The Australian actor Yael Stone has vowed to give up her green card, which allows her to work in the United States, as a “personal sacrifice” aimed at reducing carbon emissions in what she called the “climate war”.
In a video posted to Twitter on Tuesday and Instagram on Sunday, the actor and star of Netflix’s Orange is the New Black said she came to the decision to give up her green card “after a long, considered process”.
“We’ve come to understand that it’s unethical for us to set up a life in two countries, knowing what we know,” Stone said in the video, calling such frequent travelling “environmentally unjust”.
“The carbon emissions alone from that flying – it’s unethical. It’s not right. So I will be going through the process of giving up my green card, and saying goodbye to a life in America. I’m going to be here in Australia doing the the work I can to make a difference here. Because the time is now.”
Not environmentally ethical to build a life across two continents. Time to make a sacrifice. pic.twitter.com/4gFVImMeMg
— Yael Stone (@YaelStone) January 7, 2020
In an earlier video posted to Instagram on Sunday, Stone expressed horror at the political response to Australia’s ongoing and months-long bushfire crisis.
“I’m sitting in a dark room wondering what the hell is happening. Our country is on fire … and our prime minister has done absolutely nothing. Cold, calculated nothing. We don’t have leaders, we have cowards,” she said.
The actor, who recently starred in Sydney Theatre Company’s production of The Beauty Queen of Leenane, also implored others to act. “The leaders we have are the people around us. And that’s what we have to become.
“We have to step up because this is war. This is a climate war. And for the first time our enemy is not wearing a uniform that we’ll be able to recognise. Our enemy is our own behaviour.”
Stone said giving up her green card was a way that she could put “skin in the game”.
“This is war, and we’ve only got 10 years. So let’s make these sacrifices. Let’s make these changes. Let’s put some skin in the game and say yeah, I care, and this is what I’m going to do about it. This is just the beginning from me,” she said.
“It’s corporate wide, it’s government wide, it’s systematic changes that must happen, and they must happen yesterday. It’s time to act.”
