The Manliness of Being Green
Mike Martin, a regular (and very good) commentator for the local public radio station, brought up an interesting point in his piece this morning, in that it just may have taken Al Gore’s Nobel Prize to make an environmental stance a masculine pursuit. No longer about simply "cleaning up" or "keeping house" in a Mother Earth way, coming up with solutions or ways to ease the harmful effects of global warming is now seen as "brave," " brilliant," and "pragmatic." As he puts it:
"But, ever so slowly, there is a seeping realization that there is
nothing cute or bleeding-heart about environmentalism. The challenges
before us are for brave leaders, brilliant engineers, and pragmatic
problem-solvers. There is nothing idealistic about saving our
environment; on the contrary, it’s an extremely practical matter."
Women are surely driving the consumer push toward sustainability and shrinking environmental footprints, but they could never go it alone. EVERYONE has to get on board. If it takes new labeling, clever positioning, nuanced semantics - or even a Nobel Prize - to make an environmental stance valid for more people, that is what it takes.
How human beings are persuaded or motivated to take the baby steps that positively affect any cause simply represents the means to the one big end (upon which most of us can likely agree when it comes to the environment). It doesn’t matter so much how you get people to take that step, or if different groups need to hear different words/messages to take it.
Just like any marketing campaign, you have to consider your environmental initiatives, and the community relations surrounding them, very differently for each of your unique markets. At this point in time, I’d bet a lot of men and women would respond to bravery, brilliance, and pragmatism, as opposed to "housekeeping," in your environmental approach.
October 23rd, 2007 at 12:26 pm
This planet, our environment is everybody’s responsibility. It’s not merely “housekeeping” although housekeeping certainly isn’t that easy either. But you do present a valid point. It’s how we market certain issues to people that motivate them to participate in the cause. Certainly words like (as you mentioned) brilliance and bravery would rake up more helpers than housekeeping.
October 29th, 2007 at 11:04 pm
Ah, this is a very smart blog.