Category Archives: Sustainability

BLUE PLANET UNITED IN A PANDEMIC WORLD

From the Executive Director

IN 1940, the English author Dorothy L Sayers wrote, “War is an ugly disaster; it is not a final catastrophe.”  The same can be said for pandemics. Sayers went on to say, “There are no final catastrophes. Like every other historical event, war is not an end, but a beginning.” Let us hope this pandemic has opened our eyes to the failures of our society, and has given us the chance to reimagine—and work toward—a more just and sustainable society.

The future is no longer in the future, but here and now. Second by second it is upon us, and every moment in our lives is a fresh beginning. The end of one civilization is the beginning of another, and it is the people who are living through the upheaval who will decide how society moves forward. Into another few years of Economic Growth Over All Else? Until the next wave of pandemic hits and we all run indoors again? Or a recognition that our slowing down, our under-consuming, our focus on local life, may be a very good thing.  Most of us are enjoying the clean air and quiet that the “stay at home” orders have brought us. We are enjoying the songs of birds and the re-emergence of wild animals. But we do not enjoy the loneliness, the limitations, and the loss of life and work. 

How can we move from being Economic Person to Whole Person? That is going to take imagination, hard thinking, and courage to test the unknown. If we want some hard thinking done, we must think for ourselves, or others will do the thinking—and decision-making—for us.  The time has come to set our feet upon the road to sustainability. The task is urgent; we must not push it into the future; we must not leave it to others: we must do it ourselves, and we must begin here and now.

BLUE PLANET UNITED resolves to bring the theory of sustainability down from the clouds of vision into the community of local and personal action. We will provide action ideas that span all facets of human endeavor.

Reaching Up Into The Sky

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What is a Sustainable Community?

Blue Planet United is dedicated to promoting an agenda for sustainable living and sustainable communities.  But what do we mean by sustainability?

The term is often defined as having an equal balance of the three Es: Environmental quality, Economic vitality, and social Equity.  Building sustainable communities requires careful integration of environmental, social and economic strategies. If we can focus on all three – not just one – these strategies create a sense of place, personal responsibility, and social well-being that together foster improvements in quality of life.

Sustainable communities are healthy communities where natural resources are preserved, jobs are available, sprawl is contained, neighborhoods are secure, education is lifelong, health care is affordable and all citizens have opportunities to improve the quality of their lives. Who doesn’t want to live in a place like that? Who doesn’t want clean air and clean water and tasty local food and safe playgrounds for children? We can achieve those goals by changing our focus and our behavior.

To sustain is to support without collapse. As the 21st century lurches forward, sustainable communities will be the ones that become more resilient. Pandemics and the climate crisis will require rethinking how we live. For example, in order to avoid pandemics, the world needs to shut down wild animal markets, which are cruel and unsustainable anyway. To avoid worsening climate disasters, we need to transition away from fossil fuels as soon as possible, fossil fuels that are not good for our health in any case.

In this respect, the current pandemic has produced some unexpected and thought-provoking consequences.

  • People have noticed and appreciated bluer skies and cleaner air as a result of the declining use of fossil fuels. Waterways are cleaner too!  The shift to renewable sources of energy, such as solar and wind, has accelerated, supported by changing public attitudes.  
  • People have seen that disadvantaged communities, minorities, marginalized groups and low-wage industries have been disproportionately affected in the pandemic, highlighting the increasing inequality of the social order that has attracted widespread attention.  It is a reminder that a sustainable community is also a just community that guarantees the right to equal treatment and equal opportunities for everyone.
  • People have experienced a dramatic change in the relationship between work and home life, raising questions about the emergence of new and better ways of living and working.   

If nothing else, we have learned that people can make substantial daily lifestyle changes very quickly when required to do so.  To live sustainably we must endeavor to be civic minded, to treat ourselves and others with respect, and to create innovative solutions to our current problems. 

To be sure, the problems we face are complex, systemic and multifaceted.  But to get started, individuals can take steps on their own, such as:

  • Get to know the place where you live as a bioregion, not just as a political jurisdiction. Get to know native plants and animals. Appreciate the roles they play in your health and well-being.
  • If your income rises, instead of buying more, bigger, or fancier things, reward yourself with less stuff and a simpler life that allows you more freedom and more time for family, friends and community.
  • Engage in social discourse that explores complex issues, avoids stereotyping and extremism, and searches for creative solutions.  

As we work together to make a more sustainable world, we must be kind to ourselves and others, and creative in envisioning solutions for a better future.  

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In memory of Marilee Scaff

(1915-2019), board member of Blue Planet United and star of BPU’s award-winning film, SPIRIT OF PLACE (2010)*.  A longtime community activist, teacher, and naturalist, Dr. Scaff was a passionate advocate for social and environmental causes and an important donor to Blue Planet United.  Until her death in March 2019, Marilee was the nation’s oldest living girl scout and an accomplished author who wrote her best known book, Strength for the Journey, at age 102. A survivor of a POW/internment camp in the Philippines during World War II, Scaff went on to have a distinguished career as an educator in public schools and universities.

