Youth�~Earth�@Severn�@Speakers�@Tour

Sev's Sloth Questions
Vancouver, Canada
June 25, 2002

��What environmental problems are of most concern to you right now?
 
First of all, I think we should really think about the word
"environment."  It doesn't just mean trees and wild animals.  The
environment is what surrounds you.  In the city, on the planet.  It
includes everything that physically affects you.  I think that
understanding that the environment is everything that surrounds us and
interacts with us is very important-- it makes you realize that
environmental issues are very relevant to your life.  Somehow we've
become really disconnected from our surroundings.  We've lost
consciousness of the fact that we depend on our surroundings to exist!
 We don't think about where our food comes from.  We don't think about
the fact that we breathe the air that our cars pump their exhaust
into.  We don't think about where our waste water goes after we flush
the toilet.  This is why we now have serious environmental problems--
we have separated ourselves from the reality of living in the
environment.  Now there are many problems, like pollution of our air,
water and soil, which are affecting our health and our resources like
fisheries and farms.  This in turn is affecting our social issues,
aggravating poverty and social imbalance.  Our economies are affected
too.  But I think that the issues stem from the root disconnectedness
that especially developed nations seem to have. We have to get back in
touch with how we humans are part of the natural systems that sustain
us.  That we depend on.  How do we do this?  We start learning about
where our water and air come from and go, and we learn about where our
food comes from, and what the effects of our lifestyle are.  And, most
importantly, we must spend more time outside, in nature. 

There are many global issues.  But I think that it is most important
that everyone start looking to their own countries, their own homes,
their own selves to start tackling the issues at hand. 


��Give us your impressions of working as a commissioner on
the UN's Earth Charter.

It was a great experience to work on the Earth Charter Commission.  I
was able to spend time with many inspirational people, from Kamla
Chowdhry of India to Mikhail Gorbachev of Russia to Ruud Lubbers of
the Netherlands.  On the other hand, it was sometimes very
frustrating-- we were trying to come up with a document that all of us
(over 30 people), from all over the world, could agree on and believe
in.  So it took a long time, and also it couldn't be too specific.

But in the end, we came up with something we could be proud of.  I was
especially happy the last time that we met up, at the Earth Dialogues
Conference in France this winter.  There were many commissioners there
and our meeting was like a family reunion.  And everyone was united by
their dedication to working on social and environmental issues in
their own countries, and through the ethics of the Earth Charter.  It
was incredible to hear of how people had used the Charter in their own
countries, cities and communities.  I really got the sense of a global
community, that by sharing our individual projects we were working
together around the world.  These people were truly acting locally,
thinking globally.  It was quite beautiful. 

I like that the document talks about spirituality.  That it recognizes
nature as a sacred force.  I think that that is important.  Many
religions and nations know that nature is sacred.  And if we think of
it as such it is easier to see our environmental awareness is  a
priority. 


�� What are you most concerned about in Japan? 

The issues of Japan are paralleled by the problems in other developed
countries with high populations.  But Japan is an island, and so must
be very aware of its dependency on resources from the rest of the
world.
 
Issues that I think are major for Japan:  Air-- I've heard that
pollution is very bad in Japan.  Keibo says that in elementary school,
children with clear skin are unusual.  Most kids have nasty skin
reactions to the air.  Is this true?  If it is, that's awful!  Clean
air is our birthright.  This is something we must fight for!

If air is polluted, I'm sure the water is too.  Our bodies are made up
mostly of water.  If we drink poisoned water, then our bodies will be
made up of poison.  It scares me that people in developed nations
(Canada--a country with very clean water is included) are buying
water.  This means that we are accepting the fact that the water isn't
clean, and we are abandoning the people that can't afford to spend
their money on water, because it comes from the tap.  Water is our
birthright.  We must fight for that too.  

Another important issue is FOOD.  Like Japan, British Columbians
depend on the ocean for food.  Today the fish stocks are crashing.
What will we do without the Salmon?  Our West Coast is already
starving.  In Japan the fish have to be brought from around the world
to sustain the need.  Knowing where our food comes from and what the
consequences of our harvesting are is crucial.  We must realize that
we are destroying our own resources and we have to make a new plans to
sustain longterm use. 

These are issues of our environment.  These are also health issues.
And social issues.  The point is issues of our environment ARE health
and social issues.  And the first step to deal with problems is to get
educated about them, learn all the reasons for the problems, aspects
of them, how the environment affects our health, society and economy,
and vice versa.   Then we can start problem solving.  


��Tell us about Activists who are optimists.

