Green is not necessarily new, and green is not necessarily white

There is a comment that has been making the rounds for some time - Jason Toney recently reposted it. Originally, it was posted as a comment to a post entitled "Sustainable Food and Privilege: Why is Green Always White (and Male and Upper Class)." The original post, by Janani Balasubramanian, claims that, among other things, the fresh food movement overly concentrates on white male voices within the movement, and even takes some actions to denigrate others (such as blaming our lack of home cooking today on Betty Friedan).

Anyway, a comment from Blackandalive said that this attitude was not restricted to food choices:

It reminds me of the "bike to work" movement. That is also portrayed as white, but in my city more than half of the people on bike are not white. I was once talking to a white activist who was photographing "bike commuters" and had only pictures of white people with the occasional "black professional" I asked her why she didn't photograph the delivery people, construction workers etc. ... ie. the black and Hispanic and Asian people... and she mumbled something about trying to "improve the image of biking" then admitted that she didn't really see them as part of the "green movement" since they "probably have no choice" --

I was so mad I wanted to quit working on the project she and I were collaborating on.

So, in the same way when people in a poor neighborhood grow food in their yards ... it's just being poor-- but when white people do it they are saving the earth or something.

And YES black people on bikes and with gardens DO have an awareness of the environment. Surprisingly so! These values are in our communities and they are good values. My Grandmother was an organic gardener before it was "cool" --My mother believed in composting all waste and recycling whatever could be reused-- it was a religious thing. God hates waste.

Now is this all an exaggeration? Well, I took a look at the Board of Directors of the League of American Bicyclists. You can look at the pictures of the board members yourselves - I'll quote from the biographies:

Before retiring, Hans was Partner of a multi-million dollar international consulting practice, received numerous achievement awards, and was the first to commute by bike to corporate headquarters....

In his professional life, he is an economist and statistician at the World Bank, where he is also spokesman for the World Bank Staff Bike Club (which has over 300 members and more than 700 registered bike commuters)....

Currently, Brull is transitioning from his day job of more than 30 years as an industrial/organizational psychologist and spending time in his new home in Salida, Colo. (discovered on Ride the Rockies and Bicycle Tour of Colorado)....

A former bicycle retailer and City Transportation Coordinator, she has a background in Organization Development and extensive experience serving on local, regional, and national boards and bicycle advisory committees....

She is a registered patent attorney with a PhD in Materials Science. Her solo Intellectual Property law practice is located in Albuquerque....

He graduated from the University of Southern California in 1971, and earned his law degree at Hastings College of the Law in 1975. His passion for cycling has also shaped his professional career. Approximately 15 years ago he decided to transform his law practice from general personal injury cases to a specialized cycling practice....

Durrant is principal at Alta Planning + Design in Portland, Ore....

David Madson, a resident of Berkeley, is a Senior Development Officer with California Pacific Medical Center Foundation. He has previously served in senior development positions with the University of California and California State University systems and his alma mater, the University of Minnesota....

Now this is probably not unique to cycling - any Board of Directors (or any group such as the U.S. Congress) is going to be skewed towards those who have money and therefore influence, and in our society today those people will tend to have certain genetic characteristics.

Incidentally, I thought about buying this image to improve the look of this post, but thought better of it. Take a look at the adjectives used in the caption, such as "active." Interesting.