Month: April 2023

After reading through everyone’s thoughtful replies to my previous blog post, “Actively Creating Change,” I revisited my Conservation Starts With Conversation plan.

One of the most frequent suggestions that I received was to make a social media platform to advertise and spread the ecofeminist message of the
“brand.” Alina even mentioned creating a video to present the designs, and I realized that would also serve perfectly for a social media post/brand introduction. Check it out:

Conservation Starts With Conversation by Jasmine Mattey

I created a video presentation that could easily be uploaded to TikTok / Instagram as an introduction to the “brand.” I took the time to try to make the video as eye-catching, engaging, and aesthetically pleasing as possible to hopefully receive some buzz/shares. 

I also had the idea to create a discord to create a place of community and organizing for like-minded ecofeminists or for unlike-minded ecofeminists to develop new and inclusive ways of thinking through critical conversation.

Then, going off of Kylie’s “activism tip” idea, I integrated ecofeminist quotes into the presentation between the merch pictures. Hopefully, this addition will deepen the viewer’s understanding or at least thinking surrounding what the designs represent.

Kylie made another great point—I should be looking to companies that are eco-conscious, sustainable, transparent, and traceable. Otherwise, I’d only be contributing to solidifying the patriarchal capitalist hegemonic system. 

This is something that Jess came up against when creating her merch, and as a result, she decided to partner with a small local business. Instead of having their merch available 24/7, they drop new merch designs in batches (which she partners with small artists to create), and they’re all pre-order only. This way, there isn’t wasteful overproduction of clothing, everyone involved is being paid a fair wage for their labor, they can ensure that the quality is going to last so less clothing ends up in landfills, they’re supporting small entrepreneurs instead of big corporations, and honestly, the list of positives just goes on and on. 

As a result, I decided to ditch the Printify idea. If I were to put these designs into production, I’d start by walking down to my local printing shop to see what options they have for organic cotton shirts or linen bags and if/what kind of sustainable printing media they have available.

Christine suggested that I should make the designs more gender-neutral and think about placing the designs somewhere other than across the chest. I can understand how, as part of dismantling this idea that womans’ bodies are for men’s consumption, I shouldn’t add fuel to the degradation by making it even easier for anyone’s chest to be ogled at. So, I made sure to include a design with the words toward the bottom and another one with the words under the picture. 

Additionally, Christine and Lizzy mentioned that I should expand the collection to more than just T-shirts. This further solves the design-placement dilemma because, for those who are (understandably) uncomfortable with inviting conversation based on their clothing, this is an excellent alternative. 

A reusable tote bag or a gifted mug are equal-opportunity conversation starters. So I decided to add some tote bags and water bottles to these initial mockups. Both contribute to more sustainable lifestyles, like ditching single-use plastic bags and water bottles. Again, the more that we respect the Earth, the more that we can dismantle the logic of domination and create a more egalitarian world. 

I think the designs that I’ve created by taking into consideration the input of all my ecofeminist peers sets this plan to create change up for success. However, I think that it could be taken a step further.

Amanda suggested that I could donate a portion of the proceeds to an ecofeminist organization, and I thought that was an amazing idea! Over the course of our studies, Intersectional Ecofeminism was my AHA! Moment.

All the pieces fell into place, and it became evident that the only way forward is inclusionary—a theory that accounts for everyone’s inherent intersectionality. Through an inclusive ecofeminist view, the true oppression/domination continuum can be studied and dismantled accordingly. Essentializing identities strips marginalized voices from being heard and their needs being met. So I knew that I wanted to pick an organization that focused on intersectional ecofeminism. This search led me to Intersectional Environmentalist.

In an ideal world, I could set this brand up to where the profits cover the production, and anything leftover would go directly to supporting Intersectional Environmentalist initiatives.

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I think it’s amazing to see the Conversation and Community that this potential brand is already facilitating. All the amazing women who commented on my post and offered critical and actionable feedback grew this budding idea into one that could seriously create change. This was exactly the hope that I had for this brand and these designs—to make ecofeminism accessible to everyone.

With these conversations, I hope to add a drop in the bucket toward conservation and building community. It’s through the ecofeminist work of dismantling labels and stigmas by showing that anyone and everyone is what an ecofeminist looks like. It’s through reminders that we are all animals and all deserve equal and just treatment. It’s through fostering respect for our mothers—the many mothers who birthed us all and Mother Earth for sustaining our life that we can work toward the conservation of our planet and, subsequently, shrink the hierarchical gap between those with more/less privilege. 

