Crystal: [00:00:00] I’m Crystal DiMiceli and welcome to the Forces for Nature show. Do you find yourself overwhelmed with all the doom and gloom you hear of these days? Do you feel like you, as just one person, can’t really make a difference? Forces for Nature cuts through that negativity. In each episode, I interview someone who is working to make the world more sustainable and humane.

Join me in learning from them and get empowered to take action so that you too can become a Force for Nature.

Welcome to another episode [00:00:45] of the Forces for Nature EarthX conference series, where I bring you behind the scenes of my experiences during that week, and up close and personal with some of the incredible presenters. Did you know that there were more people involved in the first Earth Day in 1970 than even the largest of the war protests in the 60s?

The first Earth Day was nonpartisan. As it should be. Clean air, clean water, nature. Shouldn’t be Democrat versus Republican. It only became that way when industry lobbyists started getting involved because regulations to keep the air, land, and water clean were getting in their way. Money started flowing to politicians, [00:01:30] partisan media outlets were created, and the rest is history.

I know it’s probably not that simple, but tell me otherwise. How do we go from pretty solid consensus to then this feeling of it’s a choice of either people or a planet? As if the two weren’t part of the same whole. And the media paints it as a war, from either side. As today’s guest, Theo E. J. Wilson, stated at EarthX, framing all conflicts in the paradigm of war frames the others as the bad guy, even if they aren’t really bad.

When you are at war, there is an enemy, and [00:02:15] an enemy needs to be destroyed. I guess that could help explain the vitriol people feel nowadays on either side of the issues. Which brings us to EarthX declaring a ceasefire. For the year on the climate war, they implored each side to lay down their swords and aim to work together for solutions.

This is being put into effect through something being led by Bill Shireman called the Leadership Circle, which anyone can get involved in. So if you’re interested, I’ll include a link in the show notes. Back to today’s guest, Theo E. J. Wilson. When I first learned that he was going to be presenting at EarthX, I didn’t quite understand [00:03:00] why.

He’s a well known TEDx speaker and a social activist, but not environmental, necessarily. The reason became clear pretty quickly, though. Besides the obvious of environmental justice being a social issue, Theo is skilled at fostering dialogue and understanding across cultural and ideological divides. He has dedicated his life to bridging division and fostering dialogue between communities.

And he’s now a part of EarthX Action, which is spotlighting brands who are moving in the right direction with climate and amplifying restoration efforts. Thank you It was lovely to talk to him, and he even brought me to tears at one point. [00:03:45] You’ll know where, and I would love to know if you get through it untouched.

Enjoy.

Theo, thank you so much for joining me on the Forces for Nature podcast. It’s so great to have you.

Theo: It’s great to be here.

Crystal: We are in a very opportune moment in history where we can step off the path that we have been on for the industrial revolution and create a new future. But we can’t do that without knowing what we’re working towards, without envisioning the kind of future we want.

And I want to ask you to paint a picture of the future you’d like to see. But Before we end there, let’s talk about the present. How is [00:04:30] social justice and climate justice related?

Theo: The problems with the climate and social justice began with the same injustice. And when you talk about justice, people sometimes get a little queasy because justice is a loaded word sometimes.

But the fact is, a lot of this runs on injustice. So when you talk about communities who are, quote, underprivileged, who put them under the privilege, right? Communities like the one I’m from. It was environmentally polluted also because it was designed by racism. Same thing. I was born in a neighborhood called Park Hill.

And Park Hill, is a [00:05:15] result of white flight. The original residents were white, but then when black people began to move in, the phenomenon of blockbusting, when realtors were like, well, it’s getting good, but the property values get too low. And then, once it was mostly black, it got redlined from investment from banks.

meant that they didn’t care what kind of pollutants were in that environment. They’re linked right there. If we have a relationship with the refuse of capitalism that says dispose of it, that means we got a relationship with people that we think are disposable. And I’m from the ones who are the untouchables, the disposables.

