It seems the problem of the climate crisis would be solved if more people—at least an overwhelming majority—were environmentalists. If those in business and in government cared for the environment as much as the average environmentalist does, most of the problems environmentalists fight against would not exist in the first place. But beyond that, assuming that there was a split in society, and the majority of the public were attentive, passionate, outspoken environmentalists, and politicians and business leaders were not, those same politicians and business leaders would presumably not commit the ecological crimes that they might like to, because public outcry would mean the end of their political career and the demise of their business. There is a lot of presumption here, including the presumption that this majority would act on their feelings and their principles and not go along with something because it was expedient or because they had not found a way to carry on with their lives without it. But let us carry forward with the idea that, if the bulk of the population were outspoken environmentalists, most of the problems we are contending with, such as climate change, would be rapidly resolved and would cease to be repeated.
It is obvious that the bulk of the public does not fit this description today, which means we are still dealing with a slew of environmental problems, and those problems are either not being resolved rapidly enough or are actually accelerating. A more environmentally active and aware population would be the key to solving our problems, and is something to be desired. We must ask ourselves a key question, then: What is keeping people from becoming environmentalists?
1) Disinformation. At the extreme end of the spectrum, you have those who do not believe that climate change, the most pressing environmental issue of our time, is real. These are people who have been misinformed by Republican talking points, pseudoscience, conspiracy theories, and flawed studies, all promulgated initially by fossil fuel interests. They break down into two groups. One group comprises average, likable people who have been passively misled by their party of choice (or inheritance—I don’t believe “choice” indeed plays a role in every citizen’s political affiliations). They may say things like “I don’t think all the science is in yet.” They tend to adhere to the Republican line on other issues, but wouldn’t see themselves as actively “anti-environment.” I have to think that a book like Nathaniel Rich’s Losing Earth would change their minds on the climate issue, unless they are in the fossil fuel industry and have a vested interest in denying the reality of climate change. Then there are the really worrisome cases, often found trolling YouTube comment sections, the sort who modify their cars to belch more smoke. There is an element of “I’m smarter than the mainstream” here (in the same way that many white supremacists feel “superior” even though they have little reason to). They are convinced that global warming is a hoax and enjoy actively harming the environment and harming or maddening those who believe climate change is real. These people are fortunately a minority, and a lost cause who will be damned by the future. They seem to have no concept of being dependent upon the planet they live on. One would like to exile them to space and see how they survive there.
Note that action on the environment and climate change was once bipartisan in the seventies and eighties. Also note that Abbie Hoffman, never a darling of the right wing, was able to (while in disguise and in hiding from the FBI) assemble a coalition of environmentalists and conservatives who did not consider themselves environmentalists in order to protect the St. Lawrence River. So there’s always hope for bridging those areas of disagreement, or skirting around them to work on what’s important.
2) Environmentalism is seen as “anti-business.” Some of this carries over from the preceding category. Many people who condone rollbacks of environmental standards see themselves not as “anti-environment” but as “pro-business.” They believe that business is being hamstrung by the environmental movement and that the nation is suffering as a result. They neglect the fact that industrial business had a 150-year head start, trashing the earth for profit long before environmental standards were introduced. They got used to business operating without hindrance and do not take seriously the painful legacy industrialization has left the planet. They seem to believe that businesses would operate within reasonable limits on their own, with no serious damage being done to air, water, climate, people, plants, or animals, and that environmental legislation is unnecessary and damaging to the economy. They are quick to dismiss the well-publicized environmental disasters of yesteryear as a thing of the past and often point out that “those companies employed a lot of people.”
3) Our lives are too busy. From here on down, the reasons for people not being environmentalists have less to do with hostility towards environmentalism and more to do with lifestyle. One obvious factor in today’s world that keeps people from becoming active environmentalists is a lack of time. With a list of duties that include a full-time job, keeping a marriage going, raising children, maintaining a social life, taking care of the house, and any other things that make for a normal life, it can be hard to find time to commit oneself to following environmental issues, attending and organizing demonstrations, writing letters, signing petitions, participating in cleanups, and greening one’s life. I imagine nearly everyone has some amount of free time in spite of the abovementioned duties, but active environmentalism is a time commitment, and there are other things clamoring for that time, not the least of which is R&R (more on that later).
4) Not enough social pressure. I was going to write that views on YouTube for zero-waste lifestyle tutorials are completely dwarfed by makeup tutorials by someone like Olivia Jade or Kendall Jenner, but I found that wasn’t entirely the case. While the average video featuring Kendall Jenner has about 4 million views, and there are a ton of videos featuring her (why?), there are some zero-waste videos featuring Lauren Singer, whose five years of trash fit in a mason jar, that are equally popular. Does it help that they are both pretty? Regardless, I’d argue that there are more people aspiring to look like Kendall Jenner than there are to live like Lauren Singer.
