(A warning to Leaders and Policy Makers)
Our need to get the environmental message across is urgent, but we can seem arrogant and distant. As a result, we are losing the argument and darker forces are effectively recruiting the public.
Since the decline of heavy industry, the people of the South Wales Valleys have mostly been talked at, not listened to… they have been made to feel redundant and wretched.
Since the new orthodoxy of ‘being green’, coloured the conversations of the culturati, Valleys communities have been told – by people who have never had to choose between heating and eating – to live greener lives, with EV cars, solar panels & organic foods.
This effectively alienates and pushes them towards populists… who amplify resentment and stoke fear to gain power.
…the louder we proclaim climate catastrophe – the less they hear and, the more vulnerable they are to political manipulation.
Stress as a political tool…
The more you stress people, the less they listen… stress changes how the brain works. It makes thinking rigid and gives space to extremism, which populists and climate denier’s fill.
Making people feel powerless and guilty… will cause them to turn to others who present a compelling different story… one that may not be true, but one which offers a welcome, an acceptance, reassurance and comfort.
The more powerless and guilty we make people from deprived areas feel, the more they’ll accept voices who promise to help them ‘take back control’.
Framing nature crises in catastrophic terms… ‘Melting ice caps’, ‘Burning forests’, ‘Biodiversity collapse’ – is just one more crisis for families who face real & present daily issues: “Will the food bank have anything left?”, “Is our teenager buying drugs?”, “Will we get to the end of the month/week/day?”
In the reality of their day-to-day, climate change warnings just become more background noise.
The conservation movement must shift its message emphasis from doom, impending disaster, nature as punisher… to one of empowerment. One where conservation is fully understood as a shared fight, that offers a better future.
A future in which all can benefit.
Build a Narrative for Change…
Consider positive stories…
…stories that inspire, not shame.
…stories that include, not alienate.
….stories of hope.
…that illuminate a path to success
…where our actions benefit both nature and ourselves
…stories where lives have agency and are nature & society positive
Speak of actions that benefit nature and help our relationship with it – this is the route to successfully engaging the people of The Valleys.
They are being lost but can be helped to return.
To lives entwined with Nature.
After all – it is our home.
