Three weeks ago NUS hosted the National Sustainability Conference, addressing the need for Singapore to become sustainable, and how Singapore can influence the rest of the world to do the same. One of the speakers, from NewsAsia, brought up an interesting point. The main reason we don’t see sustainability addressed as much as we would like (or as much as is considered necessary) is because the people have not demanded it. There is a breakdown in communication, and it seems to be between science and the masses. Most people, even those who are aware of the climate crisis and the coming end of cheap fossil fuel, are not demanding change. The problem is not immediately tangible, in contrast to losing half of one’s retirement savings due to the economic crisis, and thus does not command attention.
What we need is a great communicator – such as a Mao Zedong, a Martin Luther King Jr, or a Barack Obama; someone whose voice can resonate with the masses, maybe just enough to move us past the tipping point. Al Gore’s movie “An Inconvenient Truth” helped to do this, as it raised the awareness, especially of the immediacy of the issue.
In relation, the speaker said that people who are working to raise awareness, such as protestors and their organizers, need to go through media training. In such training, the student would learn to give a good sound bite that news producers all over would love to use, which would greatly increase the probability that the message is proliferated.
My question to the reader is: Given the immediacy of climate change, do we as citizens have time to wait for this motivator, or does this sort of change have to be driven by what we have – grass roots talking to people in your neighborhood?
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Hieyo Matt!
ReplyDeleteI can see you are an environmentalist.
With regards to your question, the change you want to see can happen only when majority of the human population suffers some inconveniences or disadvantages due to the badly-hurt Earth.
Let's say Person A wants to bring a change. In order for Person A to communicate to the people who don't see what he/she envisions, it is needed for him/her to communicate to the masses to look from his/her perspectives. So, how to be convincing and how to persuade people to change their perspectives?
First, Person A has to know what their interests are. For example, cost of living. Choosing the target group of drivers who have personal cars, increasing fuel prices would hurt their interests and they will cut down on fuel consumption which will in turn benefit the Earth. As such, Person A has to let the drivers see this. For example, "now it's not happening, but if your actions perpetuate, this gonna happen and your interests will be compromised."
For a human being to change, it requires the human to experience some sort of pain.
Hi matt,
ReplyDeleteI think grassroots talking to people in their neighbourhoods about climate change can increase their awareness but does not necessary translate into actions that will save the climate. One of the reasons is because the economic crisis has impacted the people in a more direct manner than the climate crisis.
Until people can package climate crisis in such a way it is heavliy linked to the economic crisis, climate crisis will most likely to be on a backstep.
Lastly, i agree with kaylene that for a human being to change, they have to go through some or great pains. Only when all the countries agree to bear the pain together can changes to the climate be achieved
Hi Matt,
ReplyDeleteSometimes I do feel that there is a communication breakdown between the communicator and the masses. As not the majority of the masses are well-educated, we need to find a communicator who can address the issue and communicate to the masses in understandable, layman terms.
With regards to your question, I feel that the latter will work more effectively than the earlier. As the grassroot is closer to the masses, I believed that understanding and relationship that exist between the grassroot and the public provide an excellent ground more for effective communication. Rather than reaching to someone with a high post, the grassroot member can also help to communicate the concerns of the masses to the high post officials more effectively.
However, the urgency of the issue do require a leader to advocate the need for a solution. Under such circumstances, I feel that the cooperation of the grassroots with the motivator could help to drive changes more effectively.
Hi Matt,
ReplyDeleteWith regards to the immediacy of climate change, we do need an effective communicator that can relate to the masses and also to the higher authority who has the means to bring a about the change. Grassroot leaders are one way to help spur the masses and increase awareness.
As what you have pointed out, lack of sustainability due to lack of demand from the people. So how do we increase the demand of the people towards surviving in climate crisis? I agree with Swee Guan to link it with economic crisis. Waiting for a country to went into some pain then bring about a change would be too late. Preventive measures are better than intervention measures.
Theses measures should be on-going and require cooperation between the motivators, leaders and the citizens.