Marilee Scaff in Spirit of Place

In order to celebrate and to promote her legacy, Blue Planet United is re-releasing SPIRIT OF PLACE, making it freely available on this and other web sites.  The 29-minute film addresses the importance of wildness in a technologically transformed and urbanizing world. Featuring Marilee Scaff’s observations about a life lived close to nature, the film celebrates the powerful sense of wonder that springs from human encounters with wildlife and spectacular scenery. The purpose of the film is to remind nature lovers everywhere of the inspiring places that add meaning to their lives. It aims to encourage young people, especially, to discover the true wealth hidden in wild landscapes and seascapes. The film builds slowly to an emotional climax that explores human spirituality and mortality at its most profound level, inviting both secular and religious interpretations of our changing relationship with Nature.

Spirit of Place

Written, directed and produced by Monty Hempel

     *Winner of the John Muir Award,  Yosemite International Film Festival, 2011

Click on play button below to view film

 

 

 

 

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Exploring the Anthropocene

Blue Planet United announces plans for a new on-line video masterclass series, Exploring the Anthropocene, which began production in early 2018 and is scheduled for completion in 2019-2020. The series will be hosted by BPU President, Dr. Monty Hempel, who is writing, directing, and producing the ten-part series.

The Anthropocene is the name proposed by scientists to describe the current geological epoch of planet earth, in which human activities have become a major driving force in altering and often disrupting climate and other global environmental systems. The film series will examine the resulting changes in life and interdependence on a human-dominated planet.

Although presented in the format of a video masterclass, the series will draw heavily on dramatic storytelling, spectacular visuals of nature and wildlife, and a strong blend of science-based learning and poignant appeals for emotional intelligence.  The entire series will be provided free on-line for students in high school, college, and life-long learners, everywhere.

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Dr. Monty Hempel, environmental scientist, filmmaker and president of Blue Planet United

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When Good People Deny Human Responsibility for Climate Disruption

by Monty Hempel

As a college professor, I am painfully aware that my students often use education more to justify pre-existing opinions and worldviews than to enlighten themselves with new knowledge and ways of knowing.  This knowledge-for-justification tendency can be found in each of us and varies only by degree of application. But it can be dangerous when it leads people to deny mounting evidence that change is urgently needed, as witnessed in the current debate over climate disruption, or in historic debates about the health hazards of smoking, or the economic hazards of deregulating Wall Street.

The selective use of knowledge to rationalize human wants and behaviors has been heavily studied by social scientists.  They refer to this phenomenon by many different names, including motivated reasoning, confirmation bias, and cultural cognition. Combined with long-studied phenomena of “groupthink” and cognitive dissonance theory, researchers have woven together a persuasive but unflattering account of human reason and its self-serving uses.

The importance of these research findings for people concerned about climate change is in understanding how to communicate better and to present scientific findings in practical tradeoff terms when they somehow threaten the dominant values and institutions of the status quo.  Most people in denial are neither evil nor stupid.  Denial may be an effective way to reduce stress and cognitive dissonance. But it may also deeply undermine their own self-interest, in the long term.

 A major barrier to public mobilization on climate and other global environmental issues is the psychological distance involved in moving from abstract environmental data (e.g., global mean temperature) to more immediate concerns about local impacts, such as disruption of drought cycles in a particular area, and how they may affect one’s personal prosperity or family security.

But there is an even more important kind of distancing that helps to explain the failure to promote eco-literacy when and where it is most needed. This kind of distancing results from the receding boundaries of the natural world in the face of rapid human development. People disconnected from nature have less motivation to learn more about it. The consequences are especially important for children, as suggested by recent book titles, such as Last Child in the Woods and Free-Range Kids. The psychological distance separating the urbanized places where most humans reside from shrinking remnants of natural landscape has never been greater. As a consequence, the opportunity to connect emotionally and physically with nature and wildlife has steadily declined. And implicit in this decline is an accompanying loss of attachment to natural places and wild habitat, or what is sometimes understood as lost bioregional identity.

 Precisely how much this growing separation diminishes human concern about the environment is unknown, but it is clear that people are more likely to protect the things they love and actively internalize. Distancing from nature may have some of the same emotionally debilitating effects as distancing from other people. This separation becomes even more significant in issues of climate change, where the most dramatic impacts are taking place in the Arctic and other remote areas that few people ever visit or monitor.

The obstacles to clear thinking about these kinds of threats extend far beyond psychological distancing. Research on climate change communication has identified dozens of factors that serve to hinder or derail public support for timely action on climate risks.  As a partial summary of many of these factors, I have developed a simple table (below) to help in examining the causal forces at work in the development and persistence of climate denial and disbelief.

Overcoming the disbelief and suspicion that currently polarize large segments of our population will require both intellectual and emotional intelligence about our common origin in the great web of life and our common future in sustaining it.

Causes of Eco-Complacency and Disbelief 

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