By JAN LARSON McLAUGHLIN
BG Independent News
Sitting at his mom’s kitchen table, eating oatmeal and grapefruit, Andy Long talked about his plans to get arrested. His mom, Lyn Long of Bowling Green, smiled with pride.
She, after all, had helped to instill this desire for social justice in her children.
This won’t be the first time her son is thrown in jail for standing up for something bigger than himself – the Earth.
Andy Long, who grew up in Bowling Green and now teaches at Northern Kentucky University, has already purchased his bus ticket to Washington, D.C., to join in the next Fire Drill Friday – the weekly demonstrations to focus attention on the urgency of the climate crisis.
“He usually tells me ahead of time, so I’m forewarned,” his mom said.
Lyn Long has done her own share of standing up for her beliefs.
“Mom would stand up against injustice,” her son said. “I do think Mom had a lot to do with my hell-raising.”
But Lyn Long’s style is a little different than her son’s. Though she has never been arrested for protesting, she understands the need to stand up for right over wrong.
“If you believe in something, you should act,” Lyn Long said.
When Andy was a child, he often volunteered to help his mom deliver wheeled meals to local senior citizens.
“He did it without me making him,” Lyn remembered with a smile.
That was the start of a life focused on helping others. Andy Long served in the U.S. Peace Corps in Togo, West Africa, and has gone on sabbatical to help in Haiti.
But a major focus in his life has been the climate crisis. A mathematician, Long said he cannot ignore the numbers.
“I focus on data and science,” he said. “My wake up call was seeing the Keeling data on carbon dioxide.” The graph shows the accumulation of carbon dioxide in the Earth’s atmosphere based on continuous measurements taken from 1958 to the present day.
“It’s a beautiful, horrifying curve,” Long said.
The curve predicts the oceans acidifying, and loss of the food chain base. The reality is oceans are rising, the ice and the permafrost are melting. Weather conditions are more severe – with frequent fires and flooding. Many climate experts predict there will be climate refugees and rationing of food.
“The signs are right there in front of us, but people don’t want to see it,” Long said.
Andy Long saw firsthand the slicing of mountaintops in Kentucky to get coal.
“They rape mountains to get coal,” he said. “We should be getting angry about what we’re doing to the earth.”
So in 2010 he joined the Appalachia Rising effort, along with NASA scientist James Hansen. The protestors, who refused to move from the front of the White House had been trained to be non-violent.
“We all got arrested together,” said Long, who still remembers he was No. 113th to be put in plastic handcuffs and taken to jail in a paddy wagon.
On Jan. 3, he will be back protesting. This time with Jane Fonda and others in front of the White House – expecting the same outcome.
“It feels good to get together with like-minded people,” he said. “I just need a good opportunity to get arrested.”
Like many, Long has been impressed by the work of Greta Thunberg, 16, from Sweden, who is trying to get the world’s attention about the climate crisis.
“I was just amazed by Greta,” Long said. “She is telling it like it is.”
Listening to her speech to the United Nations, he realized that he had to do more.
“It’s not enough to apologize. What are we going to do about it?” he said.
Since 2005, the Long family has had more than a passing interest in fighting the climate crisis. The family bought farmland in Ontario, where they work on sustainable agriculture.
They have planted 11,000 trees and work on carbon sequestration – the process of capturing and storing atmospheric carbon dioxide. It is one method of reducing the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere with the goal of reducing global climate change.
“We’ve got to be thinking about how to do things better for the climate,” Long said.
Andy Long has also changed his diet to vegetarian, no longer flies when he travels, and plants food on hugel mounds on the family’s farm in Canada.
But in an effort to do more, Long is very willing to be arrested again.
“We should be panicking and taking action,” he said.
But “climate saboteurs,” like President Donald Trump and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, refuse to listen to the science, Long said.
“The U.S. is among the climate criminals,” with Brazil and Australia, Long said. “We’re throwing hand grenades.”
“Listen to the science,” he said. “The old men don’t want to hear it. It is a crisis – but no one is behaving as if it’s a crisis.”
