Filed under: Business + Politics
There’s something to be said about being machismo. All those rippling muscles, the oil, the perfect tan, the testosterone oh so palpable – a definite turn-on for the ladies. And the envy of puny souls like me. No wonder then that Arnie, who has built his career, not on his wonderful Austrian charm or his way with the English language, but through pure brawn, hopes for the dawn of a new era in the environmental movement by jazzing up its image.
Remember last week, the prognosis of some greenies was that it was all but dead and buried. Today it’s been resurrected and the second coming is envisaged to be leaner, more sexy, more mainstream. Who needed those dreaded carrot-chomping lefty sorts with their tie dye hemps and bushy armpits right? The en vogue environmentalist is the one with the Prius, a snappy dresser spouting platitudes about eco-friendly living and the dismal state of the planet if global warming is not curbed. The buzzword then was “Peace.” Now it’s “Change.” But exactly how is the question. How do you sex-up a movement? Do you have a think tank of creative PR, ad experts and environmental activists working on marketing a lifestyle change to millions of people and polluting industries that have no notion of corporate accountability?
Arnie’s done an about turn. He was the cigar-smoking Hollywood star, driving his gas guzzling Hummer around California whilst giving the “Up Yours” index finger to the trailing greenies. He’s baaaaack. Thankfully this time it’s not with some hi-tech, million-rounds-a-second firing weapon at a never say die alien. Now his armory is filled with tough talk and the enemy of pollution is just as resilient. Of course, his record on the passage, or lack thereof, of environmental bills is not without blemish and his penchant for groping women has been the butt (pardon the pun) of many jokes over the years. Not the best person perhaps to lead the charge, but his high profile status and position of political influence does help the cause.
Add that to the drive by Al Gore and you have an interesting mix. Its the doom and gloom versus the sexy and attractive – competing approaches for a common end goal of sustainable living. Hollywood and the music industry has its fair share of heavyweights committed to various causes – Angelina Jolie is doing her bit as a UNHCR Goodwill Ambassador, George Clooney working as a UN Peace Envoy, Bono for social justice causes in third world countries – all of whom and more could give the movement the momentum it needs to have growing appeal, to raise consciousness and call to global action on climate change. Using committed celebrities could be the starting point to focus more attention on the environment, the language of how that’s dressed up will follow.
- Denzyl
Hmm…making environmentalism sexy…is it possible? I have to wonder what Arnold actually meant by this statement. I actually laughed out loud when he compared environmentalism to body building. There are moments like this when it is so difficult to take him seriously (because all I can think of is him killing terrorists in his movie “True Lies”.) On the contrary, Arnold brings up a valid point about the necessity for environmental activism. One approach of getting attention is through SEX.
When I think of making environmentalism sexy, my mind quickly runs back to this article on “How to Green your Sex Life” that I had found on Treehugger.com after our discussion in class last Thursday. I think about how appealing, attractive, and desirable this truly is to consumers. Well of course environmentalism is going sell when you relate it to SEX!
You know what else sells…celebrities. The use of celebrities to promote environmentalism is so smart. Why? Because it so works! Celebrities are motivational. Everybody (when I use the term ‘everybody’…I really mean ‘generally’) wants to be like celebs in one way or another. For example, Oprah. When Oprah helps promote environmentalism and the need to be more enviornmentally conscious to American middle-aged mothers, it sells in a snap. It’s inspiring.
Well that is the first step. The second step is making it possible for consumers to even obtain these products to be able to promote environmentalism. The cost of organic clothing, cleaning products, and cars are wild. How can I, a college student, be able to even promote the cause without having any money?
Although some of us out there are financially challenged, Arnold was onto something. Right? His humorous approach to environmentalism helps the release of this certain anxiety that is held about the notion that our world is literally crumbling into pieces. Humor is contagious, therefore spreading word about needing to help our enviornment will hopefully be contagious too.
What do you think??
-Dena Hart
Filed under: Society + Media
OK, I admit it. Although I’m probably the most pop-culture illiterate person on campus, I am easily tempted by a new issue of People Magazine. I have even been caught late at night watching the Daily 10 on E! I’m not proud of this, and I can’t say that I really care who was seen with who where wearing nothing but what, but the modern American seems to have some an inborn attraction to celebrity. So my initial reaction to Arnold Schwarzenegger’s call to sex up the environmental movement was “bring it on!”. If an NPR listening, Science Magazine reading graduate student like me can be so easily drawn to a pretty face and a flashy car, then I can’t be the only one. Why not sell the environmental movement with sex? It’s no secret that we’ve used sex to sell just about everything else.
