Year 2, Ep. 15: This Situation

I'm finally back from a long, COVID-lockdown-induced funk. This week I talk about how I reduced my emissions last year and why I'm moving to "Our Climate Diet." Also, I invite you to join a panel organized by friend of the podcast Franziska Elmer related to Scientist Rebellion. For more information, go to myclimatediet.org.

In this episode, I reflect on how personal action and government action can pick up each other's slack in dealing with our biggest problems -- using the examples of coronavirus and climate change. And two Greek women's delicious vegan food is giving me hope.

This week I talk about what degrowth can mean at home, and give tips on how to create spaces for "enough" stuff not to morph into "too much." I crunch the climate numbers on living smaller based on a recent article in "Energy Policy" by Immanuel Stiess, Anja Umbach-Daniel, and Corinna Fischer. And my local voting official is giving me hope this week!

Welcome to "This Situation"! I talk about my time in Tino Sehgal's fascinating installation/performance piece at Gropius Bau this past month, and how it felt to be an often lone voice on climate action. Then I get real about this podcast and promise to get back to my intended focus on positive visions of the future and degrowth.

This week, I complain about cleaning yet MORE junk out of the junk house, the cluttered state of my apartment, and the problem of stuff in general. But there's a silver lining -- I'm taking part in an upcoming exhibition of "This Situation," an art piece that involves talking about current and age-old problems by Berlin-based artist Tino Sehgal, who doesn't use material in his work. Art without stuff, how does that work? More on the exhibition "Down To Earth" here: https://www.berlinerfestspiele.de/en/berliner-festspiele/programm/bfs-gesamtprogramm/programmdetail_309206.html And don't forget my other project, "Stories From the Future," which will be hosting another public workshop very soon: https://acudmachtneu.de/events/1643/stories-from-the-future-%E2%80%93-crisis-catalyst-for-carbon-neutrality/

I report back on the media diet I started two weeks ago, and find that it's great reading less and being more mindful about my media consumption. Plus, climate activists boycott Facebook, why the BBC podcast "Forest 404" is making me happy, and what Nick Hornby's reading philosophy could have to do with climate change.

This coming month I'm going on a media diet. That means canceling my last streaming account to take a larger role in curating entertainment media, spending more time on news and analysis relevant to climate change and less on "stories of the moment," and trying out new sources that can help me get more useful perspectives. A shout out to the Guardian, HEATED, and Hot Take, as well as Perspective Daily. Finally, why the rediscovery of a presumably extinct plant species in North Carolina is giving me hope (thanks to the Revelator for sharing this).

This week I weigh in on Black Lives Matter, connect it to the climate and sustainability crises, and explain why I'm joining Extinction Rebellion's next Rebel Wave from June 12-21. A big shout-out to Osita Nwanevu's excellent February essay "End the GOP" in "The New Republic" (https://newrepublic.com/article/156411/end-gop) and thanks to everyone who joined the workshop series "Stories from the Future" that I'm facilitating with Dylan Harris as part of ACUD MACHT NEU's Collective Practices program. Check out the stream of the first workshop while it's on Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/watch/live/?v=861674787724449).

Today's episode is something special: I talk about the new project I'm working on, a series of workshops called Stories from the Future. In these workshops, organized as part of the "Collective Practices" program at ACUD MACHT NEU, participants will come together to imagine a climate-neutral 2030 and create artifacts to bring back to the present. To talk about these workshops, I am interviewed by ACUD MACHT NEU curator Daniela Silvestrin--in May 2030! For more information, go to http://myclimatediet.org/stories-from-the-future/ or http://acudmachtneu.de.

This week I present an interview I did with Maria Koimtzoglou, owner of the Berlin restaurant Maria (mariamariamaria.com), about the connections between food and sustainability and what it's like owning a restaurant in our corona reality. Plus, crashing oil prices are giving me hope, as is seeing corona as an opportunity for us to turn this ship around. Thanks to Maria for chatting and CIEE Berlin (cieeberlin.org) for letting me use this conversation outside the classroom. #digitallearning