Some would argue that we are currently living in the most socially-progressive era of humanity. Others might state this with annoyance and add that all this ongoing progressive nonsense must be stopped! But, while there have been unbelievably important social developments, fundamentally, nothing has changed. Women’s equality and the climate crisis have begrudgingly become key parts of our international agendas, yet the UN has recently declared that women’s rights are regressing worldwide, and the last four years were the four hottest on record.
This isn’t surprising in the slightest. Though these improvements had to be actively and desperately fought for by courageous people in our recent history, nothing has been systemically tackled. We’ve slapped a few bandaids on these issues by giving women their independent rights to work and vote (while playing back and forth with others, like their reproductive autonomy) and increasing restrictions on company plastic-use. But when the system put in place is the core source from which these issues are being (re-)produced, this inevitably creates stagnation, if not an eventual regression.
Importantly, this is the inevitable outcome of how off-handedly we, as the general public and those actively involved in the daily creation and enactment of politics, tend to disregard the arguments of feminism and environmentalism.
It’s easy to notice amid debates overcome with discussions about the actively-morphing factors of the economy, geopolitics, and party politics, how the moment feminism or climate concerns are brought up, the tone of the group often seems to collectively sigh in disappointment, or lose interest in what is being said. Of course, these other factors are highly relevant to various political issues, but so are the roles of patriarchy and environmental degradation that we so blatantly shy away from.
This is, in part, because both feminism and environmentalism feel somewhat intangible. Compared to issues like inflating costs-of-living, we feel disconnected from the violence we enact on the environment and the repercussions of climate change, just as we continually naturalise the pervasive ways in which patriarchy and its gendered, imperial logics infiltrate the day-to-day of our societies and cultures. In forcing us to confront our most profound biases and systemic flaws, their concepts are viewed as too abstract or their critiques too hopeless to feasibly action. To mention them feels fruitless, so their perspectives are sidelined into irrelevance.
It is precisely this hesitation to recognise the value in these approaches that prevents us from enacting beneficial and long-lasting moves towards sustainability and equality. We need to confront these feelings and open ourselves to re-envisioning our status quo. Otherwise, nothing can change. And while they may not always be implicitly correct, or well-applied by their advocates, they are worthy of being discussed in good faith, rather than treated as inherently purposeless or unsubstantiated.
There is a broad misconception taking place that feminism and environmentalism are purely concerned with women or the environment, which individuals in power believe they have no interest in supporting. In truth, they are deeply entwined with all aspects of our lives. By ignoring them, we are generating our own, global self-destruction by contributing to and developing unsustainable inequalities, in which people — who fundamentally uphold our societies — will simply increasingly struggle to live.
Photo by Markus Spiske on Unsplash.
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Nothing is changing, because feminism and environmentalism are the outcasts of politics
Some would argue that we are currently living in the most socially-progressive era of humanity. Others might state this with annoyance and add that all this ongoing progressive nonsense must be stopped! But, while there have been unbelievably important social developments, fundamentally, nothing has changed. Women’s equality and the climate crisis have begrudgingly become key parts of our international agendas, yet the UN has recently declared that women’s rights are regressing worldwide, and the last four years were the four hottest on record.
This isn’t surprising in the slightest. Though these improvements had to be actively and desperately fought for by courageous people in our recent history, nothing has been systemically tackled. We’ve slapped a few bandaids on these issues by giving women their independent rights to work and vote (while playing back and forth with others, like their reproductive autonomy) and increasing restrictions on company plastic-use. But when the system put in place is the core source from which these issues are being (re-)produced, this inevitably creates stagnation, if not an eventual regression.
Importantly, this is the inevitable outcome of how off-handedly we, as the general public and those actively involved in the daily creation and enactment of politics, tend to disregard the arguments of feminism and environmentalism.
It’s easy to notice amid debates overcome with discussions about the actively-morphing factors of the economy, geopolitics, and party politics, how the moment feminism or climate concerns are brought up, the tone of the group often seems to collectively sigh in disappointment, or lose interest in what is being said. Of course, these other factors are highly relevant to various political issues, but so are the roles of patriarchy and environmental degradation that we so blatantly shy away from.
This is, in part, because both feminism and environmentalism feel somewhat intangible. Compared to issues like inflating costs-of-living, we feel disconnected from the violence we enact on the environment and the repercussions of climate change, just as we continually naturalise the pervasive ways in which patriarchy and its gendered, imperial logics infiltrate the day-to-day of our societies and cultures. In forcing us to confront our most profound biases and systemic flaws, their concepts are viewed as too abstract or their critiques too hopeless to feasibly action. To mention them feels fruitless, so their perspectives are sidelined into irrelevance.
It is precisely this hesitation to recognise the value in these approaches that prevents us from enacting beneficial and long-lasting moves towards sustainability and equality. We need to confront these feelings and open ourselves to re-envisioning our status quo. Otherwise, nothing can change. And while they may not always be implicitly correct, or well-applied by their advocates, they are worthy of being discussed in good faith, rather than treated as inherently purposeless or unsubstantiated.
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There is a broad misconception taking place that feminism and environmentalism are purely concerned with women or the environment, which individuals in power believe they have no interest in supporting. In truth, they are deeply entwined with all aspects of our lives. By ignoring them, we are generating our own, global self-destruction by contributing to and developing unsustainable inequalities, in which people — who fundamentally uphold our societies — will simply increasingly struggle to live.
Photo by Markus Spiske on Unsplash.
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