We have a media problem. Not just in the echo-chamber of social media but in the mainstream media world as well. So how do we fix it? As our guest for this episode, Elson Bankoff, puts it, “Imagine a world where there aren’t simply IPCC reports, but after each clause, a demand. Imagine a world where after each local broadcast, there are four events to attend to address the issue.”-- wow, imagine that world! This is what she defines as “Proactive media”. Educational media that is coupled with direct opportunities for action. Proactive media is needed to forward all kinds of social movements, including the climate movement because too often we’re failed by mainstream media that doesn’t connect the dots between world events and the climate crisis. And social media “activism” that begins and ends on a screen. That’s what we’re discussing on our episode today with Elson Bankoff, a young climate activist from Washington DC. She runs a biweekly environmental justice magazine called Ecosystemic. She has seen the power of organizing and sees this publication as a means to change the course of the movement. Ecosystemic not only provides moving art and narratives but is gradually becoming a political force through their goal of creating Proactive Media. Read Elson's manifesto on proactive media here. ____________ Visit our website to keep up with the OC team and for a full transcript of this episode! https://operationclimatepo.wixsite.com/operationclimate Follow us on Instagram at @operationclimate! Follow us on Twitter at @opclimate! Subscribe to us on Youtube! To contact us, DM us on Instagram or email us at operationclimatepodcast@gmail.com! ____________ Host: Katherine Li Writer/Producer: Katherine Li Guest: Elson Bankoff Audio Editor: Katherine Li TRANSCRIPT:
KATHERINE:
Hello everyone.Welcome back to another episode of Operation Climate, the podcasts made by use for youth, where we talk about climate change solutions with cool people and learn about how we as young people and students can take action in the climate movement.
My name is Katherine and I'll be guiding you Throughout this episode.
What a dystopian time we're living in where human rights are limited by the highest powers of the country, and our response is to post news articles and infographics on our Instagram stories. Not saying that's a bad thing, guys, but think about It we're barely even given the time to breathe When the next disaster strikes in, everyones attention shifts, forcing us to deal with our distress about the previous issue at a later time if that time ever comes. Scrolling through post after post after Tik T.O.K After Tik T.O.K telling us that our world is going to ****
Too fast. It's over well.
Social media, algorithms and news sites push out quick and snappy 32nd videos and three page infographics synthesizing and analyzing these issues. That can often be helpful, but are also often too short to surface level to let the average viewer deeply understand the issue enough to know how to act. And details are often missed. And misinformation spreads like wildfire. And then the viewer moves on to the next post.
We have a media problem, not just in the Echo Chamber of social media, but in the mainstream media World as well. So how do you fix it?
Is our guest for this episode, Elson Bankoff puts it Imagine a world where there aren't simply IPCC reports, but after each clause, a demand. Imagine a world where after each local broadcast, there are four events to attend to address the issue.
Wow, imagine that world.
This is what she defines as proactive media, educational media that is coupled with direct opportunities for action. Proactive media is needed to forward all kinds of social movements, including the climate movement, because too often were failed by mainstream media that doesn't connect the dots between world events and the climate crisis And social media activism that begins and ends on a screen.
That's what we're discussing on our episode today with Elson Bankoff.
ELSON:
I'm Elson Bankoff. She/her pronounce I am a junior in high school. I live in Washington DC, which is a great place if you're into advocacy and protests and organizing.
KATHERINE:
Elson is a junior in high school at Sidwell Friends School in Washington DC, and runs a biweekly environmental justice magazine called Ecosystemic.
Ecosystemic is a high school student run Digital magazine that's working to shatter the Echo Chamber of Climate Education Media.
Here's how Elson puts it.
ELSON:
Ecosystemic our approach is sort of like, well, why be like an organization with a newsletter when you can be a magazine that's actively advocating, like doing the work of an organization, but through something that sort of tries to undermine their culture that is provoked through social media, where like, you just Read something you. Move on. You only see it if you're interested in it. There's like an. echo chamber huge win with climate change, so that's something that we're trying To do is sort of like move out of that.
