*Contented sigh*
I know I'll be lucky if people even skim something this overwhelmingly long, but I can't resist sharing it. It's the conclusion of my environmental sociology paper.
Background: Tina [Clarke] is a campaign director from Clean Water Action whom I've been working with for this project. Nuestras Raices ("our roots") is a grassroots community development organization among the low-income Puerto Rican residents of Holyoke, MA. I've been trying to coordinate tap water testing for them, since their water tastes nasty and some people say they feel sick when they drink it.
I am NOT done, however. Between now and 9 am on Monday morning, I need to finish researching and start writing an up-to-17-page paper. After that is my Hydrogeo final, but I'm not worried about that. Fortunately, I seem to be functioning fine on three hours of sleep and the sleep deficit accumulated over the past several days. I could've caught up Tuesday evening, but I'm glad I didn't >:-D . Watch me crash at 9 am today.
Best of luck on finals, everyone!!! Don't freak out--take a deep breath, we'll all get it done.
Conclusion-My vision for myself as an environmental activist
First and foremost, I want to emulate Tina’s capacity to love all manner of people, and find shared values and experiences. What do I have in common with the people Tina encountered as a financial counselor, who live beyond their means because they consider a high-consumption lifestyle a mark of success, and are so afraid of looking like failures to others if they cannot afford it? With coal miners and power plant workers who want to maintain well-paid, unionized jobs? With family farmers who find environmental regulations an undue burden? With individuals who are so used to the comforts and conveniences of modern American lifestyle that they “tend to surliness when [it is] threatened” ()? (I am one of the people who feels entrenched in this lifestyle.) Tina suggests that most people have about forty-five shared values, but that different people put different priorities on them at various points in their lives. People’s health and happiness is undoubtedly as high a priority for many other Americans as it is for me-we may simply see different ways of securing it. The trick is to have a conversation in which we discuss these different approaches and reach some agreements.
In terms of environmental health, I still do not feel personally threatened by the hazards I know I am exposed to. Even the real threats that may be manifested in the Nuestras Raices community-insidious troubles developing for the teenagers I met face to face-are abstract to me. However, as I interact more with Nuestras Raices and other concerned people, my capacity for empathy may develop further. Above all it is important to listen-to avoid the (completely understandable) pitfall of dictating instead of collaborating.
I will pay special attention to problems people express with the environmental movement, both the mainstream and grassroots aspects, and with environmental policy. If Daniel Ross says that even grassroots conference presentations are too technical, I’ll keep that in mind when presenting information myself. As another example, my farmer relatives told me of a case where the Connecticut Department of Environmental Quality imperiously demanded that state farmers submit data about irrigation water use over the past four years. Irrigation has never been regulated in Connecticut, so most farmers could not comply, but some were threatened by the DEP with sanctions. Ideally, farmers and environmental regulators would see their activities as two sides of the same coin of an environment-embedded society, and hash out how best to grow crops productively and cost-effectively with minimal harm to the environment.
Over the semester I have realized the importance of environmental education. It used to seem frustratingly indirect: teachers cannot simply breed more teachers; some students must eventually go out and do something with what they have learned-help push a piece of legislation through or convince a firm to shift to cleaner processes. But to be motivated to protect the environment, people need some baseline knowledge, and many do not have it. The man I spoke to on the phone, who asked where in our daily lives we are exposed to toxic chemicals, is a case in point. Caitlin, as well, was largely oblivious to environmental threats in our midst until this semester. As an educator, I hope to democratize information, to present a clear and comprehensive survey of the concepts. I want to share the joy, inspiration, and awe for the world around me that science has helped foster in me, and to convey the uncertainty and humility that characterizes good science. I must be careful, though, not to be alarmist: it causes people to become so overwhelmed that they tune out, to not take the arguments seriously, or to not pay attention to environmental concerns unless they are apocalyptic (Gruber 2002). I also want to democratize nature, to invite those who traditionally have not had the luxury of enjoying wild places as a complement to earning their livelihoods rather than a threat, to experience it.
Unfortunately, government may not be the place for my life’s work, at least not in the current political climate. Although it is full of good people making important incremental commitments, its noble objectives largely become buried in inertia, bureaucracy, and politics. As an entry-level peon, I probably would not have the freedom to innovate and help construct better policy, unless suggestions I made to my immediate supervisor survived all the way to the person on the totem pole with the power to implement them. As a more senior official, I might find my hands tied by hostile top appointees. In both cases, for federal government at least, my ability to be politically active outside of work would be limited.
From the vantage point of the grassroots movement, though, I would have the freedom to pressure policy makers to use the potentially excellent tools already on the books. I could help organizations push the EPA to implement their initiatives for environmental justice, pollution prevention, and community assistance (see http://www.epa.gov/opptintr/cahp/). I am convinced that grassroots environmentalism is the key, as Clean Water Action argues, to using the tool of democracy already in place, and creating new ones. It can provide the on-the-ground infrastructure and support for the legislation and other measures supported by mainstream groups. By attacking problems at a local and regional level, grassroots activism can plant seeds of recognition in the public for national and global issues, and increase our inclination and practical ability to act on them.
The first time we met, Tina told me and the other students at the seminar that it is necessary for activists to be able to “look into the abyss”-to confront “how frightening and awful things are,” but have enough “courage and passion and love and hope to do something about it.” Fortunately, I have a good few decades ahead of me to follow Tina’s example. I want to help reclaim the sense of continuity between environment and people that has been taken from us as citizens, and the democratic power to construct it.
