Green Man a 'Media Bunny'?

Now I will do almost anything to promote sustainable lifestyle choices and to provide information to encourage people to behave more ethically towards each other, our shared environment and with regard to people not yet born. But there's a risk in using the telly for this, several risks infact. Some people will think that I'm attempting to be a media star, with a huge ego, sporting a 'greener than thou' attitude. One mum at school has already said something to the effect of 'You think that you care more about the environment than anybody else', which made me think about how we can tell if someone cares about something? Well it's through their actions. This mum is a School Governor, and because of this action, I assume that she cares more than most about having a well-managed school. So when she sees me removing fruit and paper from the four playground bins on a daily basis and taking them to the compost bins I've put in, she can see that I care more than most about reducing waste and pollution. There are others out there who do more than me to reduce waste, and my actions are not done in order to get on telly! However I did show ITV what I do at school, as the school hasn't (yet?) got proper recycling procedures in place, which is why I do it for them.

The other risk is that I could be misquoted or misrepresented, as happened last week to a TV company editing footage of the Queen in such a way that they needed to apologise. This has already happened to me. The Yorkshire Post journalist wrote 'John allows his wife to use the flush toilet'... Nonsense! I prefer the recycling 'compost toilet' in the outhouse, but would never force or even persuade somebody else to use it. People have to make their own choices, and I don't even consider myself to be the head of the household. My wife's toilet habits are her own business, she just doesn't much like the spiders in the shed the commode is in!

So back to the media. Many of my more radical friends mistrust the mainstream media and instead look to independent information sources. The web has many, dubbed 'indymedia' or independent media, which are democratic and non-corporate, most large centres of population have their own indymedia groups and it is interesting to see what makes the news in these. Then there's outfits like 'Positive News' which I particularly like. Some places are lucky and big enough to support an independent local newspaper, York had one years ago but it was suppressed by the larger mainstream paper saying that it couldn't be displayed on the same shelf as it was, or they wouldn't allow the newsagent access to theirs. So it 'folded', and the proprietor now uses the internet where intimidation is less evident.

My 'Green Tip Of The Week' is to check out your local Indymedia, and read 'Positive News', to get another slant on what's happening. It can be quite an eye-opener, to see what the mainstream doesn't report.