It's all-encompassing as the point we're not just reading about in nature, writing about the conditions that create this, the conditions that are continuing to create. Things like corporate greed. We do a lot of intersectional things like Ukraine X environment, patriarchy, X environment. Just stuff like that. So people see that it is systemic, it is all intertwined in ecosystem. The point is that it. All sort of works in harmony and if you alter one thing then.The rest kind of falls. We all work together and have our part.
KATHERINE:
I first got introduced to ecosystemic through an article that Elson wrote earlier this year called Proactive Media and Mutual Education, in which she describes how she thinks the climate justice movement should advance using themes of mutual aid, mutual education, proactive media and how youth should really take A leading role in this renewable revolution.
So I'll be Taking themes from that manifesto that she wrote. Because I think it's just a very powerful piece.And I'll be using those to guide our conversation today.
One of the first things our Elson mentions in her manifesto is a concept of mutual aid.
The concept of mutual aid is when people take responsibility For caring for one another. It's different from charity in that it's not a one way transaction. It's a network of solidarity between members of a community where people offer their resources and skills and those are redistributed to people in the community that need those resources and skills.
Everyone has something to contribute and everyone has something they need.
Here's an example. Last year, Texas had. A huge ice Freeze that resulted in power and water being cut to millions of Texan homes for about a Week from that, mutual aid efforts became apparent.
People who luckily didn't have their power cut let their community members who did lose powers stay in their houses. People who didn't go grocery shopping that week were brought food by people who luckily did everyone helping everyone.
And this doesn't just happen during a natural disaster, this can be a long term way of living.
Mutual aid is a powerful political concept that can help the climate movement become stronger. Here are Elson’s thoughts.
ELSON:
When we were.Organizing for the March 25th climate strikes in DC, somebody mentioned on our zoom call there was this climate event and while everyone chanting all these disruptive things. But we were all making sandwiches in the background and there was something so.Powerful about that. We were producing a product to give it to people to Help people while Also calling for these Radical changes in the climate movement. It's important that you really, really, really stress like the local humanitarian things. Resolving the issue while calling for a greater reform is a great way to model activism.
I mean, you can look at the Black Panther Party. Like what they did is they. Had their free breakfast programs and you know it Did all these Things that weren't that radical but like because A radical group was calling for reform while also feeding People it's like. We can do it.
KATHERINE:
Proactive media is different from social media. We've seen movements being amplified on social media. A lot of us get our news from social media. We've learned a lot about different social issues through social media. But it's a means, not an end. Difficult to make change when you advocate only through social.
In Elson’s manifesto, she explains that this is because social media is an echo chamber.
This is how the algorithm works.You see content that you agree with, and the content you put out is shown to people who already agree with it. This is how these multibillion dollar social media companies keep you on their apps.
Elson also writes how social media is a black Hole, she says. Quote we Spend time scrolling, informing ourselves only to become inspired for a single moment and leave drained and buzz with that all too familiar feeling, a phone burnout. It sucks our energy and it sucks our time.These two things Energy and time are the fuels of powerful movements. End Quote.
ELSON:
I read a book recently called The Quiet Before.Basically, in the first chapter it talks about social movements and how effective social movements build up over time before they're you're able to get to the point where everyone is screaming a champ.And social media kind of undermines that.Because it sort of jumps a step In a way.
Or it undermines the Work of the people who have been do Things forever who have been working on an issue for so Long and like the first chapter of the book, the author basically described social media as like a cocktail party, where you go and you like clink glasses and You know, chat It up and it's like really fun. But then you go home and you're drained and you'll go to another cocktail party for like, we send there 24 hours, if not a lot longer, but like versus You know, having a dinner with your friends or have like productive conversations and you are talking and You're not intoxicated, basically, and it's Just like a very slow Conversation versus like a cocktail party.
It's draining. It is so exhausting, and I don't think we realize it, especially if you're an activist. Listening to this, people talk a lot about like, oh, like you see, like beauty standards. And stuff like that. I get massive burnout from seeing activism standards. It's exhausting to go into social Media and to see like Kids hosting with congressmen and all this stuff and you're like. Like kids at the White House who, like, went viral on Tik T.O.K and stuff like that. It's like, Oh my God, you're making more change than I am and stuff like that.
