Often when I'm painting, I prefer to look at what is around me, my environment, rather than trying to paint from a place that I'm unable to access. Painting an optimistic future was sort of something that just came about. Just came from living the struggle in the city.

Many of your works involve on-site creation, using both paint and spray paint to capture the essence of Aotearoa's landscapes and city spaces. How do you choose your painting locations?

With murals, you have to work around permission and consider what and where you’re painting so that it’s not going to get tagged over straight away. Often I've tried to meet with people from business associations - the Karangahape Road Business Association has been very helpful, for instance. They've always been keen on helping out in terms of getting permission for murals. For my oil paintings, it's a lot about just the lighting at the time.

With good natural lighting, you can capture that raw essence of what's going on. It doesn't need to have perfect composition, as long as you’re able to capture the nitty gritty stuff.

One site I have used for reference several times is Queen Street, partly due to the obvious wealth disparity there. At the bottom of the road, you’ve got designer stores like Louis Vuitton and Gucci, and then you've got a homeless person sitting between them. Things like this will catch my eye because it compositionally sums up what's going on in Auckland right now.

Themes surrounding land, colonialism and indigenous rights are recurring within your work. How do you navigate and address politically sensitive topics within your kind of artistic expression?

If you're painting something for the future, you've gotta be able to try to think about everyone and the political aspect of that is often torn because of obvious reasons. Certain people want different things for the future.

It was interesting doing a commission for the Auckland council on what 2050 looked like because you had to put your lens through the Council, a group that looks at everyone. All communities and lifestyles needed to be included and considered, and so it was a unique task to make sure to capture that and balance political elements.

As an artist who does environmentally focused work, I would say you don't want to fall into the trap of like, just being a Green Party advocate either. You don't want your art used and seen purely as propaganda. So I try and balance it out with things or initiatives that I want to happen, for example, re-greening streets. The reasoning is it's just gonna be nicer to walk down, you know. I'm not gonna go through so many pairs of shoes and it's just gonna be a softer, more natural environment that isn't so harsh on the eyes.

In what ways do you believe that art can contribute to discussions about environmentalism and social justice?

The Queen Street works are great for people, especially in urban design because often a lot of the works they're looking at are very orthographic and black and white. Whereas to have like an illustrated painting for people to look at as an end goal, it seems to make the vision a little bit more hopefully realistic and justifiable and not so "airy fairy", you know.

If there's something that people can physically see, to provide a sort of goal for the future, then I think in some ways that would be far more impactful in terms of having a more eco-conscious country.

I know in previous situations, you haven’t always asked permission to create work. How do you go about approaching for permission to create work when you do seek it?

Permission is a tricky one as it can come down to one or two parties, but often within Auckland, you have to deal with like five or six different entities in terms of gaining the final permission to achieve, you

know, a simple task of simply putting some paint on a wall. Because of how hard it can be to gain the final permission, it becomes not worth the effort to attempt to go through all the barriers and rather just do it.

So yeah, it has been a classic case in the past of, like, trying my hardest to ask for forgiveness rather than for permission. But that doesn't always go too well, having been arrested a handful of times. Luckily, if you always tell the truth in those circumstances, and I feel like my truth wasn't to cause any harm, you often get away with a slap on the wrist and maybe some community service. Ironically, the community service I had to do happened to be doing more painting, so it was a blessing in disguise. I think if you do things with good intentions, permission becomes not as important.

What would you say to aspiring artists who are passionate about addressing environmental and social issues through art?

I'll say make sure you don't follow too many trends online 'cause then you're just blowing into the wind. If you ever feel like you need to do something in the art world, don't just do something because everyone else is doing it. I say find an angle that is unique to yourself. That is more likely to create an impact and make people think.

Another thing is, you just got to do it every day. That's what I've been telling all the kids working in primary and high schools this year. That period in life is a very delicate time for artists because often that's the last time people paint or use that skill because they'll go on to do other things. However, I think a stigma towards doing art beyond tertiary education is also apart of that.