There is more social pressure to dress nicely, look good, have a well-paying job, be dating or in a relationship, and to keep up with popular TV shows than there is to be an environmentalist. Some of those pressures directly squelch environmentalist tendencies. Dressing nicely means buying new and buying often; working that job may mean supporting a company whose environmental practices leave something to be desired; watching those TV shows means less time for the environment. (I myself am looking forward to an episode of Breaking Bad after finishing work on this article for the night—I resisted the pressure to watch it when it was on, but somehow caved ten years later while planning a trip to New Mexico.) If you don’t live in the city, there is social pressure to own a car and use it to get everywhere. In the suburbs, you feel conspicuous when you bike or walk anywhere, like you aren’t “fitting in.” Some of it may be pure, silly self-consciousness, but sometimes you’ll be actively hooted at by a group of adolescents in a car. By contrast, nobody ever glares at you to get out of your car and find some other means of transport. The same goes when you buck the average American diet. Eat a chicken burrito and no one asks you anything. Mention that you are vegan and you are immediately asked about your reasoning, your sources of protein, and your desire for bacon.
There is little social pressure to cut down on waste, go vegan, or to attend environmental actions. You are free to do those thing if you want to, but there is no expectation from anyone that you will.
5) Consumerism. By its very nature, our consumerist culture and economy expect and encourage people to want more, more, more. Advertisements hawk products you never knew you needed. Companies track you online to solicit you more effectively. Apple comes out with a new version of the iPhone every year and somehow people still want it. A large segment of the population is employed by companies that contribute little to people’s actual well-being, and yet we laud those useless jobs and the useless companies that create them. The free market is often free of social (and certainly environmental) purpose, but it’s what we have, and it is defended by the vast majority. Because we don’t want to end up homeless and begging on the streets, we take our meaningless jobs and we thank the companies that give them to us, and we defend the consumerist system they are a part of.
Consuming less (or, a nearly impossible ideal in America, consuming only what we need), buying used, repairing and reusing what you already own, and refusing to be led by the nose to the latest expensive corporate trough that has been laid out for the public, are all undesirable, in the eyes of business and the government it is wed to, and advertisement and the aforementioned social pressure unite to prevent most people from doing them.
6) The perception of environmentalism as a sacrifice. In a consumerist culture, the idea of environmentalism seems to suggest to many a life of extreme sacrifice. Part of this comes from having been overindulged and never asked to reckon what the impact of one’s life on the environment is. It breeds, especially in America, a sort of knee-jerk reaction against the idea of “giving up” anything, whether that is meat, a gas-guzzling car, the practice of driving everywhere (no matter how short the distance), single-use bottles, plastic straws, or wanton electricity or heat usage. Many refuse to contemplate giving up their “right” to buy and dispose of food and beverages in single-use plastic form, anywhere, although the simple step of using reusable water bottles, coffee mugs, bags, and containers for leftovers or bulk bin items would eliminate billions of single-use items that end up in the trash every year. The requirement of foresight (“If I’m going to the store, I should bring a bag”; “If I’m going to get coffee on the way to work, I should bring a mug”) is something many Americans kick against, as if the Constitution guaranteed them freedom from the need for it. News segments, YouTube videos, and public initiatives have been tackling the perception of environmentalism as requiring sacrifice, gently assuring their audience that they can make small, meaningful changes that will make a big difference. Some people then settle for these small changes, like turning the lights off when they leave a room, and feel good about them, reassured that they are doing something and don’t have to go farther.
Real lifestyle changes are a harder sell, and there is the perception that environmentalism means a life of deprivation. “I would die if I went vegan” is something I’ve heard too many times. People tend to overestimate the difficulty and disruption of lifestyle changes that would lessen their negative effect on the environment, and also fail to see the benefits that such changes bring. A dietary change like veganism brings a wealth of health benefits, a much smaller ecological footprint, and a deepened connection to animal life. “Now I can look at you in peace,” said Kafka to the fish at an aquarium he visited. “I don’t eat you anymore.” There is indeed a spiritual peace that comes with a deepening devotion to the earth. Weaning yourself off the drug of consumerism, with its cry in the blood for more, more, more, brings with it a liberation from want. Rather than pining for the latest gadget one has denied oneself, one realizes it was never needed in the first place. You can turn an indifferent eye to advertising and the keeping-up-with-the-Joneses technological arms race and see the game for what it is. Committing yourself to a cleanup brings with it the feeling of a day well spent; joining the fight for a sustainable future brings with it courage, self-confidence, and the intrinsic reward of fighting the good fight.
7) Avoidance of depressing reality/A sense of powerlessness. Most of the news today about the environment is bleak and utterly depressing, so it’s no surprise some choose to avoid it. News that carbon dioxide levels are at the highest ever recorded, or that we have only ten to twelve years to get our act together, or that Paris just hit 108 degrees this summer and Greenland lost billions of tons of sea ice in a day, or that Donald Trump is still President and still rolling back emissions standards and endangered species protections while opening up nearly every last protected space in the country to fossil fuel interests, can ruin a whole day and haunt you for weeks on end. It forces one to think about a future that is many times worse than the present. It forces you to realize that we may fail, in large part because people with power are doing everything they can to oppose progress on climate change and are determined to continue “business as usual” with the fossil fuel companies, their idea of “business as usual” being business as it was circa the 1950s before any kind of environmental protections were put in place.