I think we do compare each other. And then now. It's not productive because social media is. It's just a place to like, highlight your. Best performance of yourself and then that's not authentic. It creates more competition within movements than I would like because that's how these companies make money is by literally getting people to want to become something to stay on the app and to see things that they're not.
KATHERINE:
Let's not discount how social media has helped social movements, including the climate movement, a viral video sparking global protests, a #exposing and holding abusers accountable.
When we can take our digital presence to the real world, we're more able to make change, but it's often difficult to do that.
ELSON:
I think it's really good for it. Yeah, means not ends. We got the turn out. We like 500 people at the March 25th strike, which is pretty good. The main way that we did that was we had Instagram chats because they exist to message People communicating.Totally revolutionary for promoting things. Also awesome, like giving a time and place. Giving, you know, putting a flyer mutually like here's. What I need Venmo. Awesome.
We're really trying to maximize like, the slow Like, OK, read this, like, let it sink and be inspired 'cause what happens It's it's like nauseating. Like it is spam. Like you get spammed with news, you get spammed with these like insanely heavy things.
A huge issue with The owner for movement and Black Lives Matter is that organizers in those spaces have been like, well, why is it that we only get a million Retweets when someone has to be Shot spamming your mind with literally The most like terrible things. You become desensitized at some point and you become like, OK, this is inevitable.
There's nothing I can do to solve it 'cause you're just on these platforms. This news header, header, header, header, header. Delete it, get off of it for a while, come back on if you need to do something on it. If you really want to post something, it makes you more mindful.
I've just been deleting Instagram all the time. Doesn't mean some slower, it makes you Really look to Other media, it makes you read the whole thing and I just think like everyone, sort of Craves like something slow. But we don't get it often and I think social media doesn't help with that and it makes us really Numb to a lot of social issues and it's really hard with climate like, Voting honestly go All out with like social media. That's all you need for an election. A bunch of people talking about one thing for a few weeks, climate stuff It's like, so long term, there's really not much you can do.
KATHERINE:
So what exactly is proactive media?
Ellison describes it as when we integrate lessons about climate or other social issues into everyday forms of media and shatter the echo chamber.
Here are some examples that Elson shared.
ELSON:
I literally knows in like second grade Read this book. On like baseball? 'cause I was in like a huge baseball phase.
The premise was like, this kid goes back in time and like, meet these baseball players book His time machine breaks in this one book and he goes to the future. And it's like. Climate change and I'm like, what?
And it integrated it, and I've already think about that all the time. I'm like, I never would have thought about this. I never would have picked up a book about climate change at age 8, and it's easy to say that at age 8. But like everyone, no One picks up a book about climate change If they're not interested in it, you need it integrated. You need it in every single part of everything. So that's where proactive media sort of comes in. You have to be very like have a mission in the stuff That you're saying and the Things that you're presenting to the world, example, we're running several campaigns through ecosystemic that are like citywide campaigns where basically we're writing demands and people are content Getting organizations like NGO's, Auditions, Council people in their cities getting information about what the issues are, and so we're sort of taking a journalistic approach to like demanding legislation.
I wrote a bill recently. I never Thought I would do that. It's interesting 'cause I Did it for The Forum of publishing it on a Magazine, which is cool because it's not like, oh, I'm just. Writing a bill like for shifts and giggles, like I I did it for the magazine as a part of this series.
Just going into every field and being like, hey everyone, let's shift the mission just a little bit 'cause this is an emergency.
Hollywood and Broadway, not super having, they're not really having that conversation. It's gotten Better with race A little bit Arguably, over time, other social movements like really not much because it's so like, especially with environmentalism. It’s So like.I would never pick up that book. It's so like science, it's so IPCC, it's so like wildfires and people, animals dying and like anything that you're doing right now can have a climate implication without having to notice Like to center your life around climate stuff?
You can write a book that isn't about climate change, but has the conversation in a really heart That way, I think that's really what people get inspired by and moved by or angered by.
