tv Earth Focus LINKTV May 9, 2016 4:30pm-5:01pm PDT
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on every continent around the world in response to the injustices against the earth. of a more of a few sane and just world, spurred on by the numbers of individuals who recognize the necessity for change. these women lead into a journey filled with stories that inspire us and challenge us to create change, support and respect all life. leaders inbeen recognizing there were problems and understanding there are solutions around environmentalism and being part of that change. today the environmental movement is made up of women. >> you can impact a nation. we feel empowered. the world is stroke. if we are healthy, the world is healthy.
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♪ of funad a lot selecting the women in this film and we had a number of criteria. we are looking for all ages so we had a woman in her mid-20's and one over 80. we had to focus in on who we believed were really out there making a statement and using their voice to eat chge. , theis really shows that concerns of a woman in africa and in america and in ecuador are very similar acore. we are concerned about the next generation. we concerned about the planet we live on and what is going to
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happen. we are concerned about clean air and clean water and how we are going to find our food sources and how we are going to feed our children and feethem sohey ow up toe health ♪ >> when it comes to the disappearance of water will it is the women who do the struggle. the founder of a farm in india is standing up for the rights of farmers and water. she was inspired by the chp coal women whose current saved their community. they are essential to feeding their families. she follows in their footsteps. asrecognizing the earth each time we so the
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crop, we know we need the corporation -- corporation of the soil. the next step. evy culturin ind. >> if y talk abut farming in india, it is mostly the women. they are the backbone. it is women who are looking after. , werehe women started using -- we were losing our environment. it will be too late tomorrow.
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making food banks. these are not owned by any businesses, it is owned by committees. there are beekeepers. , we are alsoerving multiplying this. these food banks are really helpful in making a self- sufficient. heroines are on the screen. i s drawn their stories because they are voices that are not normally heard. we see a lot of male influences throughout
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the environmental movement and most of the movement and these are women and minority women talking about what we are doing to the earth and how it is affecting them, their communities, and their children. >> we want them to be energized, passionate, to be ready to go and find their own leadership strength and to put in that to work on behalf of the planet. ♪ >> we are all in this togetr when we are talking about the environmental issues we are facing on this planet. this is what makes these women special because they transcend all of that. it is not who we are or whe we ce from, is abouhow we will leave this planet for the next generation.
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♪ >> as she struggles, she stands --to save the indigenous that was passed down by her tribe. her passion and her ability to fight injustice is transforming her community. >> we are here on the reservation. and we live here in this aria for about 9000 years or so. to go toho foll the place where the food growth is on the water. . am working on my dress we have a lot of different ways to dr. our people. they have a significant role in
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our community. it is those who keep our cultural practices are those who are essential to decision- making, those in charge of water. we have our own ceremony. i try to do my best being a woman in this millennium. it is different than being a woman before. it is challenging. american society is about the individual, separate from the natural world. is the perception that somehow we are smarter. have to work on it because there will be a fix. i do not consider myself an activist, i consider myself a responsible person. the reality is we have this privilege of being people who
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can save mountaintops. we can save a whole species. from damaging a river. it is a big privilege to be the one who can do that. my community here is wealthy. we have good land. we have a lot of fish and dear and wildlife. i did not realize the significance of that until modification. we are restoring this. a lot of our traditional foods are strong and they predate industrial fertilizers. usually we fertilized with what we have. fish and different things.
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a lot of our people have diabetes in our community. it is been a rough transition from a traditional system to an industrial system. i want to restore our food. it is the foundation of our health. i am trying to read localized that for our economy. i am trying to keep it here and keep it healthy. enough foodto grow to feed our community. right now loma -- now, we're operating programs. that program provides. you need a green economy. that is not transported 1500 miles. we need local energy and you
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not -- and you're not addicted to other powers. you become responsible. you take responsibility. we did a study a couple of years ago that a portion of our people spend a quarter of their economy on energy. a lot of the work is how to be local. how to great intellectual property. it will ensure you have a local economy. and we began to look at wind. we have wind on our reservation. we start working on it in 2003. weft put up about five. ♪
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someone down the road asked how did you do that. we have the foundation and a crane and we put it up. they asked if we could help them. ♪ the main thing the drives these women his passion and commitment to the earth. they love to get their fingers into it. they love to make a difference. they lovto work from a position of where they are and make something better than it was. i do not know that they have something that is different from everyone else. i think that it's a seed that is planted in all of us, that given the right water and the right motivation and inspiration we can all become leaders like that, from our own perspective. and i think that is the beauty
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of watching these women. i think it is one of the things that people gravitate to in this film, because they can see themselves and they can say, well, if she can do that, i can do that. >> whether we ke it not, sometimes it is as women -- it takes us women to start in make that change, if for no other reason, then to start with ourselves first, then our children and our families. it is by design. we are made that way. and if oureart is it, y cannot stop us. we are a force tbe reckod with. we just have to believe that we have enough power to get it done. ifou get a woman like that, you better helper or get out of her way -- help her or get out of her way.
