Action Briefing December 2006 - January 2007
	The Newsletter of Birmingham Friends of the Earth

Reflections from a FOE Oldie

As part of the welcome to the three new workers, Ian, Chris and Tamsin, may I contribute some reflections from a ‘FOE oldie’?
I was one of the original gang who took the momentous step of leasing the decrepit, mouldy, dismal warehouse back in the mid 70s. The Coordinator’s terraced house was groaning from the impact of tons of recycled duplicating paper (Gestetner, inky things, pre photo-copier – anyone remember?) and recycled toilet rolls. With trading taking off we needed premises and were confident that if we quadrupled our activities we could pay the rent! Well the rest – including the eventual purchase of the property when the 99-year lease ran out – is history, as they say. The hub of a home insulation empire, wholefood shop and café, and home to diverse other organisations - the warehouse flourished as we had hardly dared to expect.

I worked there for 17 years, variously as campaigner, newsletter editor, company secretary, and in the later years as Regional Board member. I set up the Golden Supporter Scheme to raise the funds to pay our first ‘professional’ campaigner, Elaine Gilligan; a scheme which I’m delighted to find still thriving.
I still pay my subs and enjoy keeping up with all the news from Birmingham FOE via Action Briefing. What marvellous editors and campaigners you’ve had since my days there!

But some things change in the organisation as a whole. In the early days FOE’s by-line was ‘Help the Earth Fight Back!’ Yes, FOE set out to be the voice of all the voiceless, vote-less species we share the planet with: the endangered animals, fish, insects, trees, and flowers. Humankind with its burgeoning numbers and hugely increasing demands on natural resources and habitats was what we had to help the Earth fight against. All that has changed with the need to be politically correct, and now the Earth (and all its myriad species) is to be seen as ‘for people’. We are urged to protect the Earth and its eco-systems out of self-interest, in order to ensure long-term human welfare - even for the UN-projected nine thousand million humans. (In the early campaign that line of argument had simply seemed a good tactic.) Now FOE Birmingham’s new Campaign Support Worker can say ‘I care about people more than anything else’. Fine. But if we (with our intense awareness of the ecological crises now upon us) really care about human welfare, we must surely recognise that the Earth and its complex eco-system have to come FIRST. We have to care more about the Earth, and its flora and fauna and support systems, than anything else, if our care for people is to be more than wishful thinking.

Me, I’d still be on the side of a bog or a snow leopard rather than on the side of people wanting more homes or more holidays. Perhaps, in the end, I have fallen quite out-of-step with today’s environmental movement. I am, I suppose, an unrepentant eco-centric.

Val Stevens