And until we reframe Our relationship with waste in general, [00:06:00] then we’re going to continue to waste resources and people.

What would you say is a good first step or tenth step to get ourselves there? We have

to understand that, like, the elites and the powerful people in the world ain’t going to breathe different air than us.

Like, where y’all going to breathe? You going to terraform Mars to breathe there? We’re connected. And I think that what I’m seeing a lot is The fact that holistic thinking, the kind that indigenous people have, is coming back into the fore because segmented, fragmented, separatist thinking has run its course, which means that you got to start taking into account [00:06:45] all of the beings of the earth that have been commodified and the back end of commodity is disposal and realizing that, lo and behold, they don’t really go nowhere.

The trash is still with us, the ghetto is still with us. And as soon as you realize that both of these were made. By an outmoded way of thinking, then the way forward is the holistic thinking that sees all of these things interconnected as one and their benefit tied to our benefit.

Crystal: And you’re going to be talking about this subject this evening.

I sure will. I’m putting you on the spot. What are you going to be talking about?

Theo: I actually don’t fully know to be honest with you, but I’m going to talk From my heart, [00:07:30] and what I understand to be true based on the limited information that I have in this space. I’m from the Black Lives Justice space, and as a police brutality survivor, I suppose the lines were chosen for me.

But, I understand that we gotta talk to folks across all of the aisles. Like Van Jones said, we got a different politics at the head, but the same politics at the heart. So, where that’s going to take us, I have no idea, but I’m going to speak from what I know. And

Crystal: in your experience with what you know, in Trying to get a better idea of what the other side thinks or where they’re coming from.

How do you think we could bridge these divides that we have now? I

Theo: started seeing the world from their [00:08:15] perspective. I did an experiment a few years ago where I went undercover online, of course, in a white supremacist space. I created a fake profile as a member of the Alt, and my speech from that went pretty viral.

It kicked my spotlight into gear. But fundamentally, at the beginning of the experiment, when I understood that there was going to be this resurgence of what looked like open faced racism, which I knew to be so explicitly and horrifically wrong, I had to ask myself, why do they think they’re the hero of their story?

I had to put myself in their shoes to some extent. And it’s shoes I wasn’t necessarily too keen on walking in, right? But I

Crystal: understand.

Theo: The fact is, they think they are [00:09:00] correct. And they are operating from a data set that says that this will be rewarded in the long term. And if I want to defuse them, since I ain’t the FBI, I can’t go in and raid them.

I have to understand what’s at the root of that. Maybe I can strike at that root. Why are they the hero of their story? The people who you disagree with, why are they the hero of their story? If you are from the climate side, why do you think the people in big oil are the hero of their story? What is the long term benefit that they believe that they are serving?

And if they don’t think they’re serving one, why do they feel they can’t get away? And what you’ll find is that there’s a very human cause behind the issues that you take issue with. And that’s what you do to me.

Crystal: This actually reminds me of a [00:09:45] conversation I was having yesterday at lunch or dinner. Yeah.

There, it was after lunch and that very tense lunch with the left and right. And I was chatting with a gentleman afterwards and he was saying his truth is that the climate movement has been lying all this time. We have made these We, the climate movement has been making these predictions that haven’t come true.

They’ve been using this data that is not true. And he’s looked at the, he says he’s looked at the data and long story short, he feels very informed. And he thinks that whatever he’s looking at is the truth. How [00:10:30] can, I feel like this is an impossible question, but how can we make sure that what we’re looking at is not misinformation and how can we make sure that we’re not Misinforming ourselves?

Not sure if that’s what I’m trying to get at.

Theo: All you got in life is your best guess, based on the data you’re given. That’s really all you got.

Crystal: Yeah.

Theo: And a lot of people say, oh, the climate people, they were exaggerating. They don’t really take into account. We’ve done stuff since then. We’ve taken action since then.

