I’ve Always Been an Activist
| October 18, 2011 | Posted by Lisa Sharp under Uncategorized |
Yesterday, Jennifer aka The Smart Mama, posted a picture on Facebook of a turtle stuck in one of those plastic ring things. (Look at the video below to see the turtle) It got me thinking about my childhood and how I really have always been an activist. I didn’t know I was environmental or an activist but looking back, I was. I want to share a few stories I remember that go to show I’ve always been like this.
Since before I can remember I’ve been cutting those plastic rings. My mom must have taught me to do it. I remember at least one time that a friend went throw one of the rings away and I stopped them and told them something like “you have to cut those or animals will get stuck in them and die!” I remember being quite upset about the whole thing because I thought everyone cut those rings and knowing not everyone did made me very sad.
When I was just a toddler my dad went to throw away a baby food jar and I told him “no daddy we cycle.” I may not have known the right words but I knew what didn’t go in the trash.
When I was around 7 or 8, I got a paper grocery sack from our kitchen and went around the neighborhood asking for canned food for the homeless shelter. I’m not sure what gave me this idea, likely something I watched but I remember thinking I HAD to help all of the hungry people. One neighbor gave me so much I think I only had to go to her house because I couldn’t carry the bag anymore. I came home and showed my mom what I had done and she was worried at first because she wasn’t sure I had told people why I wanted canned food. I told her I told them what I was doing so she gave me more cans and we went to the shelter to drop off the food.
Around that same age my brother and I watched an episode of Bill Nye the Science Guy and he talked about how you shouldn’t wash your car at home because the metals and chemicals wash into the storm drains and end up in the water. We quickly told our parents this, as we sometimes washed our car at home. My parents are wonderful and listened to us and started washing the car at the car wash instead.
I also remember starting at a very young age I refused to eat tuna unless it was dolphin safe. I think this came about when I was shopping with my mom and read on one of the cans that it said “dolphin safe” so I asked her what it meant. After learning I made sure that was all I would eat. (Now I avoid it all together because of the bpa and mercury)
In first grade my school was releasing balloons for something, I don’t remember what, and I refused to be apart of it. This was big since I was pretty shy and not one to stand up to adults. However, I guess my mom had told me that animals eat balloons that are released then pop and it can kill them. The thought of me being apart of killing animals was enough for me to stand up and say I wouldn’t do it. My teacher said it was fine and that I just had to stand with them but I didn’t have to be apart of it. I remember being very proud after school when I told my mom what I had done. She was proud of me as well, so we may have found the source of my activist ways.
These are just a few things I remember from my childhood that go to show even though I’ve only called myself an environmental activist for a few years, I’ve been one since childhood. I just didn’t know it yet.
Any of my activist readers able to look back and see signs of being an activist early on?
Ahh, you have the activist gene!
I do too. I used to give people gifts that were acres of the rainforest or some such thing and I remember as a tween, sneaking into grocery stores to put stickers on tuna cans indicating that the tuna was not dolphin safe. I guess once you’ve got the gene, you never give up.
Love it! We would have been good friends as kids.
I feel like we have had this conversation sometime before.
I do believe that some people are more prone toward activism and certainly toward social and environmental justice issues. I started young too – recycling, writing letters to my representatives, supporting the Rainbow Warrior, cutting all the rings of the plastic rings from the six-packs, etc. 
That’s awesome Brenna. It seems to be a common theme that there are early signs of activism.
love it! i remember telling my mom, while watching her cut up the plastic 6 pack holders, that far more animals died, and far more horribly too, at slaughterhouses, in my bid to try to convince my family to stop eating meat. i was escorted from a grocery store once, for putting “murderer” stickers on packages of chicken, and heaven help anyone who threw veggie peelings in the trash instead of the compost. ahhh the good old days….now my kids are being escorted from grocery stores for putting “please don’t eat me” stickers on meat,and my own son has a worm farm under the kitchen sink! lol
haha that’s great. While I’m not a vegetarian I am a flexitarian.
I love the you have passed this on to your kids.