Background: Tina [Clarke] is a campaign director from Clean Water Action whom I've been working with for this project. Nuestras Raices ("our roots") is a grassroots community development organization among the low-income Puerto Rican residents of Holyoke, MA. I've been trying to coordinate tap water testing for them, since their water tastes nasty and some people say they feel sick when they drink it.
I am NOT done, however. Between now and 9 am on Monday morning, I need to finish researching and start writing an up-to-17-page paper. After that is my Hydrogeo final, but I'm not worried about that. Fortunately, I seem to be functioning fine on three hours of sleep and the sleep deficit accumulated over the past several days. I could've caught up Tuesday evening, but I'm glad I didn't >:-D . Watch me crash at 9 am today.
Best of luck on finals, everyone!!! Don't freak out--take a deep breath, we'll all get it done.
Conclusion-My vision for myself as an environmental activist
First and foremost, I want to emulate Tina’s capacity to love all manner of people, and find shared values and experiences. What do I have in common with the people Tina encountered as a financial counselor, who live beyond their means because they consider a high-consumption lifestyle a mark of success, and are so afraid of looking like failures to others if they cannot afford it? With coal miners and power plant workers who want to maintain well-paid, unionized jobs? With family farmers who find environmental regulations an undue burden? With individuals who are so used to the comforts and conveniences of modern American lifestyle that they “tend to surliness when [it is] threatened” ()? (I am one of the people who feels entrenched in this lifestyle.) Tina suggests that most people have about forty-five shared values, but that different people put different priorities on them at various points in their lives. People’s health and happiness is undoubtedly as high a priority for many other Americans as it is for me-we may simply see different ways of securing it. The trick is to have a conversation in which we discuss these different approaches and reach some agreements.
In terms of environmental health, I still do not feel personally threatened by the hazards I know I am exposed to. Even the real threats that may be manifested in the Nuestras Raices community-insidious troubles developing for the teenagers I met face to face-are abstract to me. However, as I interact more with Nuestras Raices and other concerned people, my capacity for empathy may develop further. Above all it is important to listen-to avoid the (completely understandable) pitfall of dictating instead of collaborating.
I will pay special attention to problems people express with the environmental movement, both the mainstream and grassroots aspects, and with environmental policy. If Daniel Ross says that even grassroots conference presentations are too technical, I’ll keep that in mind when presenting information myself. As another example, my farmer relatives told me of a case where the Connecticut Department of Environmental Quality imperiously demanded that state farmers submit data about irrigation water use over the past four years. Irrigation has never been regulated in Connecticut, so most farmers could not comply, but some were threatened by the DEP with sanctions. Ideally, farmers and environmental regulators would see their activities as two sides of the same coin of an environment-embedded society, and hash out how best to grow crops productively and cost-effectively with minimal harm to the environment.
Over the semester I have realized the importance of environmental education. It used to seem frustratingly indirect: teachers cannot simply breed more teachers; some students must eventually go out and do something with what they have learned-help push a piece of legislation through or convince a firm to shift to cleaner processes. But to be motivated to protect the environment, people need some baseline knowledge, and many do not have it. The man I spoke to on the phone, who asked where in our daily lives we are exposed to toxic chemicals, is a case in point. Caitlin, as well, was largely oblivious to environmental threats in our midst until this semester. As an educator, I hope to democratize information, to present a clear and comprehensive survey of the concepts. I want to share the joy, inspiration, and awe for the world around me that science has helped foster in me, and to convey the uncertainty and humility that characterizes good science. I must be careful, though, not to be alarmist: it causes people to become so overwhelmed that they tune out, to not take the arguments seriously, or to not pay attention to environmental concerns unless they are apocalyptic (Gruber 2002). I also want to democratize nature, to invite those who traditionally have not had the luxury of enjoying wild places as a complement to earning their livelihoods rather than a threat, to experience it.
Unfortunately, government may not be the place for my life’s work, at least not in the current political climate. Although it is full of good people making important incremental commitments, its noble objectives largely become buried in inertia, bureaucracy, and politics. As an entry-level peon, I probably would not have the freedom to innovate and help construct better policy, unless suggestions I made to my immediate supervisor survived all the way to the person on the totem pole with the power to implement them. As a more senior official, I might find my hands tied by hostile top appointees. In both cases, for federal government at least, my ability to be politically active outside of work would be limited.
From the vantage point of the grassroots movement, though, I would have the freedom to pressure policy makers to use the potentially excellent tools already on the books. I could help organizations push the EPA to implement their initiatives for environmental justice, pollution prevention, and community assistance (see http://www.epa.gov/opptintr/cahp/). I am convinced that grassroots environmentalism is the key, as Clean Water Action argues, to using the tool of democracy already in place, and creating new ones. It can provide the on-the-ground infrastructure and support for the legislation and other measures supported by mainstream groups. By attacking problems at a local and regional level, grassroots activism can plant seeds of recognition in the public for national and global issues, and increase our inclination and practical ability to act on them.
The first time we met, Tina told me and the other students at the seminar that it is necessary for activists to be able to “look into the abyss”-to confront “how frightening and awful things are,” but have enough “courage and passion and love and hope to do something about it.” Fortunately, I have a good few decades ahead of me to follow Tina’s example. I want to help reclaim the sense of continuity between environment and people that has been taken from us as citizens, and the democratic power to construct it.