I'm an optimist!  We are young!  Our whole lives are ahead of us! We
have to be optimistic.  And we should be-- the world is an incredible,
beautiful place.  We have to make sure that we get to experience it as
such!  And ensure that our children can experience a beautiful world
too.  A beautiful planet Earth is what our great grandparents left our
grandparents, what our grandparents left for our parents.  We must not
be the generation to deny this legacy. 

Our generation has a great challenge.  Sometimes, the problems seem so
big.  It is easy to get depressed when you think about the imbalance
that people have created.  But being an activist for the environment
has led to the most amazing experiences I have had.  It has allowed me
to meet passionate, inspiring people.  I have learned so much.  I've
learned about how to communicate with people, what people care about.

 And, perhaps most importantly, it makes me feel empowered.  In
working to help the environment, I realize that there are many people
out there who are working on parallel paths.  There are people all
over the world trying to make their communities better, trying to find
better ways to do things.  Learning about what individuals and groups
of people are doing is a great source of inspiration.  What are
environmentalists doing in Japan?  I'm sure they're out there, so we
must learn about who they are and what they are working on! 


��What will be the core of your message to the Johannesburg Summit?
 
I will focus on two things:  1) the interconnectedness of social,
health and environmental issues, and 2) the true theme of the
conference:  taking personal RESPONSIBILITY for our problems!


��Do you feel the attitudes of Adult political leaders of the world
have changed since the Rio Earth Summit? 

One of the problems with politics is that governments only care about
the short term-- getting elected again.  That was why in Rio I wanted
them to think about their own children-- to get them to think about
the true, long-term stakes.  Unfortunately, after the last 10 years I
think it's evident that after Rio political leaders haven't started
thinking long term at all. 

I was hoping that after the September 11th bombings in the US, people
would start paying attention to the global imbalance, and realize that
we must start looking for serious, long-term, global solutions to
prevent such insanity and international attacks between the Haves and
Have-Nots from increasing.  But unfortunately the response of the
government has turned into a bandaid solution to hunt down the bad
guys, not investigate the cause of the bad guys. 

 
��What advice would you give to the youth of Japan and the rest of
the world in regards to resolving urgent environmental problems? 

Get out into nature.  I can't stress this enough.  It is so important
that youth grow up with a sense of nature.  I think it is important
for our individual health and sanity.  I am worried that we are
getting more and more disconnected from nature, and that perhaps our
generation might be the first generation that doesn't have childhood
memories of nature.  I think that this correlates with the fact that
children in cities are becoming increasingly unhealthy.  This is very
dangerous-- if we don't know nature, how will we want to protect it?
We won't know why it is important, and will unfortunately think we
don't need it. If we spend time outdoors, in nature, we will know and
remember why we must preserve the natural world. 

Getting out into nature is a big part of learning about the natural
systems and how we fit into nature, and depend on it.  We have to
re-learn where our food comes from, how our air and water get purified
by the trees and oceans, and what the effects of our lifestyles are.
Learning about these will lead us closer to solutions to the
problems. 

 
��What would be your dream for the future of the world? 

This is the big question!  I am still learning, researching and
developing my thoughts on what a bright (and really possible!)  human
future would look like.  I know that if we spent all the money we
spend on militia, or advertising, or even on cosmetics on trying to
find sustainable solutions, we would have no problem finding answers!
 
I think that there must be a revolution of our values.  Today we are
taught about short term survival:  about short government terms,
quarterly business reports.  We are not taught to ask "what kind of a
future do I want?"   In school we are taught a lot of information, but
not taught how we, as human beings, fit in with the natural world and
how we can take care of ourselves, each other, or the Earth.  We are
not taught that those things are important.  We must give more
importance to learning these things. 

In the future there will be a revolution of our cities.  They will
have to change-- today they are unsustainable.  In the future I hope
that we can live in communities, where we feel some interaction and
solidarity with our neighbours.  I think every city should have many
community gardens from which the neighbourhood could share
responsibility and the harvest.  There also needs to be an efficient,
cheap public transit system.  

There are many things that we could do to make our future sustainable,
and to make our cities far more pleasant!  It is an exciting
challenge.  We need to problem solve!  It is very possible;  there are
many examples of positive action in many cities.  I think that this
last question, what is your dream for the future?, is the first step
to move towards it.  This is the question I want to ask children,
youth, adults.  What is your dream?  And how can we begin to achieve
it?  It is a good question to end this interview on, because this
question is the beginning of the solution.  I would love to hear from
you what your dreams are, so we can start figuring out how to make
them real. 

Thanks, everyone!

Love,
Severn

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