4: "Do you want a habitable planet for your children?" - Sentientist Conversations - Zion Lights Sentientism

Zion Lights is an author & activist known for her environmental work & science communication. She is UK director of Environmental Progress. She has been a spokesperson for Extinction Rebellion (XR) UK on TV and radio, and founded & edited XR’s Hourglass newspaper. She has written for The Huffington Post, authored the evidence-based nonfiction book The Ultimate Guide to Green Parenting, and given a TEDx talk.

To watch instead of listen, here's our conversation on YouTube.

We talk about:


Front line activism (before & during XR)
Why environmentalists should commit to evidence & reason, even when it’s uncomfortable (e.g. nuclear)
The risks of cause commitment leading to dogma & the ignoring/warping of evidence
How a lack of evidence risks undermining movement credibility (particularly when being interviewed by Andrew Neill)
Individual change vs. systemic change – making it easier for people to do the right thing
How XR have helped bring env. concerns into the public consciousness
Energy Justice, finding sustainable ways to get energy to people that most need it
Understanding the reality of life in less-developed countries & acting with compassion as we pursue solutions
Avoiding the developed country trope of: “We burned fossil fuels to get rich & happy – but you developing countries can’t, because we’ve destroyed the environment”
Embedding compassion (for human & non-sentient beings) in our environmentalism
Growing up in England with Punjabi parents, one Christian & one Sikh
Exploring religions but being “baffled” by them
How other dogmas (e.g. anti-vaxx, anti-masking) relate to religious dogmas
The good (compassion) & bad (e.g. caste discrimination) of religious ethics
Fatalism, karma & crossing the road in Indian cities!
Fatalism & prayer as ways of coping with a difficult life, but ones that trap people
Avoiding romanticism about living “simple” lives. These lives are often short, risky & full of suffering
Superstitions as another set of un-founded & potentially dangerous beliefs
The sense of freedom from letting go of superstition & religion & adopting a scientific worldview
Marrying a doctor for safety/health as well as status reasons!
Risking family & social connections to take a different path
The value & constraints/dangers of community obligations
The importance of freedom & autonomy
The image of animal products as high status, aspirational or a “treat”,  going back to hunter/gatherer times
Veganism, animal farming, clean meat, wild animal suffering, eco-fascism, paganism 
A Star Trek/Kaku/Deutschian/Sagan future!

There’s more about Zion here: http://www.zionlights.co.uk/ & you can follow her on Twitter here @ziontree. Here she is on our Celebrity “wall”.

Sentientism is “Evidence, reason and compassion for all sentient beings.” You can find out more at sentientism.info.

Everyone interested, Sentientist or not, is welcome to join our community. Our main group is here on FaceBook.


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