We–as in humans of all genders, shapes, sizes, sexualities, races, classes, and all other intersectional delineation, the nonhuman animals, the environment and planet that we share space and life with—we all deserve a healthy, harmonious, and empowering egalitarian future.

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Please let me know what you think! What do you think of the designs? Do you have any suggestions for sustainable alternatives to Printify? What are some more ecofeminist principles boiled down to a few words? What more can I improve on?

Thank you to everyone who has already played a role in shaping this “brand” and creating change toward an ecofeminist future.

Earlier this semester, we studied Terry Tempest Williams’ writing “Home Work,” in which Williams identified that the pathway toward conservation must include conversation. I explored this idea in more depth in my previous blog post, “Conservation Starts With Conversation,” but ultimately, I came to the conclusion that the best way to open minds instead of close them is through conversation. And this is how ecofeminists can effectively spread their message and unite with other marginalized voices to create real change. 

In that same post, I mentioned how a huge role model of mine is Jessica Sowards of Roots and Refuge Farm. As part of her grander activist role in advocating for a new wave of homesteading, gardening, and self-sufficiency, Jess chronicles her own homestead on YouTube. She also writes blog posts and entire books that make homesteading accessible to anyone and everyone. She is currently working on opening a homesteading store and community center with the same goal in mind.

I remember watching one of her videos in which she is talking about her online merch store. She recounts how her followers who purchased the merch were writing to her to tell her that they were great conversation starters. 

Eye-catching T-shirts that read “Real Food Comes Dirty” were enough to create space for strangers to connect over Jess’ important message. The shirt was enough of a conversation starter to really spark positive change for the earth and to begin uniting like-minded individuals and create community.

I want to apply this same idea to ecofeminist principles.

I plan to create different merch designs that illustrate some of the ecofeminist theories/principles that we’ve studied this semester and that I’ve covered in depth on the blog.

Something as simple as an eye-catching T-shirt could be just enough to facilitate conversation, community, and active change.

The more ecofeminist theories that I can boil down to snappy one-liners, the more critical conversations can be sparked. 

In the grand scheme of things, I could have these designs printed through a third-party company like Printify and linked to an Etsy account or Amazon seller account. Like-minded individuals could literally wear these conversations across their chests. Just imagine, all it would take is one marketing video to go viral, and the message would go viral as well. 

I hope that through creating these designs, and in theory the merchandise itself, would act as a way to initiate conversations about ecofeminism, and through opening minds or joining like-minds, real change can be enacted to dismantle the hierarchical system of oppression and free all those deemed inferior—women, nonhuman animals, the earth, and anyone considered “other” under patriarchy.

A few weeks ago, when I was reading “Gender Equality and State Environmentalism,” I noticed that Kari Norgaard and Richard York present an ecofeminist stance that I agree with and that I believe sums up how the oppression of women and the oppression of nature are interconnected expressions of patriarchal domination. 

They believe there is “a link between gender equality and the environmental behavior of nation-states [as] implied by the assertion that sexism and environmental degradation reinforce one another” (510). From this theory, we are faced with a difficult truth: there is an inherent connection between the oppression of women and the oppression of nature, and it lies within the fact that the two are mutually reinforcing under perpetuated patriarchal hegemony. 

It’s true that material deprivations and cultural losses of the marginalized and the poor lie within the deeper issues of disempowerment and environmental degradation because the oppression of these marginalized groups—whether they be women, the poor, nonhuman animals, the environment, or any other individual who doesn’t fall into the perpetuated Anglo-European androcentric and patriarchal mold—is tied to a logic of domination where men reinforce their own entitlement at the expense of all “others.” 

We see this logic of domination in play when more and more mines are opened on Indigenous land, all for the profit and benefit of men and at the expense of the Native women and the environment within the area. 

Legal research associate and activist, Julia Stern, explores this “Pipeline of Violence” in an Immigration and Human Rights Law Review blog post. She explains that “​since the oil boom, Native communities have reported increased rates of human trafficking, sex trafficking, and missing and murdered Indigenous women in their communities.” Non-Native working men are coming in, appropriating land and contributing to ecological degradation in the process, and committing violent acts of oppression against the women they deem inferior because they truly believe they are entitled via their institutionalized logic of domination. 

