by Simon Weiss, A’24
On March 9th, 2022, Tufts ALLIES had the distinct honor of hosting Nick Rabb to speak with our members about Climate and Militarism. Nick Rabb is a Ph.D. Candidate at Tufts University and spends his time organizing with Sunrise Movement, MA Peace Action, and Dissenters. He has given climate-related talks at webinars held by MA Peace Action, 350MA, CODEPINK, and more.
As part of Tufts of Global Month, ALLIES was provided a grant to purchase plants that were handed out at the event. In the spirit of environmental protection, the plants were acquired from a local arborist and were all native to the Northeast.
At the talk, Nick spoke about the interdisciplinary nature of the military-industrial complex, specifically, how military interventions are used to protect oil interests and how climate change creates unique stressors for conflict in the future. He also spoke about the ways in which military technologies are themselves very harmful to the environment. Some facts that were particularly impactful in his talk were that: the US Department of Defense is the 25th largest carbon emitter in the world, worse than about 170 countries, a single B-52 Bomber emits as much in an hour as the average car drive does in 7 years, and academic institutions receive a lot of money from defense contractors, oil companies, and the Department of Defense.
At the Q&A session towards the end of the talk, students asked Nick Rabb about how they could get involved with this broad issue at Tufts and how to think about national security concerns through an environmental lens. Nick spoke about the hope of bringing Dissenters to Tufts in the near future and how radically imagining democracy would give people a say in our future.
The members that attended the event had a great time and learned a lot about this broad topic. ALLIES would like to thank Global Tufts Month, all the students who attended the event, and the IGL for their support.