by Maggie Paquet
Have you stopped watching or listening to the news, or reading the newspaper because it all seems so bad? Do you just want to crawl back into bed and pull the covers up over your head? Yeah, me, too. Forcing myself to try to figure out how to deal with the dismal news from all corners of the globe, let alone our own country, I began to think about the state of theCanadian “environmental movement.”
I realized I was getting so depressed that I could barely scrape up the energy to make a sandwich, wash my face, or any necessary daily tasks. Many of us feel overwhelmed with an incredible sense of despair and cynicism, even anger, when we think of the direction the world is heading. Like me, some of my friends seem paralysed in trying to work towards possible solutions to the many problems – social, environmental, political – the world is facing today.
The scope of these – climate change; loss of biodiversity; major threats to fresh water; ocean acidification; deforestation; corporate agri-business and the loss of family farms; genetic modification of food; widespread pollution of air, water, and food; destruction of rivers (the lifeblood of the planet) all over the world by dams; EMFs from all directions assaulting living cells – is truly mind-numbing. In order to cope with it all, to help me focus on what to do, I’ve had to dredge up that wise old aphorism: “Think globally; act locally.” There’s a kernel of hope in that, and hope sometimes seems like the only thing keeping many of us functioning.
Continuing to hope without changing behaviour, however, exacerbates intellectual and emotional paralysis. It’s like exercising only one muscle group all the time while the rest of the body deteriorates. So I did a re-think on how acting locally while thinking globally may help to dispel emotional meltdown and further “analysis paralysis.”
A good bit of my personal solution is to be part of the Canadian Environmental Network (RCEN—the “R” stands for Reseau, French for network), first through my local group, and then having it join the regional affiliate network – the BCEN in British Columbia. Why? Because, to use another aphorism, “There’s strength in numbers.”
The social, environmental, and political problems we’re all grappling with are huge; the causes can be laid at the feet of equally huge political and economic forces and lobby groups greedily foisting their corporate agendas onto dear old Mother Earth…not to mention our elected officials. To help counteract this, we need as many good minds and dedicated people as we can get to work collaboratively on developing successful strategies to deal with all the issues. Our efforts, however, require effective coordination, which can be provided—first at the regional level and then nationally— through membership in the RCEN.
Among the RCEN’s strategic goals are to broaden the voice of the environmental movement in Canada and to build capacity to prepare for the transition to a sustainable society. Laudable goals, but can they be achieved? At the very root of both the RCEN and the BCEN is the imperative to engage people at the local level. Carrying on “education- al activities to develop public awareness” is the foundation upon which to build a “sustainable society.” By connecting people to synergistically develop knowledge, expertise, and action, the RCEN is serving its basic purpose. This is not theoretical. It happens every day in some part of the country thanks to the Network.
This connectivity reminds us that everything is connected to everything else – what is local is global, and vice versa – so the best way to develop solutions is to start by becoming engaged at the local level.
The RCEN came about largely as a volunteer-based network of largely volunteer-based groups across Canada. Between the AGMs, caucuses, and consultations, individuals met over time. This helped build trust and collegiality. In a volunteer-based organization, these are absolutely vital. What is the basic commonality among us? Why are some people engaged when so many more are not? Is it that we care more for future generations? For biodiversity? For the air we breathe? The water we drink? The food we eat? Culture? Health?
What separates us from people who go blithely on their way “shopping ’til they drop;” driving when they could walk, take public transit, or ride a bike; working at jobs that not only bore them to tears, but contribute to the loss of “quality of life” for everyone? Maybe we’re less fearful about looking reality in the face and saying, “I’m not going to do that.” or “I’m not going to vote for that.” or “That’s not good for me, nor for others, so I’m going to help change things.”
There’s no doubt that the Network is highly complex. Keeping it together is a bit like herding cats. But there’s equally no doubt that the people who make up the organizations that make up the provincial and national networks are, for the most part, people who care enough about something in their existence to do something different than most other people in society.
A major quality for the Network to function is trust. Lately, this is dissolving. Another important quality is the desire to work together, to build on our various synergies. This, too, is waning. Instead, what I’m seeing parallels what I see in the public service: people more focused on how to boost their careers, not on how their work can benefit society – the society that ultimately pays their wages and their pension plans.
As funding has dissipated over the last half decade (and you have to ask why this is happening when there is certainly more money “out there” but it is being controlled by increasingly fewer people), we haven’t been able to meet face-to-face as frequently. We are being isolated and alienated from each other. This alienation contributes to losing collegiality and, most importantly, trust. We have to commit to reversing this. If we don’t, the essence of the Canadian environmental movement will waft away on the breeze. The neo-cons and corporados will win—and Mother Earth will most definitely lose.
Contemplating on the knowledge that there are kindred spirits all across the country goes a long way to helping fight despair and paralysis. We’re in a minority… so far. But that could – and must – change if there’s to be social and ecological justice in Earth’s future.
I’ve decided that the best advice I can give myself to help prevent “analysis paralysis,” is to not get so hung up on the global that it causes despair. Of course, we shouldn’t bury our heads in the sand either; rather, we need to put our energy into doing what we can locally that can percolate to the global level. Then we can win. After all, it’s the only planet we have.
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Maggie Paquet is a biologist, writer, editor, and general all-around activist. She is the BCEN rep to the RCEN and is on the board of the RCEN.
[From WS September/October 2011]