community level were displayed on a corresponding info board. Steps ranged from one to three star level challenges from turning the water off while brushing your teeth to starting a community garden. Our categories of focus for this educational tool were waste, water, energy, transportation and of course - food! Talking to people, sharing and spreading in eco consciousness was an empowering and hopeful experience. People of all ages added these challenges to their already impressive plethora of environmental initiatives. It was a pleasure to see that the people of Kingston are making serious efforts to do their part in suport of sustainability. This was at least true of those who made it out to earth hour and turned off their lights and hopefully their power!
The evening itself consisted of accoustic and percussive entertainment and excellent performances by local artists while people shared an optimistic atmosphere of synergy. The moon and candlelights shone brightly and reflected the light in the darkness that the momentum of the current environmental movement represents. Another aspect of the KSC display involved a bike that converts human generated energy into electricity. To illustrate this we had people pedaling to turn on an energy efficient lightbulb. (below) It really was an illuminating method of showing how much effort and resources is actually needed for the smallest amount of energy use. This was yet another visible manifestation of how one person's force can account for alot of impact. Please use your personal power for environmental change!
I am looking forward to sharing alot of environmental info including alot of how-to's! Many interesting and relevant topics have already arisen - stay tuned for future posts about solar power, vermicomposting, sustainable fashion and more. Upcoming this Saturday, March 27th is EARTH HOUR from 8:30-9:30pm which is the international initiative to conserve energy, showing government and mother earth how much we need to care about changing on an individual and collective level. The centre is part of the event occuring this weekend in the downtown Spring Market Square. From 7pm-10pm it will feature a candlelit evening of speeches, local vendors and musicians. We will be there volunteering with an inter-active game that challenges people to choose an environmental initiative in their own lives or communities. The night will also include a completely off-the-grid concert aswell! Here are Dave and Emily working on our display for the earh hour day event that we are so exited for! Looking forward to celebrating with you on Satuday if you're in Kingston or anywhere doing something for energy conservation!
CONS (just a few):
-a capitalist model of extreme competitiveness and commercialization of the event through sponsors, consumer products and commercials themselves we are exposed to inevitably in any form of olympic coverage
-an opening ceremony that had not been executed as such COULD have otherwise paid for so many better causes on a provincial, national, or international level i don't feel the need to list them...
-an elaborate presentation and artistic depiction of the birth of the world (the continental shift) was beautiful but oblivious to the multiple forms of decoposition, decay and death that is a direct effect of misplaced values and disconnectedness among human beings today (and therefore ironic)
-a light show of a stunning forest display when those dollars could have been spent on reforestation
-the advanced technology that came from valuable research dollars enabled the dazzling light display. This is yet more evidence of the "myth of progress" which has so poignantly been described in Ronald Wright's A Short History of Progress.
-a total disregard of Vancouver's recent push to ban bottled water:
It is often difficult to tell the difference between products that harm the environment on a lower scale of impact than others. One hint is that if a company is large and if it sells other "non-eco" products then they are likely to greenwash (think Clorox's line of "green works" household cleaning products). I think it's important to think "Is this necessary?" before making a purchase of any kind. Coupled with public activism, protest and collective forms of making a difference, it must begin and include an individual level of consciousness. I am talking about daily habits on the smallest level to the point of avoiding that afternoon coffee if you've forgotten a reusable mug. We are all on different levels of environmental consciousness and at varying stages of acting on that awareness. Some may be coming to the realization that it is possible to live without the newest brand and fragrance of deoderant....or without deoderant at all (at least the kind that is packaged and bought in a store).
There was a recent post by George Monbiot which I feel is a poignant and explanatory deconstruction of this recent "eco-everything" phenomenon, which since it is a part of capitalist society, has been used to manipulate people into spending their dollars in the Marketplace. Furthermore, propogating the status quo's definition of progress.
"[C]onsumerism is a totalitarian system: it permeates every aspect of our lives. Even our dissent from the system is packaged up and sold to us in the form of anti-consumption consumption, like the “I’m not a plastic bag” which was supposed to replace disposable carriers but was mostly used once or twice before it fell out of fashion, or lucrative new books on how to live without money.
Orwell and Huxley proposed different totalitarianisms: one sustained by fear, the other partly by greed. Huxley’s nightmare has come closer to realisation. In the nurseries of the Brave New World, “the voices were adapting future demand to future industrial supply. ‘I do love flying,’ they whispered, ‘I do love flying, I do love having new clothes … old clothes are beastly …We always throw away old clothes. Ending is better than mending, ending is better than mending’”(7). "
The easy way to cope with this reality is to be cynical. It often seems like the "blazes of glory" descent of humanity (i.e. Brando actively degenerating in the chaos of Apocalypse Now!) is held in favour over repair, recycling and regenerating the ecosystem. Natural disasters and other environmental effects are not only impacting people significantly around the world but are causing millions of deaths (by the 100,000's in Haiti alone!). Cynicism and accepting the current direction of our fate will not only lead to more deaths and violations of human rights but also to ecological catasptophe. We must adopt a hyper-awareness when it comes to our lifestyles on a public and private level. Our ecological footprint includes our consumer choices. At the very least do not let yourself fall into the greenwash trap - support that it is "always in" to live green instead of look it.
A few texts I recommend that support the related "myth of progress" include:
A Short History of Progress - Ronald Wright
Ishmael - Daniel Quinn