When you're going out there, making work and you haven't got permission, I'd say the more confident you are, the more you can get away with. If you just go out in the day and make it look like this is what you're meant to be doing and you're not going to cause any fuss, that's a lot safer than trying to sneak around at night, you know, because there are a lot of sketchy people out at 3:00 AM and you find yourself in the wrong spot. You can find yourself in a pretty vulnerable position fast.

Something I've noticed about overseas is people are keener to give you more constructive criticism around art. Compared to over here, where people shelter a lot more. I think having that freedom to go and go and express yourself in that way is super freeing.

Are there any upcoming projects or exhibitions that we should know about?

In May I will be having a show, where I will exhibit all my paintings from last year on Karangahape Rd. It'll be good to get everyone together and celebrate another body of work, you know.

In June, I'm going to Iceland for three months for an artist residency. Super exciting stuff. I'll be staying in an old fishing net factory that has been turned into a big artist studio. The brief behind that is a similar sort of thing. Living in a community that heavily relies on their relationship with the environment. Hopefully, I can bring those ideas and learnings back into another future show in Tāmaki.

To keep up to date with Chris and his future exhibits, follow his Instagram: @christopherdews_ and check out his website: https://dewsyart.com/

Don’t Be A

I give zero shits about the environment. ZERO. 0! Null. I set firepits in my garden every night to speed up Earth’s downfall! I never bring a reusable bottle; the vending machine bottles are already chilled! And you got me fucked up if you think I’m gonna toss the milk jug cap and the bottle into SEPARATE BINS?? Whatchu’ gonna’ do with a lidless bottle? Because what’s the point?

Let’s say that one day I put the bottle and its cap into the red and blue bins respectively (respectfully, will never happen). Then what? Sing “We Are the World”? Ice caps come back? There are billions in this world, so what is me and Greta Thunberg sorting our rubbish going to do against worldwide pollution? After all, it’s those damn corporations transforming the world into a machine fueled by crushed spirits, broken dreams, and emptied pockets… right?

You may be familiar with the statistic of only 100 corporations in the world are responsible for 71 percent of greenhouse gas emissions (GHG). This headline is a common pivot for people who say they don’t bother managing their carbon footprint because if they did, all these corporations would still be causing the majority of GHG emissions anyway. It originates from a Guardian article that cites the 2017 Carbon Majors Report, stating that since the founding of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change in 1988, just only 100 fossil fuel companies have been contributing this 71% of greenhouse gas emissions. And just those top 10 companies give 50% of GHG emissions. Oh, crazy, corporations run the world and even if I were to become a low-emission green warrior, the change I would make is minuscule compared to what big oil is doing? That is the most unbelievable!!

Okay, but hold on a tick. If corporations are what they eat (they eat human souls) then buying less of their products, such as single-use plastics, petrol, or meat, would cause them to produce less and therefore lower their GHG emissions (don’t worry reader, I took economics in year 11 and this is called supply and demand I know I’m so smart.). So this whole time in Auckland raining all the damn time is actually because we’re in a Weathering with You-type scenario where consumers can’t take any responsibility to stop where our planet is headed? Driving is bad for the air? What the fuck?

In a perfect world where every person stopped driving, eating high-emission food like meat, or just held a 0-child policy: climate change would stop, and these top 100 companies would have no reason to emit. But guess what? We don’t live in a perfect world; we live in Auckland where people may be dependent on their cars to get to work due to there being no other alternatives or maybe we’re so transfixed on the Kiwi life of grilling steaks next to our black diesel SUV that we don’t even bother to try to change. But all this noise about reducing your carbon footprint doesn’t mean anything if you’re the only one doing it.

And should our carbon footprint even matter? After all, it was our favourite car-go-vroom producer and number 11 of the top 100 British Petroleum who popularized the term carbon footprint. While the concept of an ecological footprint had been floated around since 1979, the mainstream buzzword-ifcation of the term came from BP’s ad campaign in 2003 shaming people for not managing their carbon footprint and… using the gas BP supplied us with? Wow golly, those rich execs care a lot. Look BP even made a fancy website where you can put in your car mileage and out comes your future generations living in a Mad Max type apocalypse. Look at you, driving your death car. A kid in Africa could’ve eaten that petrol. Putting the onus on the consumer? Oh boy, that sounds like corporate propaganda! But how does that work? Why would these companies try to persuade us against buying their product? Is it from the goodness of the CEO’s three reptiloid hearts? Because BP’s 13 million dollar campaign donation to lobby against carbon tax in Washington state begs to differ. So why?

