By: Dr. Jackie Ogden
What’s Our Role?
We know that we’re facing the sixth great extinction on our planet.
We also know that we’re already feeling the impact of global climate change, and that it’s likely too late to avert significant impact to our planet, even if we were to immediately take significant steps.
Many experts – from climate scientists to economists to policy wonks – believe that we’re on the precipice of a growing crisis: from food and water, to energy, to social equity, to extinction to economics.
At Canopy, we’ve recently been asking the question: Are we doing enough? Specifically, are public-facing organizations whose missions involve conservation doing enough? The answer clearly is no. We aren’t reaching the potential that befits such organizations – all of you.
As organizations that reach the public and who care about nature and conservation, our role is clear. And our participation isn’t optional – it is an obligation to ourselves, to each other, and to our planet.
It’s clear that significant changes are required within our approach. Incremental changes haven’t worked and show no evidence of working in the future. We require system-level changes to be effective.
But first, we need to know where we’re going. And specifically, we need to develop an idea of how this community of people – you – could help get us there.
How Do We Respond?
It’s so easy to feel at the least anxious and depressed about all this. But there’s a remedy for that – and it’s to act.
We’re hearing people in our community start to talk about such things. We’re seeing them begin to DO such things. We want to further this conversation, to challenge our thinking, to be part of it, to help reveal what some of us are already doing and build on it.
We anticipate talking about a future where animals and people thrive together. (Which ignores the fact that people are animals…which is likely part of the problem, but I digress…maybe…). About working with (not for) all of our communities to understand what they want and to determine collectively how to get there. Working with native peoples to understand how they’ve successfully lived this way for eons. Focusing on solutions and moving away from negativity and scarcity models. Moving through the world with kindness, with empathy, listening more than we talk, co-creating solutions. Ensuring that people can feed their families, are healthy, have access to clean water, and live in a socially and environmentally just world.
But, we may talk about other things. And that’s fine. We want *you* to tell us what that future looks like. Together, we must focus on the future we want to create, and together – and with lots of others – we must use creativity and a solution-minded approach to develop and address that future.
We’ve seen the things you all do when you put your hearts and minds to it. And we want to work with you all to help all of us more, better, and different.
What’s the Forum For Discussion?
To achieve this, we’re going to arrange some opportunities to have some conversations. On March 21 we’re beginning a four-month series, to perhaps listen to some folks that have also been thinking of this. To talk together about what this future might look like. To talk about how we might work together and with communities where ever we work to further this future.
Join us. It might even be fun. Register here.