That might be, that may be why we didn’t see those horrific outcomes. Because we did invest a lot in changing our energy. Those extrapolations were based on that period of time. If we did nothing, we did something. And that’s why it didn’t turn out the way that it did. [00:11:15] And that’s what I wish they would see on the other side of it, that stick didn’t seem to work to move people into action if you were concerned about the climate, because the only carrot there was the profit motor.

So how could you really try to get a positive motivation when people were so damn comfortable? Perhaps they were trying to create a level of discomfort, and whether or not they swung too hard with that stick, we probably will never know. But what I do know is that those possibly worse predictions didn’t come true, we’re still having horrific outcomes.

Each year is the hottest [00:12:00] year. We have L. A. on fire to a level where you can’t even get homeowner’s insurance and fire insurance anymore. We have Storms in Dubai, now keep in mind this was the desert.

Crystal: Yeah, and they were just under feet of water. They

Theo: were just under feet and feet of water. Houston climbed out from Hurricane Harvey.

New Orleans struggles with Katrina to this day. So don’t tell me ain’t nothing happened. That’s denialism, looking at what’s right in front of your face. Go tell them people in the mountains of Los Angeles that ain’t nothing changed. That things ain’t getting worse. You got a situation where The weather’s so topsy turvy in California after all these fires, [00:12:45] they done filled their reservoirs back up.

Of all the extreme rain, uh, there was a song when I was a kid talking about it never rains in Southern California. I said, that must have been before 2000. Because since then it’s been raining a whole hell of a lot. Or no rain at all. That’s called extreme weather. So if you are on that side and be like, oh, they’re being alarmist, I’m like, I don’t know.

Because things still are happening. The worst didn’t come to pass because we have taken action. Since the predictions. When you are on either side of this, you have to understand There’s no possible way in the universe you could have all the data. And if you ain’t talking to people, then you’re setting yourself up to be wrong in the future if you’re right now.

Crystal: Good.

You mentioned action, and I learned [00:13:30] today at lunch that you’re going to be leading the EarthX Action. I

Theo: learned that today, too. For me. I was as shocked as everybody.

Crystal: Could you tell us a little bit about it, or are you still learning about it yourself?

Theo: No, I can tell you about it. EarthX Action is just us engaging stakeholders.

And using a little more carrot than stick. They got enough stick in their life. They got people protesting on them. But the fact is that Earth has action. It goes on the Bill Shireman philosophy of understanding that it’s mostly the machine doing the evil, but there’s good folks inside the machine. And when they take action towards the solution, platform that, reward that, get it to the point where people can actually see what’s going on.

Because what [00:14:15] happens is. There’s so much stick, there’s so much deterrent, there’s so much punishment, that if EarthX Action takes a stance that says, I see you doing the right thing, let’s get you at the table with more folks doing the right thing, then you can actually more easily steer the machine. Once the people who are doing good in the machine are rewarded and not possibly Terminated or extracted from that machine because they’re trying to make change.

And so there is an underdeveloped reward system. There’s an underdeveloped publicity system for people who are coming to the table with innovative ideas. In order to solve this at a corporate [00:15:00] and market level that if that infrastructure was there, more action will be taken. That’s EarthX action. Do

Crystal: you have any on the ground examples or it’s just getting started?

Theo: In fact, they’re going to play a whole demo reel of all the things I’ve done with EarthX action, which was mostly a social media campaign. I guess they’ll start putting them on TV right now.

Crystal: Okay.

Theo: But you got corporations, I forgot which corporation this is, but they’re literally making a zero emissions tower with no carbon footprint in New York City.

That’s about to happen right now. It’s one of the big banking institutions. You have people using biofuel to fly jets now, jets that run on gasoline, right? This test flight was done already. I’m just trying to pull off my head because I don’t [00:15:45] remember the exact details, but these are some of the things that stuck out to me.

