(By Jitender Dabas)
The headlines last month were dominated by the arrest and subsequent bail of a 22-year-old climate activist from Bengaluru in the toolkit controversy. Interestingly, her being a climate activist somehow got some additional attention to her arrest but at the same time, it was also used to lessen her credibility by some.
But a corollary of her being in the headline was that climate activism, perhaps, got more space in the media for a few days. Environmental protection as a concept
is not new for us, yet somehow there is something about climate activists and environmentalists that stops us from taking them as seriously as others. There is something we don’t get in someone being a full-time climate activist.
Remember those WWF guys walking up to you for a 5 minute chat outside a multiplex or a shopping mall. The ones who asked for your support to save the pandas and sea turtles. Those young people holding placards, asking governments to take measures to save the planet.
While we are perfectly at ease with a group of teens turning up on our door to ask for chanda for a temple or a pooja pandal, 20-year-olds using their weekends to protest about climate completely confuses us. After all, what kind of a teenager would waste their Fridays to create awareness about reducing carbon footprints or saving endangered turtles (it helps us to club the two, often).
Therefore, either we want to reject or dismiss them, or at times even suspect them.
Why is it so? Is it only about taking them lightly or is it reflective of our attitude as a society towards the whole idea of environmentalism?
First, there is an issue of comprehension of motive. A 16-year-old wasting weekends trying to save endangered species of animals instead of doing the teen things and someone quitting a cushy white collar job to work for environmental issues doesn’t quite fit into our conventional understanding of how things should be. Saving the planet or the environment is fine with us as a school project or an occasional voluntary indulgence, but any seriousness beyond that starts to confuse us.
The problem gets compounded in a developing nation like India, where the guilt of over-consumption has not set in as yet. A large part of the population has just earned the fruits of consumption and started to relish them. The other part is still struggling to survive and finds the idea of lowering carbon footprints and saving sea turtles too fanciful and disconnected from their lives.
For this reason, middle-class India ends up seeing environmental activism as a sign of privilege. As a 16-20-year-old, if you don’t need to focus on your studies and making money, and if you are not excited by the idea of consumption, you must be very privileged. Environmental protection, therefore, often gets labelled as an imported first world hobby and a pastime pursuit of privileged kids growing up insulated from the reality of real India.
But there is more to it. It isn’t only about our lack of comprehension of motives that leads us to reject them or suspect them. Somewhere inside, we find it convenient to reject or dismiss them.
Environmentalists are a demanding lot. They want to save endangered species, habitats, prevent damage from modified food and, of course, prevent catastrophic climate change. All are worthy goals, but are in conflict with our basic needs for a comfortable life.
Their actions and causes, therefore, make us feel guilty for our consumption choices. They live and expect us to live by higher standards, which are sometimes impractical and mostly inconvenient. It is like someone constantly reminding us of all the things we are doing wrong — burning crackers, using poly bags, using cars instead of public transport , etc, etc. Our reaction often is to find ways to reject them — as too privileged, anti-progress or even conspiracy theories of them being funded by foreign powers, etc. Labelling them as green lobby or cardboard conscience-keepers helps us reject them and go on with our comfortable lives.
But this isn’t really good for us. Once upon a time, perhaps, we needed science lessons to understand climate change, but now, all we have to do is look out of our windows (especially in Gurgaon and Delhi) to realise where we have reached. Environmental activism now needs more mainstream acceptance for our own good.
The climate movement also perhaps needs to find ways not to get marginalised or labelled incorrectly. Children as change agents works (remember the firecracker ban?). An eight-year old Licypriya Kanjugam or a 12-year-old Ridhima Pandey as the face of climate activism gets media attention but also allows us to dismiss them with our patronising condescension (“they are too young to understand serious issues”). The forever placard-holding protester image also works against them and allows us to label them cardboard conscience keepers.
But we need them and need more of them. The activists are perhaps doing something that others don’t have time for. They are trying to protect our tomorrow while we are busy indulging in today.
It is striking that the other news that was in the headlines last month was the unfortunate flash floods and dam break in Uttarakhand. Perhaps, a reminder for us to rethink our views about climate activists and their ideas.
(The author is COO, Chief Strategy Officer, McCann World Group)