And while I don’t think phone sex therapists campaigning to save the bonobo chimpanzee or selling biodiesel in the buck is quite what Arnold has in mind, I do agree that we need to tap into the mainstream and sell what we can while it’s hot. At the same time, I don’t believe that sexy sustainability is the only answer to our environmental woes, nor will it be the next major movement. There are plenty of people out there who are more culturally challenged than I and could care less who came to the Oscars in a Prius. And at the price we have to pay to mimic our celebrity idols, it may even promote the idea that environmentalism is only for the wealthy. Just as threatening, it could lead people to believe that environmentalism is just another trend. So I say, let’s sex it up, but keep in mind that there’s nothing wrong with a little modesty either. – Jeff
Filed under: Fashion + Beauty, Society + Media | Tags: Brooke Shields, Calvin Klein, male model, organic cotton, underwear
In the early ’80s, fashion designer Calvin Klein plastered billboards and TV commercials with the pre-pubescent body of 15-year-old Brooke Shields. The sell line?
“You wanna know what comes between me and my Calvins? Nothing.”
Well, Ms. Shields, I know what should come between you and your Calvins…organic underwear!
The unsexy image that organic cotton underwear used to have has been completely turned around thanks to quality designers and…hot models.
Pretty sure this guy is bringing sexy back in tightie-whitie organic cotton boxer briefs…
And these ladies? They’re rockin’ organic cotton, hemp and silk…sans pants! Who needs Calvins to be sexy?
The green movement is sexy—when it comes to fashion, beauty and consumption. Environmentalists need come up with appealing ways to make sustainability in life choices—fuel efficiency, deforestation, global warming—the climax when getting people to go green.
So what do we do?
Well for one, we have to get up off our Calvin-covered asses and let people know why buying organic cotton is sexier and why eating organic food is better. If we must reach people through consumerism, then we must at least give them everything they need in one package: the luxury product + the luxury of information.
Manufacturers should tell buyers what they’re getting and what the effects are of buying these products: Do female artisans in the Phillipines get paid fairly for sewing your knickers? Does the chocolate company offset its carbon emissions? What does it mean when cotton is grown without pesticides, and how does it affect you?
Lots of sustainable companies provide this information, but I think it really needs to be drilled into the minds of consumers so that they know that buying green is not only “trendy” but also smart. Green consumers should be able to tell their friends solid reasons why they buy eco-friendly products, in order to keep the trend, and the earth, alive!
It probably wouldn’t hurt to throw in a male model or six…
-Kim
I was having lunch with my sister this weekend, and she abruptly stops eating and proclaims the following with her voice conveying a feeling of utmost earnestness and concern.
“Vince, your beard is making me nauseous.”
This got me thinking about “sexy”, facial hair experiments, the conveniences of not shaving and the prospect and utter impossibilty of making things like “biomass gasification technology” glamorous. I’m not a trendspotter. I’ve had roughly the same haircut since elementary school and have a large and diverse collection of professional wrestling action figures, so I would advise not listening to me about what the cool guys are doing. I do, however, know a good semantic argument when I see one. “Sexy” probably isn’t the best word for the green movement. The lead paragraph in the Arnold story mentions “sexy” being synonymous with “sufficiently mainstream.” I’ve always thought “sexy” was better suited for the exotic, forbidden, risque. Webster’s dictionary defines sexy as “arousing or tending to arouse sexual desire or interest.” What should we do? Perhaps, we could place an advertisement in the New York Times with Matthew McConaughey (or McCona-hottie as my mom likes to say) shirtless, smiling, … and cultivating cellulosic biofuels! Woo-hoo! That might arouse sexual interest but probably will not elicit genuine concern in alternative energy sources. In the same way that my moustache fails to connect adequately with my beard, applying sex to certain sectors of the green movement probably would look funny and cause discomfort among the general population. (Thus ends the most clumsy, poorly conceived extended metaphor in the history of media, the environment, and J500 – media & the environment).
In actuality I think Arnold’s mission is pretty admirable. He’s just trying to make the green movement more alluring. Clearly, the man knows sexy. Just check out this eloquent explanation of the intimate relationship between bodybuilding and sex.
