Exploring the Intersections of Sustainability & Social Justice
The Eden Hall Campus K-12 Education Coordinator Kelly Henderson has partnered with community organizations, activists, and non-profit leaders to create the Social Justice and Sustainability Series, a series of presentations and discussions that highlight the intersections between social and environmental issues. Each month, the event series will spotlight a different intersection of social and environmental issues. In November, panels focused on food and racial justice and this December, the panels honed in on pollution, gender, and sexuality justice. Each month the series hosts both an intergenerational panel and a youth panel, featuring professionals in the field as well as high school and college students. You can watch all previous panels here.
“Each month is pairing a different form of social identity-based oppression with an environmental issue. Every social issue that we’re digging into is connected to other environmental issues. Every form of social identity based oppression is intersectional. In order to solve the problems in our communities, we need to think of every issue as deeply interconnected.”
Participants at the December Intergenerational Panel included State Representative Summer Lee, Environmental Justice Exchange Coordinator for New Voices for Reproductive Justice Matt Dean, and several more participants. The Youth Panel featured a diverse group of local high school and college students who had experience in environmental activism. Each panel was led by a teen moderator: Lily Jarosz at the intergenerational panel and Ilyas Khan at the youth panel.
Lily prompted her panel to consider where and how they saw gender, sexuality, and environmental justice overlapping. Summer Lee reflected on how the vulnerabilities of marginalized groups impact their environments: “Our liberation is all tied to each other particularly with environmental justice. When we think about the people who are most likely to be disproportionately impacted by environmental hazards, we're talking about black and brown people, women and femmes, queer folks, and other marginalized people. Sometimes we say “the margin” but we don't specify what that margin is. When we're talking about environmental justice, that includes communities near oil refineries, communities where lead paint remediation hasn't happened, and schools all throughout the Commonwealth with exposed asbestosis, lead, heating and cooling issues.”
Matt Dean expounded on Summer’s point: “There aren't enough women, LGBTQ folks, Black folks, and other marginalized people impacted by our environmental hazards in leadership in these organizations. That's not for lack of qualified people. It's because the structures and the systems were built that way.” Youth Panel participant Nick Anglin, a Temple University student and CEO of Young, Black, & Educated, is working to help inform those who are unaware of how marginalized communities are impacted by pollution and environmental degradation: “We educate other people on how pollution affects Black communities, [for instance] how high the infant mortality rate is for Black mothers. Black communities have to deal with high pollution rates and bad air quality, [and as a result] Black people in Pittsburgh have higher rates of asthma.”
Intergenerational Panel participants
Youth Panel participants
Moderators also asked panelists to offer advice and recommendations for becoming more involved in community activism. Intergenerational Panel participant and local climate activist Liandra Mira suggested, “Consistent organizing, consistent protesting, consistent connection with your community.” Fellow participant Joy Cannon, Director of Programming for the Center of Life said, “People have to start in a way that makes sense for them, maybe the only thing that you can do is have challenging conversations with your friends and family. That's so much better than nothing at all. These systems continue to exist for a number of reasons but to me, the prevailing reason is money. There are people that are getting money off of communities like ours being exploited. The best way to contribute, if you're able, is in an economic way—either being really strategic about where you spend your money or being able to donate your money to specific causes. Donations to grassroots organizations can go a long way.”
Youth Panel participant and junior at Obama Academy Elise Silvestri described a practice that the Sunrise Movement, a climate action group, has implemented for better inclusion in their activism: “Last year, Sunrise launched JEO, which stands for justice, equity, and anti oppression. It's a way to make sure that people of color in the movement feel like they have a space to voice their concerns. Everyone [works to] keep each other accountable, and to help build a movement. To get critical mass for things like a climate strike, we need a lot of different types of people involved. Intersectionality is huge for getting actual change done.”
Interested in exploring the intersectionality of these issues? Stay tuned for more Social Justice & Sustainability Panels to come in January 2021. January’s theme will be Energy and Class. Learn more here.
