Skip to content

David Suzuki joins environmental march in Victoria as B.C. struggles from floods, record rain

Event called for urgent action on climate change

After a week where B.C. struggled to recover from devastating floods and landslides, environmental activists marched through the streets of Victoria on Saturday.

The mass of a couple hundred, organized by Extinction Rebellion, walked in the streets from Centennial Square to the B.C. legislature. The marchers were calling for urgent climate action from the B.C. government – which the group chided for “failing to protect our ecology and ramping up support for new destructive fossil-fuel infrastructure.”

Leading the pack down Victoria’s streets was David Suzuki. Once the group settled at the steps of the legislature, the environmental activist, writer and broadcaster spoke of the impact humans have had on the planet’s natural systems.

Suzuki, widely known for hosting The Nature of Things, said that while the planet itself will persist and eventually re-flourish after a breakdown of nature, humans will not be so lucky if the status quo doesn’t change.

He noted that for most of human history, there was an understanding people are embedded and utterly dependant on nature.

“A human-caused mass extinction is happening because we have changed the way we see ourselves and our place in the world,” Suzuki said.

There was a shift in mindset, he said, to one where humans asserted dominance over everything else – seeing the Earth only as something which could be exploited for resources.

“Who the hell do we think we are,” Suzuki said, adding that politicians and corporations continue to put the economy and a historically wealthy fossil fuels sector over the welfare of children and their future. “Let’s put the eco back in economics.

“I am here to join Extinction Rebellion to rebel against the human-caused extinction of species and to signal the solution to the ecological crises of our time, which is the death of the destructive system.”

READ MORE: CRD asks for help funding new climate-related programs


Do you have a story tip? Email: jake.romphf@blackpress.ca.

Follow us on Twitter and Instagram, and like us on Facebook.



Jake Romphf

About the Author: Jake Romphf

In early 2021, I made the move from the Great Lakes to Greater Victoria with the aim of experiencing more of the country I report on.
Read more