Climate Action at Oscars

Climate change has grabbed the attention of many celebrities, who utilize every opportunity or platform they get to speak about it. Oscars has been one of the significant platforms where the academy winners use their fame to talk about issues that are important to them.

Leonardo Dicaprio’s Speech on Climate Action at Oscars 2016

It was at the Oscars 2016 when Leonardo Dicaprio spoke about climate change in his acceptance speech for the Best Actor award for his movie The Revenant. It is one of the most famous speeches on the environment by a celebrity. Dicaprio said, “Making The Revenant was about man’s relationship to the natural world. A world that we collectively felt in 2015 as the hottest year in recorded history. Our production needed to move to the southern tip of this planet just to be able to find snow. Climate change is real, it is happening right now. It is the most urgent threat facing our entire species, and we need to work collectively together and stop procrastinating. We need to support leaders around the world who do not speak for the big polluters, but who speak for all of humanity, for the indigenous people of the world, for the billions and billions of underprivileged people out there who would be most affected by this. For our children’s children, and for those people out there whose voices have been drowned out by the politics of greed. I thank you all for this amazing award tonight. Let us not take this planet for granted. I do not take tonight for granted. Thank you so very much.”

Hollywood has made many movies around doomsday and climate issues. It has done its best in spreading the word about the crises that our planet is facing. The efforts have been recognised and celebrated by the Oscars and many other award festivals every year.

Oscars 2020

In 2020, the Oscars have taken the climate action to the next level by brandishing a ‘sustainable’ plant-based menu for the guests of the distinguished academy awards. The idea came after the tremendous success observed during the Golden Globes Awards that served a vegetarian menu to its guests.

Talks on climate change have triggered once again at the Oscars by Joaquin Phoenix in his acceptance speech for the Best Actor Awards for his film Joker.

Phoenix said, “I think we’ve become very disconnected from the natural world. Many of us are guilty of an egocentric world view, and we believe that we’re the centre of the universe. We go into the natural world and we plunder it for its resources. We feel entitled to artificially inseminate a cow and steal her baby, even though her cries of anguish are unmistakable. Then we take her milk that’s intended for her calf and we put it in our coffee and our cereal.

We fear the idea of personal change because we think we need to sacrifice something; to give something up. But human beings at our best are so creative and inventive, and we can create, develop and implement systems of change that are beneficial to all sentient beings and the environment.

I have been a scoundrel all my life, I’ve been selfish. I’ve been cruel at times, hard to work with, and I’m grateful that so many of you in this room have given me a second chance. I think that’s when we’re at our best: when we support each other. Not when we cancel each other out for our past mistakes, but when we help each other to grow. When we educate each other; when we guide each other to redemption.”

Addressing climate change is the need of the hour to protect our beloved planet. While the countries of the world meet to discuss the actions and set targets for themselves, the progress has been rather slow in this direction.

After winning Best Supporting Actress for her role in “Marriage Story,” Laura Dern touched on the climate crisis during a question-and-answer period backstage. She said, “We have a planet to save, so I pray we can all come together to focus on something that isn’t all about politics — it’s about our home.”