Couple that with a sense of powerlessness that comes from decisions being made on a global scale while you are just one out of several billion, and are without a seat in power, and you may end up deciding to avoid the issues. Despair may overwhelm instead of forcing you to act, and you then turn to an escape just to try to stay sane. Some people appear to have written off the future, assuming it will be terrible, and have decided to watch all the TV they can, while they can.
8) Entertainment narcotization. Ours is an entertainment-driven culture. One might almost say that in America, entertainment is the highest good. We worship the stars of the entertainment industry more than people who are working to save lives. Even Donald Trump was elected partially because the news media found him to be a source of entertainment. This endless thirst for entertainment and diversion keeps us from thinking deeply about our lives, and what kind of life we would most like to lead, considering it from beginning to end. It also certainly keeps us from doing much about the environment. If we were forced to live without the benefit of entertainment (or at least were offered it in much smaller doses), the seriousness of the climate crisis would catch up to us and we would be driven to act on it. As it is now, many people are so engrossed in entertainment that they know little about the ecological crises we are facing, or they know of the terrors we face and turn to entertainment to get away from thinking about them. Entertainment is psychologically necessary, and I think if environmental activists and climate scientists never allowed themselves to have fun and to stop thinking about the perilous state of the environment for a while, they would probably die of stress and heartbreak. A balance between meaningful engagement and R&R is what is needed, and it is sorely lacking in our culture. Generally, when given free time, Americans elect to spend nearly all of it on one form of entertainment or another, while the planet deteriorates unseen in the background.
9) Not enough news coverage. It seems to me that there has been an uptick in news about climate change, lately, due to increasing awareness and the increasing severity of its effects around the globe. There could be more, and it is fighting for airtime with celebrity scandals (today it’s an old Sarah Silverman sketch featuring blackface), but at least it’s getting out there. Most of the news doesn’t offer the public a constructive way to approach the issue, though. We hear that things are getting bad, and are going to get worse. We hear about the failure of leaders in the US, China, and elsewhere. But due to the preponderance of national and international news, we seldom hear about local issues citizens could tackle to mitigate damage to the environment or reduce contributions to climate change in their area. Our news is largely homogenous, and on television, most of the local news comes in the form of fires and sensationalistic crime scene footage. The average citizen is unaware of new power plant construction projects in their state, for example, or what the state legislature is doing about the proposed plastic bag ban that was mentioned several months ago and then dropped. We are exposed to more information than ever, but little of it is information we can act on or that has meaningful application to our lives. To get involved in environmental issues at the local level, one generally has to seek out the news and local environmental groups themselves; there is little presentation of relevant information and activism opportunities that reaches the public.
10) Passive versus active environmentalism. If any form of environmentalism is encouraged in America, it is the same three R’s I was taught in fourth grade: Reduce, Reuse, Recycle. Environmentalism is seen as an affair of the home. You should turn the lights off when you leave the room, bring a reusable bag to the store, and separate your recycling from your garbage. I’ve heard a number of people state the single fact that they recycle as evidence that they care about the environment, as if that weren’t essentially mandatory or at least a basic expectation of everyone. Those who are more serious may look into getting solar panels on their home, improving their home’s energy efficiency, or decide to eat more local or vegetarian/vegan. Whatever steps people decide to take, environmentalism is treated as essentially a private matter.
There is little discussion of taking environmentalism into the public forum, of going from a “passive” stage of attempting to reduce one’s footprint in various ways to an “active” stage of getting involved in environmental issues. No one is really taught this sort of environmentalism in school, and most Americans don’t really engage with politics outside of voting once a year, if that. It’s a big jump to go from monitoring your own consumption to following environmental issues, attending rallies, writing letters, and calling leaders. Even if you take the plunge and begin doing those things, spreading awareness to those around you is often another matter it may take some time to get comfortable with. We Americans are uneasy about getting friends, family, and colleagues on board. Many hardly see their neighbors, and seldom hold serious conversations when they do. We don’t want to alienate people at work. We don’t want to become one of “those people” on social media who end up having their friends unfollow them. We don’t want to be seen as a “preachy vegan.” We agree to disagree on politics with family and discuss it as little as possible. The result is that we wage sometimes lonely battles and don’t bring the reinforcements to the fight that are desperately needed. In any public arena, numbers are important. When it comes to reducing our national footprint, numbers are needed. We need to find ways to share our best practices, share our knowledge of what is being done to the earth, especially locally, and to share our sense of urgency in a way that grows the number of environmentalists and encourages new members to keep recruiting to the ranks.
Thinking about obstacles to an embrace of environmentalism is a first step. Thinking of ways to overcome them is the next one. Wherever you are on your journey, think about how you can go farther, and how you can bring others with you. Then do it.