You’ve got PepsiCo and Coca Cola involved in regenerative farming infrastructure scale ups to the size of which could really make a dent in soil depletion. Okay. You need corporations doing these things because they’ve already got the machine in place. And as, so as the climate catastrophe gets more intense, as they scooping out from feet of water in Dubai, as you got half of Los Angeles on fire, people who wasn’t talking are starting to talk.

And including these corporations who are seeing the opportunity to want to have a problem solved. And [00:16:30] using their machines to do the right thing. And that’s what I think is, is really positive. That’s like the silver lining. Other than that, everybody is drowning or burning.

Crystal: You

Theo: know what

Crystal: I’m saying? Other than that.

Theo: Yeah. Other than that. We’re redrawing the maps.

Crystal: So you’re talking about these corporations.

Theo: Yeah.

Crystal: But what about our friend who’s listening? What can they do?

Theo: Buy from these folks. Tell you what. You know, one of the things that has to happen is the market has to go where the solution is. So if there’s something that’s being put out onto the marketplace, if somebody is making clothes and that are with fibers who are ethically sourced, buy that, post that, if you’ve got a Facebook page, make that footage go viral, [00:17:15] talk more to people about the products that are actually standing in the gap and kind of get to the place where.

You feel that you are emboldened to spotlight the positive. So like we got to change the media culture and meaning we got to change the social media culture. So you may not have anything to do with CNN, but you got everything to do with your page. So rather than always posting the most scandalous thing happening with P Diddy or something, give a little shout out to the folks who are stepping a positive step in the right direction.

Cause also what that does. is it decreases climate despair, which is literally paralyzed millennials and Gen Z because they don’t feel like. They got a future. Kids ain’t having babies. They’re not trying to get married or they’re [00:18:00] like, what’s the point of a 401k? The world going to be underwater by the time I’m 60, right?

But if they feel like there’s hope, lo and behold, there might be hope when they take action on that. Yeah. Start with your social media and your wallet.

Crystal: Okay. .

I’m going to put you on the spot, and you don’t have to, but your poem last night was beautiful.

Theo: Oh man.

Crystal: Would you recite it for us?

Theo: Sure, you gon get some exclusives, exclusive! This poem is called I Am Humanity, and it goes like this. I fell to earth on a birthday I can’t remember. Since the doctor smacked me, I’ve held a grudge weighing as much as this world that I never consented to [00:18:45] suffer in.

I believe my first cry was a spiritual pledge to soothe that doctor. Every cry after that has been the wailing of an infant atlas, bearing the planetary mass of his parents plans, or lack thereof. Say mama, say dada, say well behaved, say trophy K, say first place, say I got an A, say my boy is going to be somebody that this world would never let me become.

Welcome to Earth, kid. Like you, species has some growing up to do, but believe me. We are trying not to be the impending disaster of giving big brained primates rocket launchers and releasing them to target practice in Eden, of turning the tables on our predators and putting their extinction on our menu, going from appetizer to [00:19:30] apex on the food chain.

Has addicted us to the thrill of the kill. And our four legged prey barely scratched the itch anymore. Spear throwing spiritual homo sapien built a temple from the sides of his own cranium. Afraid that if he bows his head to prey, this is what he may become. And our future lies somewhere in the gray. And the tension between our nukes and namaste.

But who’d have guessed we could wrap the world around our opposable thumbs with the power to make a meal or a metaphor from the heart of a lion, shape shifting ape, becoming both locust and honeybee. In the Garden of Gaia, it is now time for us to choose our final form. The whales are waiting to sing our praises.

Or sound the alarm of the one who taught both oak and steel [00:20:15] to swim. Who strung his bow with the hide of the biblical serpent became a god and named the smallest particles atom. Our potential is as explosive as our story. Double helix plot twisting from Eve to Oppenheimer. This winding road in each cell encoding our common journey.

