Flowers In Your Hair

Posted by Lori Fagerholm

January 16, 2007

“Have a flower,” said the girl, handing me a yellow daisy, “trees are brothers.” She was chicly dressed, perhaps a university student, and she had stopped outside the Berkeley restaurant where I waited for a table, offering daisies to would-be diners. It wasn’t the strangest thing that’s happened to me on Shattuck Avenue in this town known for progressive activism, but it was the first time I’ve seen such a gesture made by a twenty-something, coiffed and trendily dressed. “Trees are brothers,” she said again, handing out another flower, and then she skipped away down the street. I tucked my daisy behind my ear and smiled.

The girl is part of a new trend I’ve just begun to notice: mainstream environmentalism. From social networking websites to teen magazine ads, conservation groups are finally reaching out to—and actually reaching—kids and young adults. Activists seem to have realized that the best—perhaps, the only—way to make a significant impact on societal trends is to deliver their message directly to the trendsetters. 18 to 24-year-olds have the most spending power, and in a society in which money does the loudest talking, the demographic that lays out the most cash has the most control.

I have a friend, Tom, who retired early from his job as a lawyer to lead an organization called KyotoUSA . It works to raise awareness of the Kyoto Protocol, and, ultimately, to persuade our government to ratify it. I urged Tom to follow the lead of other nonprofits and sign up with MySpace, the most popular social networking website among teens and twenty-somethings. “We’re kind of stodgy,” said Tom, “and in a way that’s how we want to present ourselves to the world. You know, serious, solid, as opposed to cool and trendy.” Tom, you and I will just have to agree to disagree on this one. I can’t help pointing out, though, that the Sierra Club seems to fall into my camp; several of their state and local chapters have a presence on MySpace.

If you want to appeal to the popular culture—and, in my opinion, you must in order to make an impact—you have to present them with an interface they recognize and like. Is this pandering? Maybe. But it’s called “SAVING the Sierra,” not “Almost Making Enough Impact to Save the Sierra,” right?