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but in new york city, another hub for urban agriculture, transforming the south bronx into a place where the streets are filling with the sounds of environmental justice, green collar jobs, and sustainability. >> i find it fascinating that during world war ii, 40% of american food production was actually grown in victory gardens. people were growing it in their window boxes, for yards, in pots on their fire escapes. 40% of food production. that ihow we a. i amery distbed by t fact that our current agricultural system, federally funded most of it, creates the kind of problems that we see right now, the fact that corn and soybeans are so heavily subsidized that it is the basis of much of the unhealthy food that you find, especially in the portland --
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communities around the country. -- in the poorer communities ♪round the country. >> hiperlan -- hi! >> [children singing] ♪ >> this place is so, so very special to me, and even more special when there is lots of beautiful children. i saw you before you all sat down so orderly, and i noticed you were all playing. that is exactly why wanted to make sure there were something like this in this neighborhood. this was a doubt. and if it had not been for my big dog, about 80 pounds, who pulled me into this place.
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i was afraid to come in, but i had a big dog. and i realized, this is our ♪aterfront. the question was, how did it feel, i guess, for me when families started to come and spend time in this park, it made me feel really good. there were not many places like this before. we were considered a place where nothing very good or beautiful could be. so to build this place and have people come and be happy in it, i'd made me feel like i had done the right thing. people from outside our community often thought of those inside the community has not deseing and that we would not notice if we did not have anything nice. and i knew that if we built beautiful things, we would treat them nicely and we would treat
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each other nicely. that is why i wanted to build it. my favorite part is in the middle where they look like these little canoes and boats. they are based on the folks that used to live here many years ago. they were indians, the original people in this community. long before anyone showed up they were here and lived this amazingly beautiful life. this place used to be so green and lush, and literally, everything through here. and people had a lovely lots and they fished in the waters of lot because they were so abundant, abundant with different kinds of fish. when i look at that, it reminds me of what this community used to be and who was supported and was loved and worked and were shipped here. and it also reminds me of the
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fact that our future could be wonderful, too. >> the central thing for me is that it just takes one idea, one tiny idea to start a movement that sparks change from the grassroots level. if you have an idea, whether you're a woman, a man, a child, go with it and see what may come from it. that is what we need. we need to collectively come together. >> woman, the sun rises and sets on whether you feel the connection between your tears and the toxic rain. the sky is crying. enter craine interrupters, which are at the criminal level in all specie are polting theater througut the wld from e ganges to the great lakes.
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this doctor has made it her life work to make the world aware of the danger due to these destructors. she speaks to that of which people are afraid to speak. >> i live in colorado, a small town on the western slope of corado. i love it here. it was living in this spot -- while living in is that of -- it was while living in this valley that i was inspired to go back to college aage 51. i began to inspire -- i began to get inspired to look at low levels of toxic chemicals in the water. i was working at the university of wisconsin under the fisheries department. over the years, they determined what fish needed to be restocked in the great lakes because the fish could not reproduce in the great lakes. something was wrong i immediately began looking at the
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wildlife. we dcover the populations of animals around the great lakes were just not doing well. it was at that point i began to realize that the kinds of chemicalthat ware gettg into the mother animals have introduced low levels of toxic chemicals into the babies. that was the beginning of asking the question of what endocrine disruption was. i brought together very collec-- eclecc group scieists. the first thing they said is there are a large number of chicals inhe envirment that are in development, not only in wildli, but in humans. and if we do not abate the by vironmenl exposu that we see today, we will see why dysfunction at the population leve
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at was in 1990. here we are 20 years later and no chemical has been banned yet. on the day that the doctors told me i could not back to washington to work, gundersen energy corp. announced that they had gotten drills for the grand mesa, which is the big top water that provides water for everyone on that side of the valley. and someone handed me the formula r what ty were gng to use wn a fact- they fracked,nd i recnized a t of chemicals, but there was one i did not recognize. i called my offi and sai get me everything you can about this particular chemical. when i ban to read about that particular chemical, i knew we
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were facing serious problems. and a year later, someone called me looking for me by the name of laura ams. she said, my house is within 350 feet of a well. i developed a very where -- a very rare adrenal gland tumor. it was horrible. chills went up and down the back of my neck. i know right where i was when she told me that. it will always be with me. and the worst part of it was that all the while she was beginning to develop this juror this tumor, she had given birth to her daughter. what we have discovered is that peop immedialy beg to show all of the symptoms of exposure to this -- these nasty chemicals
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that are coming up with the methane in that natural gas. air pollution is the big problem. children especially are vulnerab. there's always something new. discovery is what keeps people like me going. every day there's something beautiful. yes, there is bad news, but it's also helping us to try to push policy in the direction it needs to go.
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it is not a local problem, not a state problem mowry country problem. it is an international problem. we should be electing people that represent the people and not the corporations. >> i am ggie foxnd president and ceo of the alliance for the climate protection, which is an organization that former vice president al gore started in 2006-07. it is to work on the solutions run the climate crisis. the first thing i'd bring is a commitment to and love of the earth. and the arts as a sustaining force of life enjoyed -- the earth as a sustaining foe of life and joy for all things. and at i bri a passi for advocacy and change as action on the part of citizens and individuals. and then i like to bring people together. the fundamental precepts of that is not the win-lose paradigm,
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but that together we win. that means all sides first have to understand each other and thenind a shared solutn. women do that intuitively, whether we are raising children or running corporations or running advocacy organizations or running missions. that is who we are and that is how we lead. >> to all of us out there it is time we all held our hands together, regardless of our race, hard drive, our background, or our history -- our race, tried, background, or history. >> it just because it's rectly women were excluded, it is in our hands to create another history in which we include ourselves and not in which we can't -- reconnect with the
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