My name is Neil and I’m a 41 year old father of 2 young kids from Calgary Alberta who cares about the environmental future of my province, country and world.
For years I’ve struggled with ‘what to do’ about issues I care about and how to best effect change. Wanting to do more than a passing social media post yet lacking the commitment for a full on chain-myself-to-a-tree and hunger strike for a month, I always found myself put out by many issues but not taking any meaningful action.
In early November, 2019 I learned that Fortress Mountain had been approved to sell 50 million litres of water/year via tanker truck from the heart of the Kananaskis Country for corporate profit.
The moment in time when I heard this news is vividly etched in my memory. This news bothered me deeply and motivated me to take what I consider to be my first real activism efforts. These ongoing efforts can be read about on my website conservekananaskis.com The details of this egregious issue are well detailed on the website so there’s no need to get into them here. The purpose of this article is to share what I’ve learned during the past year trying to figure out how activism works. Hopefully this provides you ideas on how best to take action! I welcome any input from you as to how I can improve my efforts.
- Ensure your facts are correct. My very first action on this water issue was to call out Fortress Mountain on instagram. I had incorrect facts. This significantly decreases your credibility and gives your ‘opponent’ an easy out. This mistake motivated me to obtain facts from their original source (instead of the first thing that pops up on Google – guilty!). I”ve since put in hundreds of hours wading through FOIP documents, Alberta Government regulations online Etc, Etc in order to compile the facts. I’m a firm believer, perhaps naively(?), that the truth will prevail.
- Ask for help. My efforts would be nothing without the input & support from others. Computer friend building a website for free, my political buddy helping me phrase FOIP requests, a lawyer friend giving advice, hydrologist buddy looking over environmental reports, nurturing relationships with editors/reporters, magazine writer friend advising on communication, bouncing ideas off fellow amature activists….many brains make a better decision than one. One such random email with a supporter ended with him instigating a roadside info session on highway 40 where he got 6 people out with him informing anyone who would stop about the water issue! Yea, you go dude!
- Highlight how the issue affects everyone, not just you. Letters to MLA’s, social media posts, Etc should be phrased to highlight how the issue will affect the general population. Say you’re a keen gardener who wants more bees around, so you lobby your town to stop spraying herbicides/pesticides. Drawing attention to how the plants by the children’s playground, the soccer fields and the Saskatoon patch by the river that everyone picks from are covered in chemicals and you obtained documentation on exactly what chemicals are used and what documented harm those chemicals can cause will garner more respect than just: ‘There are less bees in my backyard and it bums me out yo!’
- Understand the other side of the issue. There are people equally as passionate as you are on the other side of the issue. Who’s ‘right’? Who gets their way? I”m so damn tired of how black and white politics are. To progress and get sustainable change, you have to accept grey. I personally need to make improvements on this front!
- Provide a solution, not just a problem. So let’s say we’ve understood that the other side of the our hypothetical herbicide/bee issue is that there are invasive thistles that parents and soccer players have complained about. Humm,..ok, fair enough…well how about trying the grazing-goats weed control program I saw in another town?
- Spreading the word is difficult. It shocked me how hard it is to get your message out. Even after months of efforts on the Fortress water issue, getting news articles published, creating a website, dedicated social media accounts, Etc even my close friends who knew I was fighting this issue still didn’t know what was going one. “Neil, what’s up with that water thing man?” Face palm. I’m still trying to figure this one out. Time and simply delivering your message over and over and over is likely the answer…
- Don’t be constrained by traditional methods. This is one I”m personally working on and am open to ideas. What do you do if your MLA is a douche who doesn’t care about your issue? A letter to them seems pointless. In related news, anyone want to pitch in for a rental roadside ad that tells drivers near Rapid Ascent Brewery that the water in their beer is trucked from Fortress Mountain?
I hope this has inspired you in some small way. Please do reach out with either feedback for me or if I can help you. Now, just go do it! Don’t underestimate what you can achieve in 20 minutes on your laptop!
Cheers
Neil Warren
