Radically Reframing Climate Change with Will Hackman

Author Will Hackman talks politics, environmental activism, and his book Radically Reframing Climate Change

Join local author and policy expert Will Hackman at Mary Riley Styles Public Library for a conversation about his book Radically Reframing Climate Change: A Guide to Saving Ourselves!

Drawing on Hackman's experience in political communications, the book offers practical advice on how to discuss climate change and inspire action. He will be talking with Kurt Lawrence, who serves as Environmental Planner for the City of Falls Church and staff liaison for the Environmental Sustainability Council.

A signing will follow the discussion, with copies of Radically Reframing Climate Change available for purchase from Bards Alley. You are welcome to reserve a copy in advance for pick-up at the event by calling (571) 459-2653.

RSVP for free here: https://www.mrspl.org/event/august-author-talk-will-hackman-35476

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Will Hackman has more than fifteen years’ experience working in US political campaigns, public policy process, strategic communications, coalition building, climate activism, and global environmental conservation advocacy. Will is a frequent climate policy expert voice online and in the media and has been interviewed on several climate change-related podcasts and filmed a TEDx in 2022. His writing has appeared in The Hill and Washington Post. He lives in the beautiful Shenandoah Valley in Front Royal, Virginia with his wife Paula, tucked into the Blue Ridge Mountains and the north entrance to Shenandoah National Park.

ABOUT THE BOOK

Will Hackman is a Millennial, and he is pissed. Two wars, two global economic catastrophes, and a pandemic combined with a ballooning cost-of-living crisis and crushing student loan debt can do that to a person. But there’s one thing that compounds these challenges that is unequaled in human history: the ticking time bomb of fossil fuel emissions. Millennials and Gen-Zers will be left to deal with the worst of the climate change fallout well after those responsible have passed away. And we have never been more divided.

In Radically Reframing Climate Change: A Guide to Saving Ourselves, Will Hackman identifies three main obstacles to solving climate change: polarization, paralysis, and stale, ineffective messaging. He empowers readers to turn their anxiety or apathy into passion, and anger into action at the personal, community, and government levels. The climate rallying cries to “Save the Planet” no longer work in our hyper-partisan world, nor do images of polar bears on melting glaciers. The problem isn’t scientific, fact-based, or even technological. It’s political, emotional, and ideological. Hackman provides a path forward for engagement and voter mobilization that combats apathy, dread, and resentment, and builds greater issue identification.

Hackman reframes the climate crisis as a humanity crisis, arguing that we must change how we think and talk about climate change, both in our conversations with non-believers and among those who care. Assuring humanity’s place on a changing planet will require a near universal level of public support we will never reach if we keep making the same mistakes. We know how to do this. But the stakes have never been higher and time is running out.