Today is international blog action day... and this years topic is the ENVIRONMENT...
15,000 different voices(blogs)
12 million readers
all discussing and debating one very relevant and complicated issue...
... I was planning on blogging on Saskatchewan environmental issues... but decided that that is too broad a topic... so I thought I'd blog on blog action day itself... as a form as global action...
I responded to an inquiry from the Third Estate Sunday review, an online magazine-blog collective that published an article in which they ended up quoting me... the context of which I found very interesting... mainly on the lack of involvement by big environmental organizations...
[excerpts and shameless self-promotion]
While Billy (Trees for our children . . .) could offer, "I see blogging as important independent media in an increasingly corporatized world..."; environmental organizations apparently feel differently. [Please note, Billy didn't raise the issue of environmental organizations. None who did wanted to be named. One went back and forth on it until deciding against it in her fifth e-mail on the issue of whether to be quoted or not.] Which brings up a very serious issue about the state of the organizations today. In the mainstream press, they may get a brief quote or soundbyte which will be 'balanced' by an environmental skeptic. Blog Action Day offers them the chance to get their message out in full, not partial, without any of the 'balance.' The fact that they do not grasp that or the power of the internet goes a long way towards explaining the many e-mails expressing frustration with the state of today's environmental movement.
Not everyone who replied had decided yet what they were going to write about. But there is a lot of a passion and talent participating. Billy (Trees for our children . . .) explains the purpose and starting point for him, " ... for my canadian politcis class PSCI 230 I had to create and maintain a blog about any relevant political issue... I chose the environment and a need for intergenerational justice... hence the name of my site 'trees for our children... '." Regardless of what anyone brings to the table (pro or con on the environment), this is a global action.
In conclusion about BLOG ACTION DAY... fellow students mark October 15, 2007 in your calendar for whenever you are researching anything related to the environment... I guarantee that of the 15,006 participating blogs... someone will have brought it up... likely many people with many different 'voices'
peace, love, solidarity
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