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The Oil Drum: Campfire
Know what bugs me? Those sanctimonious "green" pretenders who carry reusable bags around in their car trunks (but never remember to bring them into the store), buy bamboo sheets (oops—not green) and drop bucketloads of cash on eco-unfriendly stuff in the name of supporting a good cause. Talk about greenwashed ... Those poor souls have positively painted themselves into a corner.
Still, I suppose you have to start somewhere—and starting with the easy stuff is exactly what most people, in fact, actually do. Megan Quinn Bachman, a master's degree student in earth and environmental education, surveyed more than 2,000 early adopters of green lifestyle changes on two green listservs. Rather predictably, she found most of their efforts concentrated on easier undertakings such as cutting back on purchases, buying more local goods and services, conserving energy at home and gardening. More than two-thirds of survey respondants had managed to make those changes.
More life-altering changes remain much less popular. For example, only one-sixth of those surveyed had started new, greener careers, and anything involving driving habits or dietary changes proved to be a hard sell.
Perhaps the most fascinating part of the survey was seeing how feedback about the lifestyles they've made affects the attitude of green-leaning people. From the report:
- People are driven to act in the face of global threats largely by a sense of right and wrong—their conscience—with some encouragement and inspiration from books, movies, media programs and articles.
- Emphasizing the positive consequences of particular lifestyle changes and focusing on health and wellness benefits and a simpler, more satisfying life may be more effective ways to encourage change than promoting financial savings.
- The lack of support from one’s community and family and lack of assistance with overcoming unhelpful personal habits and attitudes are more significant roadblocks to effective response than not having enough information on what actions to take.
- Most people do not feel they need to measure the impact of their lifestyle changes, but some think such feedback would motivate and assist them with doing more. Setting goals, even without measurement, is extremely helpful.
How we can green our Summer
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It can be very difficult to get people to change. As you say many who consider themselves green have only made small changes. My wife and I certainly have a long distance to go. We have ourselves at Danish levels at some cost and it is difficult to go beyond that.
I believe that different groups have different motivations to change and you need to be aware of that.
A few years ago a friend and I teamed up to try and make a bit of change We quickly found it wasn't very worthwhile working with "greens" as they were already converted. Many of them were not making sensible choices when you work the numbers, but over time they were headed in a good direction. But they are a small part of society. We wanted to address a group where we might make a difference.
We decided to work with regular people and not use traditional green messages. Greens are often seen as a bit strange at best and sanctimonious and hypocritical at worst. We've had a bit of success and it is a big change from working in an echo chamber where people agree with you. We're not trying to change people's minds about everything as much as we're trying to get them to change a few activities. And we may not even mention these are green.
There are a multitude of approaches and you have to fine tune them to the group that you want to work with. The important thing is to try and to learn from your failures and refine your approach.