Furthermore, this logic of domination pervades and is enabled by all patriarchal societies. Capitalism and patriarchy and mutually reinforcing in the same way that the oppression of women and nature are mutually reinforcing. For both capitalism and the patriarchy, it all comes down to power—and power is money. 

Just look at the literal rivers of trash degrading the Brazillian city of Recife. This photo of 9-year-old Paulo Henrique picking through the garbage-filled canal for aluminum cans to sell was published in the Journal de Commercio. 

It’s not uncommon for Recife children to wade through filthy polluted water, through a filthy and polluted planet, for pocket change of the wealthy, but as VICE writer Talita Corrêa reports, “it was only after [this] image appeared in the press that the local government and international authoriries took notice…and promised to place Paulo, his mother, and his five siblings on welfare.”

It took bad press—a threat to the institution’s carefully crafted and projected image, ego, and capital—for any intervention or help to be offered. That’s because the institution is already aware of the oppression of both marginalized groups and nature and purposefully enables it. In fact, oppression is the instrument of the capitalist patriarchal institution’s domination as a means to keep the powerful wealthy and the wealthy powerful.

I’m sure it’s exhausting for you to read about all of this widespread domination, just as it’s exhausting for me to write about it. Just as it’s exhausting for those who experience it every day. And the worst part is, I haven’t even exhausted the examples. So, let’s keep going. 

In India, the women-led Chipko movement was formed as a result of “the government’s decision to allot a plot of forest area in the Alaknada valley to a sports goods company. This angered the villagers because their similar demand to use wood for making agricultural tools had been earlier denied” (“The Chipko Movement”). Of course, the institution’s actions were a result of capital gain—it always comes back to money. 

What’s even worse is the only way for the movement to make any real difference as far as environmental treaties are concerned was when a man entered the conversation and appealed to the institution’s greed. “Mr. Sunderial Bahuguna, a Gandhian activist and philosopher, whose appeal to Mrs. Indira Gandhi, the then Prime Minister of India, resulted in the green-felling ban. Mr. Bahuguna coined the Chipko slogan: ‘ecology is permanent economy’ (“The Chipko Movement”). Even with a female Prime Minister, there’s no severing the innate connection between a capitalist patriarchal institution and an incentive toward capital. 

We see it again in Kenyan activist and leader of The Green Belt Movement, Wangari Maathai, and her tumultuous path toward an ecofeminist future. 

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“Maathai won the Africa Prize for her work in preventing hunger and was heralded by the Kenyan government and controlled press as an exemplary citizen. 

A few years later, when Maathai denounced President Daniel Arap Moi’s proposal to erect a sixty-two-story skyscraper in the middle of Nairobi’s largest park (graced by a four-story statue of Moi himself), officials warned her to curtail her criticism. 

When she took her campaign public, she was visited by security forces. When she still refused to be silenced, she was subjected to a harassment campaign and threats. Members of parliament denounced Maathai, dismissing her organization as ‘a bunch of divorcees.’ 

The government-run newspaper questioned her sexual past, and police detained and interrogated her without ever pressing charges. Eventually, Moi was forced to forego the project, in large measure, because of the pressure Maathai successfully generated.

Years later, when she returned to the park to lead a rally on behalf of political prisoners, Maathai was hospitalized after pro-government thugs beat her and other women protesters” (Kennedy).

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This woman braved a slander campaign that simultaneously disenfranchised herself, the other activist women, and the environment—all because of a powerful man’s ego and just entitled logic of domination. At this point, the pro-government thugs mentioned are synonymous with pro-privilege, pro-privilege that is afforded by institutionalized patriarchal hierarchies. 

Or consider how the worst insult that President Moi’s campaigning could come up with was labeling the women “divorcees,” asserting the logic that a woman’s worth is freely given and revoked by a man. It’s a sign to other entitled, privileged men that these women’s husbands don’t value them, so why should any other man? This is a harmful, oppressive, and dominating logic to have, and yet it’s all around us. 

Additionally, Maathai notes that “the men see trees as an economic investment. They look thirty years into the future and see that they will have huge trees to sell. Well, nevertheless, it means that The Green Belt Movement enjoys the participation of men, women, and children” (Maathai). Again, we see how consistently men only respond to economic growth because capital is power in our hierarchical system. 