Integrating into society is the biggest thing. So yeah, shadow the echo chamber, that's our next big thing.
ELSON:
While Elson was talking about proactive media, I thought of an example.
A recent blockbuster movie featuring Meryl Streep, Leonardo DiCaprio, Jennifer Lawrence, Timothy Chalamet Literally every Hollywood a Lister You can think of.
The movie is called don't look up, it's on Netflix If you weren't clear on what I was.
Yeah, while there was no mention of climate change throughout the entire movie, it brought to light the failings of the systems that prevent us from acting on climate. A lot of people saw parallels to the US response to COVID 2.
The director, Adam McKay, originally wrote the script as a metaphor for the climate crisis.
See how this movie integrated climate into its story, and it ended up on the screens of millions of people, many who wouldn't even call themselves climate activists.
ELSON:
It's just about being creative because, like Al Gore, his whole thing, inconvenient truth, you know, it wasn't the 1st mainstream 1. If you're a mainstream person, you're talking about this stuff.
It does kind of shatter it. The people who are looking to you aren't the climate scientists.
That's a good way to use fame if you're just, if you just Start talking about It you just automatically expose it to other people.
KATHERINE:
So what is Elson’s vision for ecosystemic and for proactive media as a whole?
ELSON:
I think ecosystemic ideally. We're meeting these citywide editions. My vision is like people in different Cities, just keep our keep reaching out. People keep getting narratives, getting interviews, writing like making art, creating. Things what our Goal is is to have This, like, nice aesthetic page with just all these demands, all these narratives for cities because that's where it gets specific, is like it's not saying the same thing everyone says I feel bad going to protest and Doing these chants like I honestly feel kind of dumb at some point I'm like, wow, this is redundant, I've Been saying this for the last four Years, but it's not my fault. It's just the way no one changing.
But I think with stuff like this is like if you give your City Council these demands that are well researched and have these diverse narratives and stories and ideas and it and then giving it to them, local governments are more likely to listen to their constituents. So if You have that going on like a ton of levels.
May be included in that I, in our addition, included a proposal for creating a Youth Climate Council under the Mayor's office.They exist and. I think it could get passed, so like you can literally. Do the same and. You're their constituents and that's huge and you can't vote in most cases, so that's also huge. You know, a world where wouldn't have Do exist is a World where like If everyone just were mindful and empathetic and aware and we're able to just sort of create things with ease and not need to be constantly stimulated, we would. They have such a need to create this concept of like proactive media because people will be absorbing things, but since it's sort of like a counter to just like spam media, so it stems from that hyperactive culture that you see a lot of the time in activism.
So I would just hope that people kind of slow Down sometimes 'cause, that would be a better role.
KATHERINE:
Let's summarize this episode.
One the climate movement could benefit from mutual aid, the power of Community is mass.
Two, social media is a means, not an end, to forwarding a social movement theory.
Proactive media and the climate movement could mean coupling a journalistic story with action items. It could mean integrating climate stories into mainstream media and showing that climate relates to everything. It could mean media that is slow That doesn't thrive off the rapid news cycle and click worthy culture and that examines climate issues with nuance and detail.
So now that you have That here are some action items to take away from this episode.
Take a break from social media for a day and engage in slow media surrounding some social issue, including the climate crisis. My recommendations for books include all we can save, which was Co edited by Doctor Ayana Elizabeth Johnson and Doctor Catherine Wilkinson, Generation Dread by Brett Ray.
My recommendations for Documentaries how to let go of the world and love all the things climate can't change by Josh Fox. Is really good.
My recommendations for podcasts. So this is a hard one guys.I operation Climate I heard is a is a good one.
And obviously, read Elson’s article on ecosystemic about Proactive Media will likely be in the shots.
ELSON:
If you listened to this whole thing, good for you. You were you were the key example of the mindful human who doesn't listen on double speed like I do and doesn't well, maybe you did, actually, but you still finished the. So you know, you sound like an ecosystemic writer to me, and a great person who will. Make a lot Of change in the world and keep listening to The whole duration of episodes.