We could just hold each other. The same grip as our grudges, our eyes are reflective surfaces for a reason. Look hard enough and there we are, a shared suffering, gleaming. We all fell to earth on birthdays we can’t remember. Held other people’s dreams until they crushed our wings into conformity and learned that the only way to fly was at each other’s expense.

But what good is a trip to the moon if we only got there by piling bodies? Made the most giant step for [00:21:00] humankind, right? Or the small steps of kind humans built on the lessons learned from Auschwitz to the Antebellum South. . Maybe what we mistook for hierarchies were just trash heaps of human potential.

Maybe racism isn’t just evil, it’s outdated social technology. And we upgrade by facing history eyes open. Because a culture only needs a cast when their society is broken. I have a dream. A dream deeply rooted in the vision of this world, transformed into a spinning space garden, a thriving greenhouse from a repurposed penitentiary, resurrecting honeybees and hope when they almost went extinct because we stampeded to oblivion and lassoed it back from the brink.

Generations from now, when our grandkids go galactic [00:21:45] and the ETs ask us who we are, tell them I’m the being from the African savannah. I’ll stare down the saber tooth. And de extinct the mammoth. I play the symphony in my genome like a ballad to the stars I stole my dust from. Two legged singularity. All heavenly bodies add up to just one.

Say victory. Say invincible spirit. From here to planet Z. From riding stallions to starships to infinity and back. Because I am humanity.

Crystal: Hell yeah. You make vibes. I totally.

Theo: Oh, this is,

Crystal: that was like a highlight moment for me right there. Oh my goodness. Oh, you tearing up love. Oh my God. Sorry.

Theo: That’s like super.

Crystal: That was amazing.

Theo: Thank you.

Crystal: So beautiful. Um, okay. I’m such a dork. [00:22:30]

Theo: Um. I cried when I was writing it. See, that’s how I knew it might have that effect on people because I was like there in my heart the whole time I was penning the poem.

Crystal: Beautiful. Thank you. So let’s end on wit. Is your ideal future? What should it look like?

Theo: I want us to maximize our paradise potential. Like, when I look around the world, I see the raw materials of a paradise. You feel me? Like, when I, my sanctuary when I, left organized religion was the botanical gardens. And I’ll go to botanical gardens and it was like a, it’s like heaven had an embassy on earth.

You know what I’m saying? It’s in this urban environment where all of this pollution and noise was. There we have humans and man, man and [00:23:15] nature working in harmony, so we can’t divide the cells that grow the flowers, but we could plant the seed and then we could do that in an arrangement that just makes rows and rows of color and waterfalls, got a little fish in there, hummingbirds, bees, the whole nine, and design it in a way that.

Now, we could angle the flowers in a certain way to get them to perfect sunlight, to get them to perfect pollen, and we got these trees to have symbiotic relationships with these flowers. We are coordinating with nature, and there’s just peace there. You can’t go to a botanical garden and start a fight.

You can’t have a shootout there. Something about the energy. And as I look over the whole planet, I see different terrains that have different capacities [00:24:00] for different beauty. You know what I mean? Maybe this ain’t like a palm tree environment, but tundra got a beauty. You know what I’m saying? And even frozen landscapes have a beauty about them.

The alpine environments, there’s paradise potential in every environment. And we need to maximize that and then have new problems. I’m tired of these problems that we got. We been had these problems. Racism, bigotry, sexism, homophobia, home nine, antisemitism, you know what I’m saying? All that. We’ve had these problems.

I’m done with them. Let’s get some new ones when we figure out what to do. But these raw materials, it’s like pieces of a puzzle everywhere. And we gotta put these together. Then let’s see what the world looks like.

Crystal: Thank you so much for joining me, Theo. No problem. Thank you for all you do. You’re making a [00:24:45] difference.

Theo: Oh, I appreciate that. So are you, love.

Crystal: So moving, right? I love the description as if heaven had an embassy on earth. If we could all speak half as beautifully as he can, we would undoubtedly create the paradise that he talks about.

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