It’s not just BP. Oil companies knew about their effect on the climate since 1970. Companies like Chevron, ExxonMobil , BP, and more hired their own scientists and researchers dedicated to finding the relationship between their emissions and the climate, and those results weren’t good. To hide the truth from the public, oil and coal companies spread mass misinformation about how there wasn’t enough proof to say climate change was real, and what proof there was is severely flawed, and “Oops I slipped and my cash fell into some climate-denier groups I’m such a clutz uwu”. This was all in an attempt to keep the truth as silent and uncertain as they could to keep

Vote Ghost

politicians out of their industry and the customer consuming. Climate change isn’t the oil corporation’s responsibility. It’s yours to realize what a ruse climate change is. But until the late 20th century when we understood which industries contributed to global warming, the narrative flipped. With the new carbon footprint, it’s your fault that the world is heating! It’s your responsibility the world is dying. How about you stop driving? Stop eating meat? How about using condoms? Hey, let’s skim through articles and figures to calculate every gram of carbon you emit; here’s a calculator to help you! Every day worry about how many emissions you can save, then feel like shit for the emissions you can’t avoid. 10.7 tonnes per year isn’t that bad… Oh! Maybe if I stopped breathing, I can become net zero.

But it's all a distraction. Yes, if everyone cared about their carbon footprint, climate change wouldn’t be a problem. But they know that’s impossible. What is possible, is making you, and furthermore the politicians believe that it’s a personal problem. Maybe there’s no point in trying to change it because fossil fuel will be here to stay. And if that’s what you think, then so be it. It’s the people’s responsibility, not the industry’s! And shifting responsibility does work. George W. Bush rejected the environmental 1997 Kyoto Protocol treaty “in part, based on input from you”, referring to the Global Climate Coalition who, despite its green name, was a group backed by large players in the fossil fuel industry.

Fossil fuel industry huh? Wait a second…

Oh my shits, the Carbon Majors Report only talks about industrial producers! The Guardian portrays this 71% figure as if it were the percentage of global GHG emissions. But the report actually says that this 71% of emissions these 100 companies produce is the percentage of total emissions only from industrial firms (like fossil fuel producers). SO THE NUMBERS DOESN’T EVEN MEAN ANYTHING! It doesn’t matter if it was 100 companies, or 1000, or 69 because we’re still getting FUCKED the same amount. What have we been thinking all these years? What was the point of any of this?

The point is that, while you were reading this huge ramble of words determining who to point our finger at, you hadn’t

realized that my house had actually burst into flames from my unregulated firepit from the beginning… This argument is what they want. We’re too busy self-loathing that we don’t have the time or motivation to vote, advocate, and be passionate about supporting the actual laws that can change our future. We think there’s no point in voting for more environmentally friendly entities, but there is.

You are more important than you think, and don’t let anything British tell you otherwise.

Don’t be a vote ghost.

Written By Kyan Batuwantudawe (he/him)

CONTRIBUTING WRITER

Illustration By Mannat (she/her) @mannatdraws

In Partnership with Under The Radarindependent music news, gig guide and ticets, interviews and more at undertheradar.co.nz

Earth Tongue on upcoming album “Great Haunting” and their NZ/EU tour

Fuckin’ Earth Tongue, man! The Pōneke heavy-psych duo, consisting of Mermaidens’ Gussie Larkin and drummer Ezra Simons, is one of the most enthralling, exciting, and admittedly mental rock bands coming out of Aotearoa right now. Having already opened for Queens of The Stone Age, Ty Segall, and King Woman, the band is currently gearing up for their sophomore release Great Haunting and a major NZ/EU/UK tour to go with it.

