If you were to construct or choose the ideal figurehead for environmental activism 2009 going forward, what would such icon, or icons look like? What are the benefits and pitfalls?
I feel the environmental movement highly differs to other movements (gay rights, women’s rights, and the civil rights movements). As a result of this, it would be much more difficult to identify just one figurehead. In relation to others, the environmental movement is one that comprises of all ages, races and genders. However it does give the impression of predilection in politics, of which are mainly democrats and liberalists. With that in mind, it would be essential for this movement to have multiple figureheads in order to assimilate all people. I feel that for environmental activism it would be best to have a figurehead very much like the ones within the civil rights movement. We want someone that we can look up to such as Rosa Parks and Martin Luther King. If I were to be responsible for selecting figureheads for the environmental movement I would choose Captain Planet and Al Gore. Captain Planet would market a great deal to the youth of the world, while Al Gore would market to a mature group. Captain Planet could be a prospect because he does not have a racial, political or religious bias. His political standing is that of environment. He does not belong to any race of people as he has blue skin and green hair. Furthermore he is not associated with any political or religious groups. Captain Planet is part of the Earth and can only be beckoned by a group of multi-racial kids. These children each possess control of a different element such as fire, wind, water, earth, as well as heart. He would be the perfect figurehead of environmental activism, however he does not appeal much to a mature crowd. Thus, for the more mature I believe Al Gore would be a great figurehead. His projects include Live Earth, An Inconvenient Truth (a book and movie), The Alliance for Climate Protection, and Generation Investment Management. Gore is very engaged in environmental activism and I feel that he is the individual that everyone around the world can look up to. However there are some potential pitfalls. Although Gore is no longer associated with any political party, he was the former vice president under former president Bill Clinton. While many republicans do not appear to be concerned on the subject of environmental issues, it might be best to have a figurehead who has not had a political preference. This could perhaps increase further engagement from the republican side if there was someone who could fully understand both sides (mainly industrialism and environment). As Crenshaw’s article on intersectionality stated “The problem with identity politics is not that it fails to transcend difference, as some critics charge, but rather the opposite – that it frequently conflates or ignores intragroup differences.” Using Al Gore as a figurehead can be potentially unsuccessful as he is of a social higher class. What of the people who do not have the extra money to install solar panels or buy an alternative fuel car? As for the aspect of race and gender, I do not feel that these are large factors in this movement. It was very crucial to address all races and genders in the equal rights movement, but this environmental movement is already global. The environmental predicament is not only here in the United States but all over the world. Furthermore, I do not see Al gore being able to attract many people to this movement. He has great credentials, but I feel perhaps a figurehead that is more “suave” and has more sex appeal might be a better constituent. Please keep in mind, where our older crowd has not, our youth today is being immensely educated on the issues of the environment.
Do you think the civil rights movement might have developed differently if Claudette Colven had been chosen spearhead of the Montgomery Bus Boycott instead of Rosa Parks?
First, let me just say that I feel Claudette Colvin was too young to be involved as a figurehead in the movement. The movement could have possibly had a bad connotation given that Colvin was a “highly emotional 15-year-old 11th-grader about whom there were unsavory stories” (taken from Paul Hendricksons article “The Ladies Before Rosa: Let Us Now Praise Unfamous Women”). Not only that (taken from the same article) “E. D. Nixon, in an oral history years later, said that Colvin was pregnant out of wedlock and could not be backed”. “’Mrs. Parks’—as so much of black Montgomery respectfully thought of her—was a small, modest, ascetic-looking, wholly untainted 42-year-old seamstress and civic activist and youth leader: a perfect and righteous symbol for igniting not just a year-long boycott but an entire movement.” If by some means Claudette Colvin was one of the spearheads of the Montgomery Bus Boycott, it could have been looked at as illegitimate. It would have been very much like the case of the equal rights movement and the involvement of Mormons. It was stated in Neil Young’s article “The historiography of the Equal Rights Amendment has largely ignored the Mormon Church’s role in the political battle.” (The ERA Is a Moral Issue: The Mormon Church, LDS Women, and the Defeat of the Equal Rights Amendment). This example further shows the Montgomery Bus Boycott could have been proven illegitimate due to Colvin’s possible role in it. It would give the opposition to fight back with “why give these people rights when they are uneducated, insalubrious and pregnant by elderly men?” It could have given the opposition to prove their group all the more inferior.
I feel like Colvin could’ve made a bigger deal out of the Montgomery Bus Protest had she been on the bus pregnant. Think of it this way, is it more of an injustice to make an elderly woman move, or a pregnant woman. Regardless of her stature in comparison to Parks, she is equally as deserving of the seat. Thus I feel like either protest would’ve yielded the same result.
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