While hundreds of thousands of people in cities around the world gathered on Sunday, Sept. 21 for the People’s Climate March, a global movement calling for climate action, over 150 Whitman students, alumni and members of the greater Walla Walla community joined together to march in the local representation of the world-wide event. Carrying signs and chanting songs, the group started at Reid Campus Center and traveled to a rally at Pioneer Park with the intention of making their collective voices heard and inspiring action in the immediate future.

“Marches are interesting things,” said senior Collin Smith, a leader of Divest Whitman and a student organizer of the march. “A lot of times what it does is gives people a sense of empowerment … It gives them a sense that there are other people that feel the same way they do and feel passionately about that issue.”

The event drew strength from collaboration between student groups and organizations in the Walla Walla community. Both the march and the rally, which occurred immediately after, were planned by the Walla Walla Progressives and the Walla Walla and Tri-Cities chapters of Citizens Climate Lobby in conjunction with student groups such as Divest Whitman and Campus Climate Challenge. At the rally in Pioneer Park, a fairly even mix of Whitman students and Walla Walla residents were entertained by musicians from both the college and the community. Speakers at the rally represented a plethora of groups and all focused on the same issue of climate change.

“Whenever Whitman College can get together with the other two … universities in this community or with the citizens of this community, I think it’s win-win,” said Grace Farnsworth Phillips Professor of Geology and Environmental Studies Bob Carson, who spoke at the rally.

Many speakers touched upon the importance of local action in the bigger issue of climate change.

“I think that local action is so crucial to this effort. We have to have global and national action, but it’s not going to happen without pressure on politicians at every level,” said Martin Wagner, class of ’83. Wagner is the managing attorney at Earthjustice, a legal organization that strategizes and argues for environmental cases, and was the keynote speaker at the event.

Another issue that was addressed was the belief of some individuals that climate change is simply an environmental issue. Presenters argued for widening that scope of focus and for considering the problems caused by climate change as a broader issue.

“[Climate change] is not just a technical issue, it’s not just … an abstract issue of us all being affected, but it’s really about our most fundamental rights,” said Wagner.

This concept of climate change being an issue of human rights was cited by Smith as a reason for increasing the speed at which action is taken by local and global communities.

“Climate change is fundamentally a human rights, a human justice issue. We have a responsibility not just to the environment but to our fellow humans to address this issue substantially and as quickly as possible,” said Smith.

Although the arguments for tackling climate change and ways to combat it are numerous, support for addressing the issue as a group rather than as individuals was given by virtually all presenters at the event. Whether through political pressure in the form of legislation, letters to representatives or marches like the People’s Climate March, speakers agreed that a united stand for climate action beyond what individuals can do in terms of conservation is necessary.

“We are locked into a system that is bigger than each of us individually,” said Wagner in his speech. “We must act collectively to change the system that makes it impossible for our individual actions to save our planet.”

This post has been updated at 11:12pm on September 24, 2014.

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