This record is the follow up to their 2019 debut, Floating Being - an immersive, slightly terrifying trip into the depths of brilliantly demonic sci-fi influenced tracks and deeply fantastic live shows that will probably give you a welcome concussion from headbanging. I caught up with Gussie to chat about the band's beginnings and inspirations, before Ezra joined us on the call to chat about their recent gigs in Austin and upcoming tour.

Liam

Alright, can you quickly introduce yourself and Earth Tongue?

Gussie

Yeah! So I've been playing in bands for the last 12 years - mostly Mermaidens, which was my first band that we formed in high school. Earth Tongue was initially a side project l undertook with my partner, Ezra - but it's become so much more than that. We went travelling about eight years ago, and we went to this heavy music festival in Portugal called ‘Reverence’. We just got really inspired by the music we saw, and the dream of touring overseas.

Liam

You guys have already released one album - Floating Being, back in 2019. What inspired the debut?

Gussie

When we were writing that album, we were pretty deep into watching old sci-fi movies and analysing how they were playing with words. Those films have so many funny phrases that are really satisfying to sing - they're so rhythmic in your mouth. I think we adopted this alien, robotic way of singing, which is emphasised when we sing in unison. When I'm figuring out a melody, I'll sort of make noises rather than actual words. And then I build in the lyrics to fit the melody and the sort of mouth shape or sound that I think suits it.

Liam

I mean, it even just comes down to the name of the band. Earth Tongue elicits images of a massive kraken coming out of the sea, or some sort of massive land monster.

Gussie

It’s actually the name of a mushroom! A weird one, that sort of looks like a black tongue. It was one of the options when we were naming Mermaidens, so I've had the name in the back of my mind since before I even met Ezra.

Liam

Yeah - On that note, what has it been like to work with Ezra? There's a pretty different set up to the threepiece you undertake with Mermaidens, and I feel like guitar-drum duo bands are always pretty intertwined in their songwriting.

Gussie

Yeah - Ezra actually writes quite a bit of the guitar parts as well. The way that we write together is always changing, and I think we're both really particular about it. Every riff has to be one we're in love with, which means we can be a bit slow - we will be totally in love with a riff and then we'll hate it and get sick of it. But the thing with writing with your partner is that we're always talking about it. Speaking of which, Ezra has just joined the call!

Ezra

Hello!

Liam

Hi, Ezra! I was about to say, I saw you guys opening for Mermaidens - which I suppose is just Gus opening for Gus - in Tāmaki late last year. It's always just crazy how the band itself is quite barebones, yet the soundscapes are so vast and immersive.

Gussie

It's quite hard when we get into the studio, because we love playing live. The gigs are the main part of the band, and that’s how we've gotten so many opportunities. I sometimes have dreams of creating more dense soundscapes in our recordings, and bringing in other people to play live, but we haven't quite gotten there yet.

Liam

Speaking of live shows, you guys have just come back from the United States in what was intended to be a South by Southwest Showcase. But Earth Tongue was a part of the group of Aotearoa musicians that pulled out in solidarity with Palestine, due to SXSW's links to American weapon suppliers that have been manufacturing weapons for the Israeli Defence Force.

Gussie

Yeah, we didn't know about the military association until the day that we left. We were worried, but we had spent all this money to get there so we had to keep going. When we got there, the gravity of the situation really hit us. We saw lots of people posting about it and pulling out of the festival.

Ezra

It felt like a big deal for us, a weird heavy band, to actually get accepted into SXSW, so we wanted to make the most of the opportunity - but we also wanted to do the right thing, so we decided to pull out.

Liam

At the very least, you were still in Texas and playing all sorts of shows while you were there - just not the official South by Southwest showcase. What was it like to kind of be there and play to such a different crowd to what you would see in Aotearoa?

Gussie

It was cool, but it was honestly a bit hit and miss - but that's what I anticipated. Showcase festivals are this sort of thing where you have really high expectations of playing to these music industry heavyweights, and I knew going into it that that doesn't necessarily happen. I think we both went into it with low expectations, and we just wanted to have fun and check out the city. I think the best parts were just chatting with people who weren't even associated with SXSW.