Quick shameless plugola: Since this is humor week, I need to mention one of the best satirists around, and he’ll be in town this week! His name’s Todd Snider and he’s playing at the Granada this Friday night. Todd is a singer/songwriter and a masterful storyteller who describes himself as a “tree-huggin’, peace lovin’, pot smokin’, porn watchin’, lazy-ass hippie.” – you have to admire that kind of candor.
-Vince Meserko
Filed under: Waste + Recycling | Tags: "reduce, cavemen, change, Consumption, environment, Flintstones, global warming, Jetsons, Lauren Keith, organic, recycle, reuse, sexy
Photo by Lupin le Vorace, flickr.com
People who recall the four Rs (reduce, reuse, recycle, remember this phrase for the rest of eternity) might be a little curious about how we can reduce our impact on the planet by consuming more to make ourselves feel sexier.
When I think of making something sexier, it usually involves pushing products, especially in the fashion industry. We’ve got to get everyone buying organic, buying sustainably, wait…buying?
Unfortunately, I don’t think Earth is going to recover from global warming by indulging in a little retail therapy.
But what could be sexier than creating and buying sexy things that we already made in the past?
Like this lovely necklace from 10,000 BC:
Don’t be fooled by the rocks that she’s got, she’s still Wilma from the Bedrock block.
Or how about these lovely, organically produced dresses made from recycled plastic bags and bottles:
Available in all your favorite colors, as long as those colors are blue or white.
Forget dependence on foreign oil. Tone your Middle East with this alternative energy:
Is not compatible with E-85.
And with that mentality, why don’t we just throw out everything that requires electricity? Why don’t we stop breathing so that carbon dioxide emissions will decrease? Why don’t we just tear down our apartments and build houses out of sod again?
I must have forgotten the last R: get Real.
Global warming can’t be solved from sex-ifying a green lifestyle by encouraging consumption, especially of goods that aren’t locally produced. Instead, maybe we should look at reusing old, unsexy things to create new, eco-friendly items. Then we are sticking to at least three Rs and feeling sexy.
I might be up with cavemen, but everyone else is down with living like the Jetsons. Unfortunately, I think they got lucky enough to escape to another planet that isn’t on the path to destruction.
WILMAAAA!
—Lauren Keith
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Before I begin I have to say that taking style tips from the Terminator may or may not be the nation’s best option to fighting climate change. He is made of metal and gears and circuitry and rubber. He wears black leather and sunglasses and drives a motorcycle. He was invented to please the teenage boy moving-going demographic.
Yet, it is the one and only Terminator California Governor Arnold Shwarzenegger that thinks the green movement needs a sexy makeover to appeal to the larger public. What Arnold doesn’t realize is that the environmental movement is sexy.
For instance, can you name a sexier laptop than the new ultra thin MacBook Air with its mercury and arsenic free LED display and PVC free circuitry? You must first admit that electronics can be sexy. I did this a long time ago, but gadgets may not be your thing.
Luckily, the eco-movement also has its hand in fashion as well. The recent Fashion Week featured more than one sustainable collection. H&M is again pushing an organic collection for the fall. There are at least two stores in downtown Lawrence that feature second hand and vintage clothing. By cutting out the energy to produce clothing, you are being green. So fashion isn’t your cup of tea? Try architecture. Or furniture. The list goes on.
I would argue that the eco movement is already looking good. And yes, maybe it was a little illogical to compare the style of the green movement to the Terminator, and no, Arnold was definitely not trying to make this comparison and yes, I know Arnold is talking about omitting guilt and fear and all those negative pressures from the environmental movement, not necessarily how superficially good it looks.
To this I wanted to say that “doing green stuff” is gratifying, not scary. It’s rewarding. Why do companies offer green products? I think it is because people like to buy them.
Bobby Grace
Filed under: Society + Media
I agree with what Arnold Schwarzenegger said about trying to make the environmental movement sexy. People like to do what is popular and being green is turning into a popular trend. We see celebrities driving hybrid cars and we want to do the same. (See celebs here).
I think that the problem is, at least with myself anyways, sometimes I am too lazy and/or broke. I know that I should separate my trash to be recycled, but it is so much easier to just throw it in the trash. And I would always love to carry my resuable water bottle around with me, but some mornings I forget, and then I buy a cheap bottle at the covenience store which I throw away when I’m done.
Recently, I had to replace a couple of light bulbs in my house and when I went to the store, I fully intended on purchasing the energy efficient ones. However, I was a little shocked at the difference in price, which was almost three times as expensive. Granted, the energy efficient bulbs would last much longer and I would save money in the end. However, being a broke college student, I just didn’t have the money to invest in the pricer bulb.
