The soft spot in the hearts of the ~30 year olds; useful in a changing world.

I can’t help but feel that people around the same age as me; born in the later 70’s to mid 80’s at least, happen to fall in a fairly interesting group when it comes to addressing a number of environmental issues.
For a child, everything is more or less black or white; right or wrong. It’s only when the hormones really start to kick in that we start to blur the lines with various shades of grey.

Looking at a decades earlier, those children probably focused more on human rights and grew to hold strong views about war. Views regarding sexuality and identity where changing. What The Man said wasn’t always telling the truth. Personal choice – indeed a new form of liberation – formed, and probably fuelled the optimism of the 80’s.

Anyway, of my generation; looking back, it’s easy to find the seeds to my own passion for environmental concern. Sure, I was fortunate to have a family that took me to many of the pockets of amazing environments that still existed here and there, but beyond that, I remember various information produced relating to campaigns to saving the Amazon and species loss; hunting, habitat loss (although they were all very much the cute animals), and the threat of acid rain, I was still young when CFC’s where phased out (with all the information provided in relation to that) – even Captain Planet enjoyed a short yet interesting note for environmental activism.

My Father and me at Tarra Bulga NP, 1981

We are still in the black or white stage when environmentalism seemed to have been more passionate (and somewhat quaint I would argue) rather than a leading election agenda, which meant that environmental views were allowed to be more liberal. I cannot help but wonder how important WWF campaigns, for instance, have been to instil in my generation a view of what is right in relation to environmental issues.

Obviously, since these years, we’ve grown to be probably the biggest consumers and no doubt junkies for technology. Part of this includes the artificial universe of the internet and the near endless supply of information readily available (Who hasn’t had a debate with someone and had a web-phone pulled out to provide the answer?).  As the hormones kicked in, we started to see brands and the information and views of anyone where on hand. We hit puberty at the same time the world became a cyber city that had all but made physical distance obsolete.

It’s certainly a mixed bag, unique in its own way. There is little doubt that sudden flux of information has changes us radically from those children that saw smoke stacks as somehow hurting all the cute animals of the world. We have become incredibly cynical of information out of necessity. Yet, I cannot help but think that there must remain a green stripe painted over the heart of my generation. As we enter into true adulthood (I, myself will be 30 by financial year’s end), I truly believe that we are a raising voice and it could well be this green mark that is the key for change.