At SXSW 2024, Jane Fonda joined communications strategist David Fenton and Sweta Chakraborty, of the climate platform We Don’t Have Time, for a panel on Hollywood and activism. The video starts at 26:30, as the conversation turns to the role of artists, the media and individual action in the climate crisis.
Art can pierce through
People have prejudices, Fonda says, but art can affect them “when their guard is down”. She cites The China Syndrome, which changed many minds about nuclear energy, and 9 to 5, which opened eyes to what women office workers put up with. Her call to creators: write songs, make films, write poetry, “join the fight”. The panel quotes Yale research finding that two-thirds of Americans say they rarely or never hear about climate change, and argues that climate should be discussed as widely as sport or pop culture.
A media failure
The speakers criticise television and social media coverage of the climate crisis, while praising some print journalism. They point out that climate scientists agree on human-caused warming, recall that climate scientist Michael Mann won a defamation case over attacks on his work, and note that the idea of a personal “carbon footprint” was popularised by an oil company advertising campaign, shifting responsibility onto individuals.
From despair to action
Fonda describes falling into despair a few years ago, as fires turned the Los Angeles sky orange. After reading Naomi Klein, she called Annie Leonard, then head of Greenpeace USA, and together they created Fire Drill Fridays. Their target was “the great unasked”: the many Americans who say they are concerned about climate but have never been asked to do anything. Quoting Greta Thunberg, she says: don’t go looking for hope, look for action and hope will come. Joining organisations, she adds, brings new friends who share your values, and it is fun.
Her practical advice: move your money out of fossil fuels, join groups rather than acting alone, pay attention to candidates all the way down the ballot, and vote. The answers exist, the panel insists: the technology and the money are there; what is missing is political will.