I wonder sometimes, are we moving too quickly for some people?
In the last five years we’ve made a huge amount of progress – can you imagine lovingly sorting the recycling then? Or waiting eagerly for the latest green must-have? Or putting dates like Power Shift in your diary months in advance?
Well, it seems not everyone is always able to keep up. We’ll all probably know someone who seems to want to block climate progress, often for the sake of ‘wanting to be different’. They might try to copy (badly) some junk-science from a falsified Channel 4 documentary, or just prefer the dirty, backwards and failed way of life that we have now.
Weird, I know!
Well, how can we help these people along? We’d like suggestions please! Share your stories of convincing the stragglers…
Leave them alone!
(Literally, eventually, and hopefully soon.)
“Help” often doesn’t… (help.)
They will need as long as they need to come to their senses, and sometimes it will seem to you like an eternity. All you can do, in the meantime, is be compassionate.
Easier said than done I know, but nothing else works. We can’t ‘fix’ other people – we can only work on ourselves.
Hopefully someone will remember the actual quote that I am trying to recall here, but its something like:
Don’t try to change the behaviour of the old tribe, ignore them, start a new tribe, live the dream, enjoy it, and make sure ‘they’ get to hear rumours about how much fun it is!
I disagree
I would say don’t leave them behind and don’t leave them alone.
If you are talking about people you know then they are likely people you care about. Therefore they should be people you can talk to, and actually work on different ways to discuss the issues with them and ultimately with people you know less well.
One fear I have of the current climate/env movement is that it risks alienating vast majorities of the population.
I keep hearing that people ‘just don’t care’. But frankly that is crap. People care they just care about different things. While it may be far flung climate adaptation issues that concern you, for others it is simply having a job and providing for their family.
So ‘horses for courses’. If its jobs they care about talk about the positveness of greening the economy. Question how regions will survive if demand for cars continues to drop due to increasing petrol prices. Discuss resource depletion, local businesses, energy efficiency, profit from CleanTech investment – whatever floats their boat.
I’ve had success with mates just by mentioning my interest in issues, dropping in comments at appropriate times and asking questions of them. No preaching, no demonising.
One in particular has developed his interest and even argues about weather in Australia with his Dad (confusing weather with climate but that’s a technical issue).
But most of all never forget my favourite test: ‘the man/woman in a pub’. Not everyone is interested in climate science or mitigation targets. Messages have to resonate and we need to create an enlightened self interest amongst all members of our communities.
Very few people or communities will win if we continue down the path we are on. So it’s in everyone’s best interests to understand the impacts on them and their local area/country.
Anyway I will hop off the soap box now
Cheers and keep up the great work
Jeremy – you are spot on.
We don’t have a right to people’s attention, they are gifting it to us. It is our responsibility to find engaging messages that excite them, and are relevant to them.
As individuals we trust journalists and lawyers hardly at all, the press, NGOs and politicians only a little more. Doctors and scientists a little above that – but by FAR the most trusted people are our friends and family. This means that each of us can, through daily conversation, create enormous change.
And re the pub scenario – have you tried explaining that things like the football World Cup could be cancelled due to climate change. Now there’s a mass-engagement thought…