But back to what I was talking about earlier, environmentalism needs to be sexier and more economically sound. If those two things happen, I think the movement can spread faster than a California wild fire (that was the best joke I could come up with unfortunately).
Lindsay Crupper
Filed under: Society + Media
When anyone else thinks of Arnold’s environmental efforts, do you imagine him standing in front of a chopper screaming “Aaaaghh. This is a message fram your guberenvironmentalnator. We’ve got to save tha planet!”?
I do.
And speaking of sexing up the green movement….
In Gov. Schwarzenegger’s speech at the Council on Foreign Relations Board Meeting on April 12, 2007 he compared the green movement to body building and how he helped to change the “sketchy” image behind it:
So we knew that we had to change the image, and we did. We consciously changed the image. The book came out, Pumping Iron, and then the movie, the documentary of Pumping Iron came out. And then I started writing books on bodybuilding for men and for women, for children and all this, and started promoting and promoting. And eventually the image of bodybuilding changed so that now you literally could go anywhere in the world and you will find a gymnasium. As a matter of fact, you can go to any gymnasium and you will find ordinary people talking about their lats and their biceps and their abs and their body fat and all those kinds of things.
And, you know, it seems like people have listened. Green feels sexier than eve… and Arnold didn’t even have to write a children’s book this time. I mean look at some of the fine young ladies featured in green themed television shows during NBC’s green week last November. Let’s see… NBC shows… that gives us….
And my personal favorite ….
Something about those nerdy girls.
So the green movement might be getting sexier. And that’s great. It needs to be trendy. Arnold was right. That crying Native American commercial I saw when I was a kid…. I will remember it until the day I die, but it didn’t have an ounce of impact on me. Guilt doesn’t work. Well it does, but not for long. In order to really keep with something, it has to be cool. The quest for coolness is why most people start smoking. And the recent coolness of being a nonsmoker has urged every member of the once-ignorant, black lunged generation to quit…. or at least go into hiding.
But coolness isn’t enough.
“Look at me. I drive a hybrid.”
Cool.
“Look at me. I recycle.”
Sexy
“Look at me. I balance my green karma with carbon offset.”
Hot?
” Look at me. I use biodiesil”
Sweet?
Ok, so we’ve achieved the sex factor. Now, we need to work on awareness and understanding. Now that green is sexy, people think they can just follow the new green trend and their doing their part. Well some of these concepts may not actually be that good for the environment.
Much of this could be changed by tweaking the jargon a little. It took me about 17 readings of the word “greenwashing” before I found out it wasn’t an eco-friendsly way of cleaning your car. Greywater? Blackwater? Isn’t that a security contractor. We are going to be introduced to more and more of these words as the environmental movement grows even sexier. It is of the utmost importance that people understand what these words mean.
-Travis Brown
Filed under: Society + Media
Beer companies know it. Perfume companies know it. Designers know it. Even Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger knows it: sex sells. Advertisers definitely know it, you can’t turn on the TV, open a magazine, or walk into your local Target without getting a full-on shot of a size 00 seductress asking you to buy something without saying a word.
The environmental movement got that cute sells (think of the penguins and the polar bears), but it has yet to fully embrace the whole sex thing. The problem is that there is no sexy chick to mascot for environmentalism. Sure, there are hot celebs hugging trees all over the media, and that’s done its own share – but the fact remains that Mother Nature herself is not hot.
Now picture this: the next global warming (or climate change, or weather irregularities and possible resulting discomfort) ad comes out. A super hot Ferngullyesque model is leaning against a lone tree, pouting ever so deliciously, looking sultry as she peers over a recently plowed down stretch of boreal forest. “Save a Tree, Stop Global Warming” is printed across the bottom of the scene – not that it matters what the words say, the picture will say it all and more.
It would be even better to have an animated Gaia figure – the name Mother Nature is out obviously, no sex appeal there – made into stickers, action figures, maybe even a cartoon show, a sort of sexed-up Captain Planetess. And why not? Moral qualms, dumbing down of a serious contemporary issue – pshaw. Nature is sex – bumble bees making love to flowers, rabbits popping out multiple love bunnies, the animal drive to survive and reproduce. It’s about time humans joined in and let a pair of womanly hips and full juicy lips say what politicians, academics, and journalists have been trying to say for decades:
Global climate change is H-O-T-T Hot.
–Jennifer
