Equity

I attended a forum on Environmental Justice at the local university last evening. I was invited to participate as a community member. It was refreshing to be with the university students as they considered equity in terms of the environment. Bright students. Thoughtful questions. Some troubling reminders of days gone by.
Environmental Justice = equity = no - racism/no - classism.
It is true that the poor are effected most by environmental degradation. Their neighborhoods are more likely to have inadequate access to healthcare, good food or parks, and at the same time likely to have toxic waste, brown fields, and poor air quality. Race is the single highest determiner of class and class is what forces people into neighborhoods as described above.
We had some serious discussion last night about the need to help the people trapped into a life of poverty and inadequate resources to ensure that they thrive. But just as in the past, it was the white middle-or upper class males who were most likely to believe that they knew how to fix things for everyone. They spoke of going to those neighborhoods to empower the people. They spoke with passion and real desire to make a difference. But their predecessors are the same ones that got us into the predicament we are in today - where affluent mostly white neighborhoods have Whole Foods, New Seasons and Forest Park, and the lower-class, mostly minority neighborhoods have Sue Bee's resale canned goods and an empty lot filled with trash.
As the students spoke of how to get "those people" to care about the environment, I became increasingly distressed. The environmental movement caters to people who can afford to adapt, buy the newest green innovation, and eat only organic local food. But the poor have much to teach. They have been living on a fraction of the money that the upper classes do. They know how to live in less space and can re-use until there is nothing left or go without. In a world that is rapidly changing the poor can be teachers. Yes, the more affluent have something to bring to the table, but they have much to learn first and they have not yet grasped that reality.
Most environmental groups have never stopped to think about equity. They think they know what everyone needs to do and they are ready to expound. But really, who got the world as we know it into the mess it is in? The poor or the affluent? Why on earth should the poor continue to follow the very class of people who messed things up so badly in the first place? In what way have the affluent changed?
Maybe the affluent need people from the other side of town to organize them; teach them how to live simply; show them how to live without a savings account or a car. Teach them to reduce and reuse and where to find the things that are being given away, and where to leave the things that have encumbered their lives. Perhaps the poor would consider empowering the well to do. But then again, why should they?
Equity. How many poor people or people of color are in your Green/environmental group?