Environmentalist Drag Queen Pattie Gonia Says The Outdoors Is for Everyone

How to Save a Planet

Gimlet

Science, News, Society & Culture

4.8 • 1.6K Ratings

🗓️ 14 October 2021

⏱️ 31 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

It's no secret How to Save a Planet is a pro-nature podcast, and that’s not just because we like the mountains, or because trees suck carbon out of the atmosphere: outdoors experiences can also be an important way to build the climate movement. But not everyone feels welcome or safe in the outdoors. Environmentalist drag queen Pattie Gonia is on a mission to change that. Her goal: bring more queer people into the outdoors (and into the climate movement.) Guests: Wyn Wiley (Pattie Gonia) Calls to Action There are tons of activists, educators, and meetup groups working to diversify the outdoors. Check out all the groups listed on Melanin Basecamp, the activists and influencers from Diversify Outdoors, this list of LGBTQ+ outdoors leaders and organizations, and map of LGBTQ+ outdoors meetup groups. Maybe you’ll find someone to go on a hike with! Check out the Job Board that Pattie put together – if you’re a queer person looking for work in the outdoors, you can add yourself to the list, and if you’re hiring for outdoors workers, you can put the job posting there! Draw your Climate Action Venn Diagram – what are you good at? What is the work that needs doing? What brings you joy? Pattie’s work is a great example of finding a climate action unique to you at the center of that venn diagram. If you’re not sure what this is, check out our episode Is Your Carbon Footprint BS? And finally...go outside! Touch grass! Send us pictures if you do. Check out our Calls to Action archive for all of the actions we've recommended on the show. Send us your ideas or feedback with our Listener Mail Form. Sign up for our newsletter here. And follow us on Twitter and Instagram. This episode of How to Save a Planet was produced by Anna Ladd. The rest of our reporting and producing team includes Kendra Pierre-Louis, Rachel Waldholz, and Hannah Chinn. Our supervising producer is Lauren Silverman. Our editor is Caitlin Kenney. Our intern is Nicole Welch. Sound design and mixing by Peter Leonard with original music from Emma Munger. Our fact checker for this episode was Claudia Geib. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	Welcome to How to Save a Planet, I'm Alex Bloomberg, and this is the show about what
0:06.4	we need to do to address climate change and how to make those things happen.
0:17.6	Ah, the Great Outdoors, all the largest and one of our most beautiful vacation lands
0:31.0	is Yellowstone National Park.
0:33.5	About 300 million people visit U.S. National Parks every year, and people spend around $800
0:39.7	billion a year on outdoor recreation activities, like camping, backpacking, kayaking.
0:46.1	And if you've ever hiked to the top of mountain and looked around, it's probably not all
0:50.0	that hard to understand why.
0:52.3	For many years old, Faithful has played with average regularity every 65 minutes.
0:57.5	It's a majestic awe-inspiring sight, reaching up with a plume of white steam that towers
1:03.6	above everything, and seems to dominate the world.
1:07.7	They don't make newsreels like that anymore, do they?
1:13.4	During time in nature has all sorts of physical and mental health benefits.
1:17.5	We've talked more than once about literally hugging trees on the show.
1:21.3	That's for a reason.
1:22.7	But there is another reason why these outdoor experiences are so important.
1:26.6	They help to build the climate movement.
1:29.4	People who have outdoor experiences as a child, especially more wild ones, are more likely
1:34.1	to be environmentalists as adults, and a survey of youth climate leaders showed that childhood
1:39.5	outdoor experiences were formative in their activism, but not everyone sees the outdoors
1:45.9	as being a place for them.
1:48.5	That was certainly the case for today's guests, who showed up to our Zoom conversation with
	...

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