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We’ve now traced the patriarchal logic of domination from America to Brazil to India to Kenya. The point is that it’s not a localized issue—it’s global. And while, yes, feminist and ecofeminist discourse is important to educate others and spark conversation toward an inclusive, intersectional, nonhierarchical future, it’s not nearly enough on its own to make a change.

In her article “Ecofeminist: A Latin American Perspective,” ecofeminist Ivone Gerbara reminds us, “While these discussions are going on, lots of women and children are starving and dying with diseases produced by a capitalist system able to destroy lives and keep profit for only a few. The challenging question…is not the struggle among different ways of interpreting women’s lives and the ecosystem, or the reductionism of theories, but the destruction of life while we are discussing the theories” (94-95).

Maathai emphasizes how “Environmental protection is not just about talking. It is also about action” (Maathai). But we cannot make a difference if we—all “others” in the eyes of patriarchal hegemony—are divided by trivialities. 

What’s even more eye-opening is that we can’t just shift all of the blame either. Shifting the blame only fuels and justifies complacency. We can’t just point a finger at those in power and leave it at that. 

Maathai has practice articulating this idea, so I’m going to share her analogy here. Maathai asks, 

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“‘Where do you think these problems come from?’ 

Some people blame the government, fingering the governor or the president or his ministers. Blame is placed on the side that has the power. The people do not think that they, themselves, may be contributing to the problem. So, we use the bus symbol…

If you go onto the wrong bus, you end up at the wrong destination. You may be very hungry because you do not have any money. You may, of course, be saved by the person you were going to visit, but you may also be arrested by the police for hanging around and looking like you are lost! You may be mugged—anything can happen to you! 

We ask the people, ‘What could possibly make you get on the wrong bus? How can you walk into a bus station and instead of taking the right bus, take the wrong one?’

The most common reason for people to be on the wrong bus is that they do not know how to read and write. If you are afraid, you can get onto the wrong bus. If you are arrogant, if you think you know it all, you can easily make a mistake and get onto the wrong bus. If you are not mentally alert, not focused. [Or] Because the government was so oppressive, fear was instilled in us, and we very easily got onto the wrong bus. We made mistakes and created all of these problems for ourselves” (Maathai).

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But what good is staying on that bus once you realize it’s the wrong one? Sure, staying on the bus is easy—it’s comfortable. You can point a finger to a million and two different external reasons why you’re headed in the wrong direction. But in the end, you’re still going to end up in the wrong place. 

The only way to change the institutionalized direction is to take action.

Because the scary truth is that those with power, those with money, and those with privilege have the means to act swiftly and definitively when their power or capital is at risk, and upsetting their superior station in the hierarchy is the largest threat they could imagine. 

I can’t stress this enough: Money Makes Moves. Money Motivates. Capitalist society will act and act quickly to make more or defend capital. When feminists and ecofeminists expend all their energy on discourse that divides and fragments their shared ideals—their power—they’re mutually reinforcing the oppression as well…they’re on the wrong bus. The only way to make a change is to unite the forces of all marginalized voices to topple the patriarchy that opposes us all. 

So let’s stop all this talking. What are you going to do to resist mutually reinforcing oppression?

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Works Cited:

“The Chipko Movement.” EduGreen, Teri, edugreen.teri.res.in/explore/forestry/chipko.htm. 

Corrêa, Talita. “The Brazilian Slum Children Who Are Literally Swimming in Garbage.” VICE, 30 Jan. 2014, www.vice.com/en/article/kwpwja/the-brazilian-slum-children-who-are-literally-swimming-in-garbage-0000197-v21n1. 

Gebara, Ivone. “ECOFEMINISM: A Latin American Perspective.” CrossCurrents, vol. 53, no. 1, 2003, pp. 93–103. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/24461123. Accessed 1 Apr. 2023.

Norgaard, Kari, and Richard York. “Gender equality and state environmentalism.” Gender & Society 19.4 (2005): 506-522.

Stern, Julia. “Pipeline of Violence: The Oil Industry and Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women: Immigration and Human Rights Law Review.” Immigration and Human Rights Law Review | The Blog, 24 May 2022, lawblogs.uc.edu/ihrlr/2021/05/28/pipeline-of-violence-the-oil-industry-and-missing-and-murdered-indigenous-women/. 

Maathai, Wangari. “Speak Truth to Power.” Edited by Kerry Kennedy, The Green Belt Movement, 4 May 2000, http://www.greenbeltmovement.org/wangari-maathai/key-speeches-and-articles/speak-truth-to-power.