XIYE BASTIDA AND DOLORES HUERTA, IN CONVERSATION PART 2

Looking back on the activism of the last 60 years, it would be hard to ignore the massive influence of youth culture. From the Civil Rights marches, to the Vietnam protests, to Stonewall, to the recent Women’s and Black Lives Matter marches, young people have often been at the center of it all. A fact that is clearly not lost on Mexican-Chilean climate activist and co-organizer of Fridays for Future Xiye Bastida.

Xiye began her activism as a high school student, when she helped organize a protest at Albany and New York City Hall for the Climate and Community Leaders Protection Act. In 2019 she led her school in the first major climate strike in New York City, and, through organizations like the People’s Climate Movement, the Sunrise Movement, and Extinction Rebellion, she has become a leading voice on climate activism and indigenous and immigrant visibility.

As part of the Beauty of Becoming series, Levi’s^®–a supporter and celebrator of both youth activism and climate justice–has brought Xiye together with Dolores Huerta–labor leader, civil rights activist, and co-founder of the United Farm Workers–for a conversation on organizing, the power of the boycott, and the necessity of climate action.

Xiye Bastida: Can you tell me about what first prompted you to jump into activism?

Dolores Huerta: I think it started when I was a Girl Scout. Being a Girl Scout, you do a lot of things We would make a little bibs for babies. At Christmastime, we would sing carols. We would visit people in hospitals and make gifts for them. So the whole idea of being a Girl Scout is to be of service. Then, when I learned about organizing, that you could actually get people together and make a difference, that was a whole different thing.

Xiye Bastida: That sounds awesome. It reminds me of the time we organized one of the climate strikes, and we went down to City Hall and asked the Department of Education to allow the students to skip school. They had for prior strikes, and we asked, “Whey not climate? You need to allow us to voice our opinions as students.” I feel like that’s the point where we, as youth organizers, realized how we can demand things.

Dolores Huerta: And one of the good lessons about that, as you learned, is that every public official in every single public agency, including the president of the United States, guess who they work for? They work for us, because we pay their taxes.

Xiye Bastida: That’s something I like to bring up a lot. Like, what is your role as a public official? It’s to serve the people. It grounds them that they’re not above us. They’re actually working for our best interests. And I always say, “Our best interest is a livable, healthy planet where we can thrive, and we can have rights.” So I’m glad we’re on the same wavelength there, because it’s important to recognize that. To not see politicians as inaccessible. What is your perspective on recognizing that the climate crisis worsens other issues? That we need to tackle both climate crisis and other social issues in an intersectional way?

Dolores Huerta: I think that the climate crisis has got to be on the top of everybody’s agenda. We see what’s happening in Texas, where people were freezing and people have died because they didn’t have the power grid protected. And in California we had all of these wildfires where people were killed, and this is also affecting our crops. We see many of the refugees that have come to the U.S. border from Central America where they’re not getting enough rain for their crops, and the crops are drying up. So our planet is in peril. this is something that we have to all think about, and think about what we can do to conserve water, to transition from fossil fuels to green energy. And we’ve got to do it now.

Xiye Bastida: My generation, we’re really demanding change when it comes to pollution, and how disproportionate the effects of pollution are, especially for Latino and Black communities. What is your perspective on that aspect of climate justice, which is social justice, and how it disproportionately affects marginalized communities?

Dolores Huerta: Well, one example of this is the whole issue of pesticides. It affects everybody, not just the farm workers. In the United States, we have one of the highest cancer rates of any country in the world, and we know that a lot of these cancers come from pesticides. We have a lot of pesticides that are used in the United States that have been banned in Europe and other places, so it is a constant threat that we have to the health of the people in our country. So, it’s an ongoing issue, and we really have to be vigilant about that.

Xiye Bastida: That’s a really interesting point. Same with the level of pollution in cities. It ultimately ends up giving people high rates of asthma and other diseases. Another question I have for you is, you know, I love organizing in person. We used to get 60 youths from the city together to organize the strikes each week, in person. And there was a lot of celebration at the end of each meeting because, yay! We finished the meeting! So, how has the pandemic changed organizing for you, and what do you think are the challenges and opportunities of doing everything online?

Dolores Huerta: We’re kind of still wrestling with it, because our method of organizing is what we call house meetings. It’s something like a Tupperware party, or a jewelry party, where you get a few people together and you talk about the issue. In that sort of meeting, you get people to commit, which is very difficult to do now. So I can’t really say we have solved he problem. But the thing is, in the meantime, we just have to do as well as we can. The good news is that , hopefully by the summer, everybody will be vaccinated and then we can continue to organize in person.

Xiye Bastida: I’m really looking forward to going back to that. My next question is actually about something that Levi’s^® is an example of. Levi’s^® has been around for over 150 years, and they have radically changed how they think about sustainability. What is your perspective on the power we have as consumers, as activists, to change how companies behave? When I was younger, I used to see companies as impenetrable. How can we actually change the systems of the private sector?

Dolores Huerta: Well, I think that’s the $64 question for the whole country. How can we make our corporations more responsible? I think to begin with, and this might be an easy one, is right now there’s a lot of pressure on corporations to do something about racism and sexism. Like in California, every public corporation that does business here has to have a woman on their board. So I think it’s public pressure. If we get into a fight with a big corporation, you can always inform people of their bad habits or bad practices, and we call that a boycott. What we did with the grape boycott, where we had 17 million people in the United States that didn’t eat grapes, then the companies had to come to the negotiating table.

Xiye Bastida: Yeah, that’s interesting. What’s the importance of being proactive? In my experience, people will jump to activism, or will join a march or things like that once the damage has been done.

Dolores Huerta: Well, it can be ongoing. I love to quote Michael Moore, the documentary film-maker. He says, “When we wake up in the morning, we wash our face, we brush our teeth, and then we call our congressman.” That’s something where we can be proactive all the time, in terms of being vigilant about what legislation is being carried on in our state legislatures, or at our local level.

Xiye Bastida: Yeah, I think sometimes we forget that, right? Whenever you look at what’s going on in your legislation, what laws are being passed, what laws are being blocked, then you can organize to ultimately benefit the community. I just want to say that I really appreciate everything you’ve done throughout your life. It gives me great inspiration for resilience, because I know there’s definitely times where I could just be a normal student and not be engaged socially, but it’s not an option for me.

Dolores Huerta: And I want to thank you very much for being such a great leader. Being a leader is just getting other people involved and organizing other people to also become activists. That’s exactly what you are doing, and I want to thank you very much.