By: Ankita
Pride month is an opportunity to reflect on the importance of LGBTQ+ community and celebrate the progress in bringing new laws for the rights and equality of the queer community.Queer activists fight against the oppression they face in the name of racism and transphobia.As they understand it very well how it feels to be oppressed and critised by the society, they are more empathetic towards the environment and the animals.They are more aware of the social inequalities, and hence they want to fight for the environment .Professor Eric Shwank ,Arizona State University’s New College in 2018 found that the LGB people “were more than twice as likely as heterosexuals to join anti-war, environmental, and anti-corporate movements”. In the past decade, we can see the rise in the number of eco-activists belonging to queer community from different parts of the world. Let’s get to know about some of them :
- Isaias Hernandez , an environmental educator (Los Angeles, California) works to spread awareness about environmental justice,zero-waste living and veganism. Isaias created a platform named “Queer Brown Vegan” (@queerbrownvegan) for like-minded individuals to learn about the terms in environmental movement and also co-created an Environmental Magazine named “Alluvia Magazine”.
@queerbrownvegan
- Harish Iyer ,Equal Rights Activist,Author (India) advocates for various socio- environmental issues and campaigns through social media and articles. He promotes the rights of LGBT community,animals and child sex abuse survivors.In 2009 , He along with Shobha De started a campaign known as S.I.T.A (Sensitivity in True Action) to urging the women to blow whistles against the eve teasers. He has appeared in PETA’s ad in 2014 to encourage people towards vegetarianism.
- Izzy McLeod , sustainable blogger and activist(Cardiff,Wales) explores the issues related to sustainability and shares them on their blog ,Muccy Cloud, a sustainable living blog which is focused on Sustainable Fashion,Zero Waste Living and other Environmental Issues.They launched a campaign named ‘Who made My Pride Merch?’ to hold the Fashion brands accountable for the production of their Pride merchandise.They explain that “These brands are making money off of LGBTQIA+ people whilst manufacturing their clothes in countries where it’s illegal to be gay, or where LGBTQ+ people have little to no rights.The campaign calls on them to be more transparent and to do more to protect all their workers, especially their LGBTQIA+ workers.”
@muccycloud
- Anson W.Mackay , Professor of Geography in the Environmental Change Research Centre (London)works on the impact of humans and climate change on freshwater ecosystems like Lake Baikal and the Aral Sea in central Asia. He has worked for over 30 years to study Freshwater ecosystems as they are one of the most threatened environments on our planet. He is also a part of 500 Queer scientists.
- Christopher Sebastian,technical writer ,Lecturer and Researcher (Prague, Czechia) has a passion towards animal rights activism.He focuses on how human relationships with other animals shapes our attitudes about race, sexuality, and class. He is the director of Peace Advocacy Network and co-founded VGN, a platform for vegan views , politics and pop culture.