This speech will be given at the Global Climate Rally & March on Sept. 20 outside Usdan University Center at Wesleyan University.

I would like to start out with the opening lines of “Love Me, I’m a Liberal” by Phil Ochs:

“In every American community, you have varying shades of political opinion. One of the shadiest of these is the liberals. An outspoken group on many subjects. Ten degrees to the left of center in good times, 10 degrees to the right of center if it affects them personally. So here, then, is a lesson in safe logic.”

Wesleyan University is a welcoming haven for this sort of “safe logic.”

This safe logic is exactly the type of thinking that leads people towards “market solutions” that will help reduce the amount of carbon emitted into the atmosphere. Some environmentalists like Tim Flannery even argue that way to solve the problem is by extracting carbon from the atmosphere.

What I mean to say is that the present climate crisis represents the logical conclusion of a social and economic system whose essence exploits, expropriates, and annihilates. There is a direct connection between financial crises, such as that of 2008, the imperialism of the military of the United States, and the warming Earth. (Did you know that the U.S. military is the single biggest polluter in the world?) The only response that I believe is genuinely capable of change is one that challenges the logic of the system in which we live.

I say these things, and I recognize that some people may think of me as someone trying to be provocative. But when I speak, I am thinking of honesty. We are well beyond the stage of “solving” the climate crisis. Beware anyone who uses this language: They are either severely uninformed, or a charlatan. When we try to think about the problem of climate change, one of the difficulties and confusions is that the problem appears to be everything. What does the idea of “mitigation” really mean in the context of a dilemma that consists of our complete reality?

So, let’s consider our immediate present, our presence at the “Global Climate Rally & March” taking place at Wesleyan University. What role does Wesleyan play, both as an administration and as a student body?

The problem of the administration is right at its very core. Of its many issues, perhaps the most obvious is the board of trustees, who represent the true class interests of this University. I think of John B. Frank ’78, the Vice Chairman of Oaktree Capital Management, and more notably, a member of the board of directors of Chevron Corporation. I think of Adam C. Bird ’87 P’19, ’22, a senior partner at McKinsey & Company. I think of Andrew M. Brandon-Gordon ’86 and Marc O. Nachmann ’91, both of whom are managing directors at Goldman Sachs, whose role in the 2008 financial crisis, I hope, needs no acknowledgement. I think of Michael S. Roth ’78, who has consistently fought against workers’ rights, the divestment of Wesleyan’s quite large endowment from fossil fuel companies, as well as from Israel, a noted apartheid state.

Consider the nature of the Wesleyan student: extremely wealthy, representing certain class interests, a likely future captain of industry. The very students that Wesleyan presently admits are also the people whose class interests are in strict contradiction with those of the people, that is to say, the rest of the planet.

To be clear, I mean to say that the very school which claims to be bringing us into the world of leaders, game changers, and planet shifters, is also the school that is part of the plan to prevent actual change from happening.

I have no doubt that this speech, as well as this rally in general, in a sick act of recuperation, will be used by our University president to advertise the school to liberals. In that sense, we have already failed.

Briefly, I would like to respond to President Roth’s Tuesday email, which identified changes in the policies of the Investment Committee of Wesleyan’s board of trustees. In the email, President Roth writes that the Investment Committee “will no longer seek out managers specifically to invest in oil and gas in order to balance its portfolio as a whole,” and that it will “consider environmental, social and governance factors as part of their investment process.” The language of this pledge obscures as much as it claims to reveal. The specific decrease in fossil fuel investment is notably missing from the President’s soothing words, as are the concrete effects resulting from the Investment Committee’s desire to “consider environmental, social and governance factors.” Out of the mouth of our University President rolls hot air, or perhaps I should say, thick, noxious clouds of an opaque gas.

Given the gravity of the situation, it’s clear that we must fight for radical change. That demands radical action. Roth’s endorsement of today’s strike and rally clearly indicate that this rally will not force the administration’s hand. Spare me your lip service and your candlelight vigils. I want some real action.

Cormac Chester is a member of the Class of 2020. Cormac can be reached at cchester@wesleyan.edu.