Liam

It came pretty soon after you guys signed to In The Red Records over in Los Angeles. What's it kind of been like to join this international label compared to the smaller ones that you might find in Aotearoa?

Ezra

A lot of the bands that have released on In The Red were the biggest inspirations for us when we started this project, so it feels like we have landed in the right place. They're not a huge label, as it's all run by one guy. But we really like what he curates, and he's been really, really great to us thus far. We're stoked to be here.

Liam

In The Red will be helping you put out your next record, Great Haunting. What has gone into making this record, especially coming from Floating Being?

Gussie

It was a very long process to finish writing it. Like I said before, we were really picky and we didn't want to fill it up with songs that we weren't happy with. We had quite a few tracks end up being scrapped, which is always a really hard thing to do, but I think you have to be quite honest with yourself. Like, this is going to be on vinyl, and I'm gonna have to talk about and listen back to this record a lot, so I want to be really happy with all the songs. Maybe we'll release those songs as b-sides one day.

Liam

A couple days after we publish this issue, you'll have the second single from Great Haunting coming out. What can you tell me about this track?

Ezra

Yeah, the track is called “Grave Pressure”, and it's from the very first recording session we had just after the big COVID lockdowns. It contains a lot of initial ideas we had for this record, so I think it's a pretty crucial track. We ended up recording the instrumental before we actually had the vocal melodies written, so we then had another six months to a year to mull over how we actually wanted the vocals to go. And that's which is definitely not how we usually do it. Whenever you record songs, you kind of get sick of them after a while - but the vocal melody that Gus came up with really made us fall in love with the song again.

Liam

Gussie, you were chatting before about how the lyrical content of Earth Tongue tends to be a bit more fantastical than your other work. Are there any particular concepts that have come about in the writing of Grave Pressures, and Great Haunting in general?

Gussie

Yeah, we've been going more into horror and thriller references. Both the song and the music video is about the liminal space between life and death - Ezra and I are zombies in a morgue, with hardout makeup to look dead. It's really strange to describe it

Liam

Nah, the pictures in my head make me excited! Or at least, it makes me hopeful for a full length Earth Tongue horror musical one day. I don't know if that's in the plans or not though.

Ezra

This album is pretty much that.

Liam

Perfect! You guys will be playing up here in Tāmaki Makaurau at Whammy Bar on the 13th of April, shortly before heading off on a massive Europe tour - how are you feeling about it?

Gussie

Yeah, the EU tour will be 49 shows in unfamiliar places and venues, so Whammy will totally feel like home to us, doing a classic Earth Tongue set before we head off. We'll pretty much be playing the whole album.

Ezra

We've just announced that we're supporting Ty Segall on his full European tour, which is going to be a huge step up in venues that we're playing over there. That tour starts on the 17th of June, which is three days after the record comes out - it feels like everything is falling into place.

“Grave Pressure” will be released on the 10th of April, shortly before their headline slot at Whammy Bar on the 13th of April. Earth Tongue’s sophomore record, Great Haunting, will release on the 14th of June and is available wherever good music is sold.

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Aotearoa’s top anime and manga convention, Overload, is taking place over the 20th - 21st of April. While there’ll be a wide array of exhibitions, cosplay, international guests, and collectibles, the highlight is always the Artists Alley at overload, showcasing local artists from around Tāmaki and allowing you to grab some of their wares.

Record Store Day is BACK for 2024, kicking off on the 20th of April. Take the trail across Tāmaki Makaurau’s record stores to support local music, go crate digging, and enjoy some live music at Real Groovy. Our pick for the trek: Start at Southbound in Eden Terrace, head to Flying Nun & Flying Out on Karangahape Road, stop by Real Groovy and finish it off at Britomart’s Marbecks. Sorted.

The team behind Auckland Zinefest has put together a photography fair like never seen before in Tāmaki, with stalls, exhibitions, workshops and more showcasing photographers from all around the world! FREE // SAT 27 APRIL // Studio One Toi Tū, Ponsonby Road, Grey Lynn, Auckland 1010

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