Take 5 for Future: Turning anger into love on the streets

spunout and FFF Dublin present ‘Take 5 for Future’, a weekly five-minute-long podcast discussing the importance of the #PreserveNotPollute Global Climate Strike happening in Dublin on March 25th. You can be a part of the movement to #PreserveNotPollute. Follow Fridays for Future Dublin on Instagram and send them a message for more information on how to get involved.

Take 5 for Future Episode 1 Transcript

Amy O’Brien
Hi, everyone. My name is Amy O’Brien, and I’m a 16 year old climate justice activist from Cork. I use she/her pronouns. This podcast is a series of five conversations with Fridays for Future Dublin in the run up to March 25, which is the #PreserveNotPollute strike in Dublin with students striking all across the world for climate justice on that day.

The episodes will be released each Friday, and we hope that you learn about climate justice, FFF striking and feel empowered to come along on the 25th. I’m here with Jessica Dunne to talk about Fridays for Future Dublin. Can you tell me a bit about the history of FFF Dublin or the origins of the group? Yes.

Jessica Dunne
So Fridays for Future Dublin was founded in February 2019, and the first big strike was organised on March 15, 2019. And the group and still is run by young people like the big movement, the international movement. It’s a grassroots movement, and that means that all of the regional groups are completely autonomous. So we organise our own protests and are able to focus on local issues without having to get any big permission or whatever. And the group is also completely consensus-based. So, everybody has their say heard, and it’s all about a kind of the sense of community where everybody gets involved together rather than having any leaders or whatsoever.

Amy O’Brien
And actually, how did you get involved yourself?

Jessica Dunne
Yeah. So I went to the first protest on March 15, 2019, which is three years ago now, which is absolutely mad. And, yeah, it was incredible. So many young people were there. And I think me along with so many other people, we were there. And we realised for the first time we had known that the climate crisis was a big issue that was happening and it was completely unjust. But as young people, we didn’t know that we could do anything about it. And being there, we got this just complete sense of empowerment where we realised that we could do something. And that’s what Friday’s for Future really did for me and continues to do for so many young people. So, yeah, after that, I was like, okay, I have to get involved with everything. I got involved with my first climate justice group that year. I got involved with Fridays for Future, and I just started working on anything possible because just that sense of being able to actually do something was so incredible.

Amy O’Brien
Absolutely. Because I think it’s so easy to give in to feeling hopeless about the future. And actually our hope comes from action and actively fighting for the planet and for people. Amazing. So, yeah, actually, how do you feel on the streets striking maybe like that first day? I’m sure you’ve had many more. We’re looking forward to the 25th. How do you feel when you’re striking?

Jessica Dunne
Yeah. Like what you’re saying before, there’s obviously this anger, except I think that everybody has a general anger by the climate crisis. You’d be a fool not to have it, but it’s like anger without a direction is useless and it just festers inside of you or whatever and I think it gives you a direction for that and also turns any of that anger into this sort of like this love. Mitzi who’s an activist in the Philippines. She has this line about revolutionary love and I think that’s so true. Being on the streets and all that you’re around, all of these people and you’re all supporting each other, you’re all chanting the same things and you’re all just completely connected by your fight together and whatever that feeling on the streets of just being able to fight with everyone around you is so incredible.

Amy O’Brien
Yeah, I think recognising that the anger you have is probably because of your love for everyone, you know, and for nature and for humanity and kind of turning that anger into love on the streets. Absolutely amazing. Thank you so much for chatting to me. We’ll end with the fact because we are constantly all educating ourselves on climate justice. So, Jessica, what is this week’s fact?

Jessica Dunne
This week’s fact is that 100 corporations are responsible for 75% of carbon emissions.

Amy O’Brien
Yes, we need to fight back. So on that note, you can keep up to date with them at Friday future Dublin on Instagram DM to get involved. Thank you so much for listening to Take 5 for Future. See you next week. Thank you.