Climate Justice - Lowndes County, Alabama

The definition online for climate justice is the following: Climate justice is a framework and movement recognizing that climate change has disproportionate social, economic, and public health impacts on marginalized, low-income, and Indigenous communities, despite these groups contributing the least to the climate crisis.

I've been reading the book Waste: One Woman’s Fight Against America’s Dirty Secret by Catherine Coleman Flowers. Let me share a bit about this book.

Catherine Coleman Flowers starts the book with the following, "My story starts in Lowndes County, Alabama, a place that’s been called “Bloody Lowndes” because of its violent, racist history. It’s part of Alabama’s Black Belt, a broad swath of rich, dark soil worked and inhabited largely by poor Black people who, like me, are descendants of slaves. Our ancestors were ripped from their homes and brought here to pick the cotton that thrived in the fertile earth. I grew up here, left to get an education, and followed a range of professional opportunities. But something about that soil gets in your blood. I came back with hopes of helping good, hard-working people rise up out of the poverty that bogs them down like Alabama mud. Little did I know that the soil itself would lead me to my life’s mission."

Flowers starts working as a consultant in economic development in Lowndes County. She realizes that not much has changed since she was living their as a child. The issues are focused on failing septic tanks, no septic tanks, low wage jobs, financial exploitation, and most people are living in trailers because they can't get loans for houses. Flowers brings politicians to Lowndes County so that they understand how bad the issue really is. Below is a quote from the book:

"It just blew my mind…. People living without sewers or septic tanks, with waste running off into an open ditch. A third of the residents living in trailers, which start losing value the day they buy them, because they can get loans for trailers but not for houses on land they own. Kids attending ramshackle schools with coal-fired furnaces and as many as a third of them spending time out of school with respiratory illnesses…. I’ve just talked to a man whose 90-something-year-old father is about to be evicted from a place he owns because he doesn’t have a septic tank. It will cost the county more to take care of him after his eviction than it would cost to put in a septic tank for him."

And another quote from the book...

"The situation should shock the conscience of all Americans. It certainly made an impression on Philip Alston, the United Nations special rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights, when I took him on a Lowndes County tour in late 2017. Here’s how he described it later: In Alabama, I saw various houses in rural areas that were surrounded by cesspools of sewage that flowed out of broken or non-existent septic systems. The State Health Department had no idea of how many households exist in these conditions, despite the grave health consequences. Nor did they have any plan to find out or devise a plan to do something about it. But since the great majority of White folks live in the cities, which are well served by government built and maintained sewerage systems, and most of the rural folks in areas like Lowndes County are Black, the problem doesn’t appear on the political or governmental radar screen."

You can see how climate crisis makes this problem worse. The rising sea levels affect the raw sewage problem causing tropical diseases. Flowers explains that she developed a mysterious rash while touring the houses in Lowndes County. She investigated this issue and says the following: "I contacted Dr. Peter Hotez, a renowned tropical disease specialist and founding dean of the National School of Tropical Medicine at the Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, to see if he’d be interested in investigating whether that might be true. He and his team came through for us with a peer-reviewed study. In a sample of fifty-five adults and children, 34.5 percent tested positive for hookworms." Hookworm is a parasite that infects the intestine. It can also slow physical and mental development in children. Hookworm infection is most common in tropical areas, especially if sanitation isn’t as good and people walk on contaminated soil.

This is a bigger concern regarding septic systems in the US. The land in that part of Alabama doesn't support septic systems very well but this isn't just an issue in Alabama. Flowers says the following, "Inadequate wastewater is not just a Lowndes County or an Alabama problem. It is estimated that more than 20 percent of the country uses onsite wastewater, reaching 40 percent or more in areas with large rural populations. Up to half of the septic systems in the U.S. don’t work properly or fail at some point. By some estimates, 65 percent of the land in the U.S. cannot support septic systems." Essentially, the US needs to invest in new inventions and designs for our septic systems. I can see that this will become a bigger issue as climate crisis continues to spiral.

For anyone tempted to say, "Why don't they just move" or "Why don't they just get a job", I suggest you read Catherine Coleman Flowers' book. People are systematically kept in poverty due to rural bias, inequality, and unequal access to basic human needs. I believe one of the biggest issues is the inequality in education. Flowers hits on that in her book as well and it's eye opening.

This also of course gets back to the widening wealth gap. Most of the world's wealth is in the hands of a select few controlling our planet. Here's a quote by Oxfam: "Billionaires have seen extraordinary increases in their wealth. During the pandemic and cost-of-living crisis years since 2020, $26 trillion (63 percent) of all new wealth was captured by the richest 1 percent, while $16 trillion (37 percent) went to the rest of the world put together. A billionaire gained roughly $1.7 million for every $1 of new global wealth earned by a person in the bottom 90 percent. Billionaire fortunes have increased by $2.7 billion a day. This comes on top of a decade of historic gains —the number and wealth of billionaires having doubled over the last ten years."

I think we all know how big of a problem this is. It's really daunting, I get it. I'm not sharing to fear-monger or cause stress. I'm sharing this to expand people's minds. I believe all humans should have their basic needs met including healthy food, proper shelter, and clean drinking. I also believe all children should receive a quality education, not just the children who have parents that can afford to live in a specific neighborhood. I'm sharing this so that we can all reflect on wanting a better world.

My journey was originally focused on spirituality so that I could get to one truth. The concept of Oneness which says we are all connected and part of the same web of life. All humans come from the same Source and have a purpose. Now I'm watching humanity go through an ascension process which includes the breaking down of our old archaic systems. I'm hoping that in time humanity is ready to rebuild a new and better planet, one that focuses on climate issues and supports all humans instead of benefiting a select few. I believe everyone should be given a chance.