Elizabeth May Quotes

I was in college when tens of thousands of people marched on Washington for the first Earth Day. Raw sewage floated in rivers and clouds of smog hung over cities. But then something amazing happened. People spoke out. Thousands of students, workers, and ordinary citizens used their voices to say, 'This has to change.'

I do not believe you have to be an elected official to help 'change the world.' In fact, maybe it is easier from the outside.

It's always been young people at the forefront of any revolution.

That force - which the system tried to laugh at - when it finally broke through and the movement was recognized, the media said they were "just a bunch of spoiled kids, dope smokers [who] don't know what the hell they want." To demean it as something laughable - but that didn't work for very long. It's still an ongoing struggle; they're trying to find out how to fight. It's very exciting times.

Sometimes it takes a child to raise a village - or to take down an injustice.

I've been in movement work since I was 16 years old. Black Lives Matter becomes an important part of the story, but it's not the only part of the story.

When I was a little girl, about eight, I remember going into the Body Shop - that was my first introduction to campaigning. There would always be a petition at the till about fair-trade or stop testing on animals, and the message was: get involved and make change.

I have seen girls tackle every single big problem from cancer to lead poisoning to climate change to homelessness to bullying in schools. There is literally no problem that we can't solve.

As a daughter of a former NAACP chapter president, I know all too well how everyday people can change lives and create progress so many others consider 'impossible.'

We need to be our own heroes. We need a new way of looking at things. Greta Thunberg has shown us that. It's crazy, but this kid has proven that we can be our own leaders.

That is what is happening with the Tea Parties. I wrote a column called "The Second American Revolution" about the fact that people are acting for themselves as it happened with the Sons of Liberty which spread throughout the colonies. That was a very important awakening in this country.

The Chipko activists have always been close to my parents, since my father was among the few forestry officials who supported them within the bureaucracy. And I was involved with the Chipko movement in my student days.

Mass civil disobedience can use rage as a constructive and creative force.

I think one of the things that's happening is that people are realizing that they can't pass the buck to the government because the government, at least as far it comes to environmental protection, doesn't exist. That they're going to have to bite the bullet a little bit themselves. Look, there are no silver linings to Trumpism. This is an unmitigated disaster. But let's hope that at least it helps people find their courage in this resistance.

Not to wax nostalgic about the 1970s, but back then people got upset when they saw injustice. They got tired of seeing our air, land and water polluted. They were shocked when the Cuyahoga River in Ohio was polluted so badly it caught fire. And on one great day 20 million Americans marched all across this land. Politicians had no choice but to take notice.

All change starts with a distant rumble at the grassroots level.

There are parliamentarians in Australia I really support. People through history, you know? Men like Ned Kelly in Australia who challenged ideals. Governor William McKell in Australia really set the tone of building a nation. The fundamentals of the country are built on what the governor McKell created. I think Sea Shepherd (Conservation Society) is a wonderful organization and I support what they do.

Rock-and-roll was an example of change in the body of the culture. I think it's really what helped bring the anti-war movement to its peak and moved people into the streets to seize the day - the movement was the embodiment of what was happening in the music. This is what taught me that it was possible to bring art and activism together. Without that piece, that energetic embodiment piece, the rest is just intellectual construct.

I'll have 15 letters today from mostly young kids who don't like what's going on and want to do something about it, and [they ask me] if I can give them some advice as to what they should do, or can I tell them what to read or something.

Civil disobedience is a viable political tactic, and a non-violent tactic.

Do I think that people should in the best of all possible worlds have to go to jail for wanting the US government to pay attention to the warnings of scientists about climate change? Not really. I mean, in a rational world, if all the scientists said, "The worst thing that ever happened is about to happen and here's what you should do to stop it," you would expect any rational system to say, "Oh, sure, OK, let's do something about it." But that's not the world we live in. In the world we live in, you do need people willing to stand up, fight, march and sometimes go to jail.

Pick a movement, pick a revolution and join it.

Direct action is, ultimately, the defiant insistence on acting as if one is already free.

I watched a documentary about Freedom Riders. One young woman told her parents, 'I'm going to leave college to ride and represent the future.' I thought, 'Who would do that now?' Who would do that for my son?"

When I'm talking to people, I find myself quoting the three organizing rules of Black Lives Matter. Black Lives Matter was initiated by three young women, and too few people know that. But, anyway, the first one is lead with love. The second is low ego, high impact. The third is move with the speed of trust. I must say those make me feel very hopeful for the future.