Blue Wave 2: 500 climate activists flood Glasgow streets

Today, Saturday 29th February approximately 500 activists took part in a procession through Glasgow city centre as part of The Blue Wave. The campaigners of all ages, including families with children, were dressed in blue and green representing rising water to warn of the risk of flooding and extreme weather caused by climate breakdown.

After performances and speeches from groups at the Clydeside Amphitheatre, including the Rebellious Singers and Scottish Wild Beaver Group, the wave flowed from the Clyde to the centre of Glasgow by three routes. The first section moved up the pedestrianised Buchanan Street to the steps. The other two groups went past the Gallery of Modern Art and George Square before rejoining the first group. This was also the first outing of the ‘Blue Rebels’.

At the Buchanan Street steps a speech of the “Waters Message to Glasgow” was delivered and songs were sung.

The groups that took part were Extinction Rebellion, Animal Rebellion, Green Anti-Capitalist Front, and Greenpeace. 

Waters Message to Glasgow (speech)

We would like to start by thanking ever single droplet of you for coming along and forming a wave today. We settle now here on these steps to deliver our message to Glasgow. 

Last year our wave rose as far as George Square and we, the waters, delivered our message directly to Glasgow City Council. We informed them that it is not too late to turn the tides of destruction and we demanded that they declare a state of climate emergency. On the 16th of May last year a Climate Emergency was declared. It was the first and we hope the last time the council building will taste the waters of the Clyde. 

Since the declaration however, our council has stagnated, producing nothing but an algal bloom of excuses to cover up its inaction. A green wash over a puddle that quite frankly stinks. 

While our leaders float around pretending like nothing’s wrong, lives are being lost under the waves. Nepal, Bangladesh, Indonesia, Venice in the last year, no corner of the world has been unaffected by flooding. The poorer the region, the more casualties inflicted. That situation is reflected right here in Glasgow and the West as it is some of the least wealthy areas that will be the first to disappear under the waves: Govan, Ibrox, Renfrew, Clydebank, Paisley. Water itself does discriminate, only people do. 

It was not water’s destructive capability that hurt the most this last year but rather its absence. In 2019, from the Amazon to Australia, our world was on fire. Entire species were lost to the flames. In desperate times it is easy to drown under waves of sadness and grief. It is not uncommon to feel hopeless in the face of problems far bigger than yourself. We have to remind each other that water’s strength isn’t in a single droplet running down a cheek. Water’s strength is shown when those droplets pick each other up, bind together, flow in the same direction, and eventually form a wave. Together there is no fire we cannot overcome.

We the people are rising. We are rising faster than the problems we face. In almost every country in the world we are coming together to flood the streets. To take a stand. For each other, for the future, for life, and for love. We are turning the tides. 

Take a moment. Look around you. Take in the faces that form this wave today.

Soak in the love you share for the planet, take nourishment from each other’s passion and bathe together in hope for the future.

This coming year we will face many challenges. Many of us will see this as a pivotal moment in human history. There is a lot of important work that needs done.

Do not forget that together we are an elemental force of nature more powerful than any government, bank, or corporation. Lock the strength we feel right now in this moment deep inside and become hydrogen empowered.

We move together.

We move to action.

We are a mighty blue wave.