Karma Selsey: Climate Justice and Educational Equity Activist

Karma Selsey is a youth organizer from New York City focusing on climate justice and educational equity.
How did you first get involved with Teens Take Charge (@teenstakecharge)?
I initially got involved with Teens Take Charge around May of 2019. I basically saw on Instagram that they were doing a rally at Tweed Courthouse, so I went to the last few meetings before they began doing that. At the start of the school year, I got invited to become a member. I’m on the public action team — we plan acts of civil disobedience.
What are the goals of Teens Take Charge?
The general idea is that we are working to get educational equity when it comes to integrating NYC schools. It’s one of the biggest educational systems in the country but it’s also one of the most segregated. The whole idea is that it’s been decades since Brown v. The Board of Education but we are still feeling the effects of segregation. They tend to cluster rich neighborhoods together, regardless of geography.
What about your work with Fridays for Future NYC (@fff.nyc)?
I started working with Fridays for Future in July and basically I have two roles there — one is that I’m their school representative organizer. When we were prepping for the September 20th strike, I was the person who was sending out information about how you could get your school involved and how to convince your administration to get on board as well. My other role is that I’m a member of the outreach team to get more organizations and more people involved. I’m trying to get more people from black, brown and indigenous communities. I’m pushing for outreach in the outer boroughs, not just Manhattan and the rich areas of Brooklyn.
Why is it important that climate justice be intersectional?
With climate change in particular, what a lot of people in positions of privilege don’t realize, especially Americans, is that just because we aren’t feeling the greatest effects of climate change right now doesn’t mean that a lot of people aren’t. We contribute so much of the greenhouse gas emissions in the world, yet we see so little of that damage. Because of the effects of racism and classism, we have been trained to ignore vast areas that are primarily people of color. Even within the country as well, there’s this trend culture that popularizes using metal straws, buying from Whole Foods, and only eating vegan, but that’s not accessible to everyone. For a lot of people, its an issue of accessibility. It’s not like people want to contribute to climate change — we place a lot of responsibility on people who are the most vulnerable. We need to force people in power and privilege to see who is really being affected.
How do you distinguish between actual activism/activists and people who are only doing it because it’s “trendy”?
I think that as a high schooler, it’s kind of easier for me to tell because I spend so much time with the people around me who claim to be activists. One thing I notice is that there are people who only step up when something directly affects them. For example, people will show up for a climate change protest, but they won’t show up to a Black Lives Matter protest — you can tell when someone is not showing up for everything. A true activist is someone who doesn’t just care when something affects them — we’re not trying to look or be more popular by showing up to these events. We aren’t the people who use metal straws but put them in plastic cups, or people who choose to take an Uber over public transportation. I really believe that actions speak louder than words. Just because someone is protesting something doesn’t mean they fully believe what they’re saying.
You’ve spoken about caring for issues that don’t affect you personally. Why do you personally get involved in these kinds of issues?
Well, for me, what I found is that even though something might not affect me personally, it affects someone that I know. There’s someone in my life who is going through something, even though I might not be able to relate to that. People are hurting, and I recognize that pain because I have felt that pain. Everyone can understand that feeling of being hurt — for me it might be because of my race, for a trans person, it might be because of the benefits of being cisgender. You have to use your power to uplift those who don’t have power. Having that being part of your personality is great, but it’s also a conscious decision.
What gives you hope to keep going in your activism?
A lot of the time I do feel powerless as a queer woman of color because there are so many areas in which I am marginalized. But I look to the progress that we’ve made in the past, and I think, if we were able to do that at a time when we didn’t have social media and technology to spread our message so quickly and so easily, imagine what I can do as an individual with these tools. I think that even though there are sometimes generational issues and disconnections and misunderstandings, I would say that the climate movement, for example, has shown me that there are people who are willing to listen and willing to use their privilege to do good.

