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Cornell on Fire Says “Don’t Look Away”

Cornell on Fire invites you to imagine a university that has fully mobilized to face the accelerating climate catastrophe and is enacting sweeping changes for climate justice. This is an idea whose time has come. 

But so far, elite universities haven’t gotten the memo. Universities like Cornell continue pursuing business as usual, teaching students for a future they will never know, making incremental “sustainability” changes at the margins while failing to slash emissions or confront the inadequacy of climate “action” plans that seek to preserve current levels of consumption. 

In 2023, UN Secretary-General Guterres declared that climate breakdown has begun: “Surging temperatures demand a surge in action. Leaders must turn up the heat now for climate solutions.”

Cornell on Fire Turns Up the Heat

Cornell on Fire is the campus-community movement that is turning up the heat at Cornell University. Together with our alliance partners, we are calling on Cornell to declare a climate emergency and enact comprehensive changes to scale up current efforts. Our demands are actionable. As a matter of fact, Cornell’s Sustainability Module for incoming freshmen promises that the university is uniquely positioned to “operate at the speed, scale, and scope needed to confront climate change.” Exactly. Except they aren’t even remotely close to doing so. 

Unlike Cornell’s Trustees and decision-makers, we recognize that exceptional times require exceptional measures. This is a climate emergency, and we need to act like it. So we are mobilizing Cornell to confront the climate emergency through truth-telling, direct action, and resilient community-building. We leverage truth-telling together with direct actions to create critical moments for climate accountability at Cornell, while building up a community of people ready to disrupt the trance of ecocidal “normalcy.” 

Cornell on Fire activists stand atop a van, holding banner that says "Big Oil, Big Red: Climate Hipocrisy"

Following the landmark May 2024 Congressional hearings on Big Oil’s Denial, Disinformation, and Doublespeak, we published a report calling Cornell’s attention to an unsettling fact: Cornell University’s climate messaging parallels Big Oil’s doublespeak point for point. 

Following the release of Cornell’s draft expressive activity policy in October 2024, we issued a written response condemning the micromanagement and policing of peaceful protest. To put a fine point on it, we joined an SRTI action by muzzling and blindfolding the statue of Cornell’s co-founder A.D. White. He sent a visible message to Cornell’s leaders: don’t look away from the climate emergency, and don’t muzzle us. (more below)

Group observes Cornell on Fire sign on blindfolded statue of AD White that includes "the Science is Clear" "Don't Look Away" "Don't Muzzle Us" and "Declare Climate Emergency" December 2024
Cornell on Fire activists sit facing a wall, with signs on their back that spell out C L I M A T E, next to a banner that says "Declare a climate emergency"

Sometimes we confront decision-makers with the power of silent meditation, as when we bodily put climate on the agenda at the March 2024 Board of Trustees’ meeting. Sometimes we confront them more vocally, by dropping banners at alumni gatherings, graduation ceremonies, or Council meetings with the Trustees. 

Taking action together fosters an inimitable sense of community among ourselves, while generating press coverage and conversation that ripple far beyond our group. We have come to see direct action as an opportunity for community building, education, and action as an antidote to despair (and academia’s endless capacity for talk, talk, talk). Thus, when university staff eye our costumes and nervously ask us what we’re planning to do at their event, we honestly answer, “Oh, we’re here to educate.” 

And we are. Our actions draw attention to investigative reports (our own or our allies’) that combine academic rigor with activist candor. Our reports are raising awareness in the community and on campus, with invited presentations at venues ranging from Cornell’s Carbon Neutral Campus Committee to the County Sustainable Energy Advisory Board, Finger Lakes Climate Reality Project, and County Climate Protection Initiative (and uninvited presentations elsewhere). We’ve also made our movement’s work accessible through a satire film and movement call to action. Not to mention Instagram.

Cornell on Fire “Don’t Look Away” action

Our “Don’t Look Away” action condemns the administration’s silence and silencing in the face of an existential crisis.

Cornell on Fire hangs signs on blindfolded AD White statue, that include "the Science is Clear" "Don't Look Away" and "Declare Climate Emergency" December 2024

We blindfolded and gagged the statue of Cornell founder Andrew Dickson White and adorned him with a message to those in power at Cornell: “The science is clear. Don’t look away. Don’t muzzle protesters. Declare a Climate Emergency.” “Don’t muzzle us” is a critique of the administration’s repression of expression over the past year, culminating in a draft Expressive Activity Policy that penalizes nonviolent disruptive action while policing and micromanaging protest activity. That draft policy is currently open for public comment: our action was one aspect of our public comment. 

Cornell on Fire hung a sign that includes "the Science is Clear" "Don't Look Away", "Don't Muzzle Us" and "Declare Climate Emergency" December 2024

His injunction to “Don’t look away” condemns the current Cornell administration’s silence in the face of the climate emergency. Although activists have been calling on Cornell to declare a climate emergency since at least 2019, the administration still refuses to speak honestly about the existential crisis. We’ve posted a summary of our action on our blog: AD White Weighs in on the Expressive Policy

One more aspect of the action that might require explaining: Our statue action was accompanied by a meditation protest. After acrobatically assembling his outfit, nine of us stayed on to launch the AD White art exhibit (free!) with a 30-minute outdoor meditation in below-freezing weather. Our action included Cornell students, faculty, staff, alumni, and community members, including members of SRTI! At the action’s conclusion, we delivered our response to the expressive policy to the Dean who leads the Committee on Expressive Activity. Our response is “Don’t Muzzle Us.”

Cornell on Fire is Locally Grounded, Widely Allied

At Cornell on Fire, our work is grounded locally and allied widely. We work at home with alliance partners because we believe that local organizing is the most powerful fulcrum for change, because we are committed to restoring right relationship on Gayogo̱hó:nǫɁ lands, and because it allows us to build up real community without feeding the disastrous hypermobility epidemic of the globe’s polluter elite. Eat local, work local, study local, organize local…but ally far and wide! Using virtual connection tools, we are building coalitions with groups across Turtle Island – including Scientist Rebellion Turtle Island! – to more fully participate in the complex self-organizing system that is rising up to challenge fossil fuels and their colonial-capitalist roots.

The science is clear. But evidently, it takes concerted activism to get our universities to start acting on the science they exist to teach and produce. The clock is ticking, Cornell. Remember: “Tradition is not the keeping of ashes, but the carrying of the flame.” Wake up and light the flame.

Cornell on Fire activists hold a banner that says "Big Oil, Big Red: Climate Hipocrisy"  www.CornellOnFire.org

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