After being handcuffed and pushed into the back of a police car in April, 74-year-old Sue Markey will have her day in court next Wednesday. Her crime? Caring enough about the climate crisis to stage a sit-in, along with other members of Elders for Climate Sanity , at a Royal Bank branch in Dundas (Canada’s five big banks are top funders of fossil fuels with the Royal Bank being the largest, providing US$42 billion in 2022 to finance companies that extract oil and gas, according to the 14th annual Banking on Climate Chaos report, the most comprehensive global analysis on fossil fuel banking). Don’t let Sue fool you — she speaks softly and has an impish gleam in her eye, but she’s as fierce as they come.
She’s been protesting for peace and the environment for more than 40 years. Sue Markey has been protesting for peace and the environment for more than 40 years, Anne Bokma writes. While Markey and the others were charged with trespassing, she says the real “crooks” are the banks.
“They are acting in a criminal way because they aren’t paying attention to the science. The UN’s International Panel on Climate Change warns we have to do something now. We cannot wait.
Meanwhile, the banks keep investing in fossil fuels and we have forest fires across the country. It’s unconscionable.” Some people find it curious, even amusing, when older women rise up and rebel.
“Who put you up to this?” one of the police officers on the scene asked Markey. “Did they rea.
