Bioneers: Revolution From the Heart of Nature

As a backlash against LGBTQ rights escalates into an authoritarian crusade, acclaimed author and queer activist Taylor Brorby asks how we can still be fighting this battle? As a writer addressing the fossil fuel industry’s acceleration in the midst of climate chaos, Taylor is forced to choose between the existential crises of the assaults on nature and on LGBTQ people. It’s all connected, he says, as he seeks to reconcile nature, culture, diversity and belonging.

Visit the episode page for more show notes and transcript.

This is an episode of the Bioneers: Revolution from the Heart of Nature series. Visit the radio and podcast homepage to learn more.

Today, there’s a renaissance of independent journalism dedicated to holding power accountable. Political pressures are mounting to break up media monopolies and provide access to more voices. Independent and investigative media outlets are proliferating, often as nonprofits funded from the bottom up.

In this program, we hear from two veteran journalists who lead two of the most courageous and successful independent media outlets in the United States: Monika Bauerlein, the CEO of Mother Jones magazine, and Amy Goodman, host and executive producer of Democracy Now!

Resources

Video of Monika Bauerlein's Keynote speech at Bioneers 2019

Video of Amy Goodman's speech at Bioneers 2017

This is an episode of the Bioneers: Revolution from the Heart of Nature series. Visit the radio and podcast homepage to find out how to hear the program on your local station and how to subscribe to the podcast.

The profit-hungry agribusiness empire of the 20th century institutionalized farming practices that continue to degrade soils across the U.S. and globally. We face a fork in the road: collapse or regeneration? The good news is that we know what we need to begin an agricultural and ecological renaissance – a literal rebirth. 

Biologist Ann Biklé and geologist David Montgomery share one of the good news stories that show how the solutions residing in nature surpass our conception of what’s even possible.

David R. Montgomery, a Seattle-based MacArthur Fellow and professor of Geomorphology at the University of Washington and the author of award-winning popular-science books that have been translated into nine languages, is an internationally recognized geologist who studies landscape evolution and the effects of geological processes on ecological systems and human societies.

Anne Biklé, a biologist, science communicator, and public speaker, investigates and writes about connections between people, plants, food, health, and the environment. Her work has appeared in magazines, newspapers and radio, and her soil-building practices have been featured in independent and documentary films.

Learn more about David and Anne’s work and books at their website, dig2grow.com.

Explore Bioneers’ Regenerative Agriculture media hub to learn more about practices that increase biodiversity, build and enrich soil, improve watersheds, enhance ecosystem services, and increase soil carbon storage.

Subscribe to The Food Web, our food-and-farming newsletter sharing the stories and celebrating the people whose work builds local food systems that serve people and embed ecological stewardship into agricultural practices.

This is an episode of the Bioneers: Revolution from the Heart of Nature series. Visit the radio and podcast homepage to find out how to hear the program on your local station and how to subscribe to the podcast.

In a world that’s unraveling from climate disruption and gaping inequality, another climate crisis confronts us: the climate of hate and othering. Award-winning scholar and educator Valarie Kaur says to overcome racism and nationalism, we must not succumb to rage and grief. As someone who has spent much of her life challenging horrific injustices and intolerance, Kaur learned the lesson that historical nonviolent change-makers understood: social movements must be grounded in an ethic of love. She founded the Revolutionary Love Project, and has emerged as one of the most important voices of the American Sikh community, and a highly influential faith leader on the national stage.

This is an episode of the Bioneers: Revolution from the Heart of Nature series. Visit the radio and podcast homepage to find out how to hear the program on your local station and how to subscribe to the podcast.

For transcript and more about this program, visit: https://bioneers.org/laboring-for-justice-see-no-stranger/

Credits

Executive Producer: Kenny Ausubel

Written by: Monica Lopez and Kenny Ausubel

Senior Producer and Station Relations: Stephanie Welch

Host and Consulting Producer: Neil Harvey

Producer: Teo Grossman

Program Engineer and Music Supervisor: Emily Harris

By around 2044, the U.S. will become a majority-minority nation. This seismic demographic shift has triggered a cultural earthquake, provoking a radical spike in hate crimes. In times of massive disruption and economic stress, what Carl Jung called the “shadow side of the psyche” comes into play: the pronounced psychological tendency in the collective psyche is to project these shadow qualities with unusual potency onto whomever people see as “the other.” But is there also a deeper story? Perhaps the question to ask is: Who benefits? In this half hour, we hear from Heather McGhee of Demos. She sees a direct connection between today’s extreme inequality and this peak moment of racial panic and white anxiety.

This is an episode of the Bioneers: Revolution from the Heart of Nature series. Visit the radio and podcast homepage to find out how to hear the program on your local station and how to subscribe to the podcast.

Aligning business with biology, disruptive design uses systems thinking to create models that show what “good” really looks like. Two winners of the 2012 Buckminster Fuller Challenge Award—visionary architect Jason McLennan of the acclaimed Living Building Challenge and entrepreneur Cheryl Dahle of The Future of Fish—demonstrate breakthrough systems designs that can transform major industries, create a healthy sustainable environment and make life beautiful and fun.

This is an episode of the Bioneers: Revolution from the Heart of Nature series. Visit the radio and podcast homepage to find out how to hear the program on your local station and how to subscribe to the podcast.

Labor organizer and Founder of One Fair Wage, Saru Jayaraman, takes us inside one of the fiercest labor struggles to challenge a mighty oligarchy: The food, beverage and restaurant industry. Workers are walking off the job and refusing historically low wages. She says if “we the people” stand with workers as they face this powerful lobby, they can win.

Featuring

Saru Jayaraman, President of One Fair Wage and Director of the Food Labor Research Center at UC Berkeley, co-founded (after 9/11) the Restaurant Opportunities Center (ROC), which grew into a national movement of restaurant workers, employers and consumers. Saru has won many prestigious awards for her advocacy and is the author of four books including: One Fair Wage: Ending All Subminimum Pay in America and Bite Back: People Taking on Corporate Food and Winning.

Resources

Saru Jayaraman – The Great Revolution: What A Worker Power Moment Can Mean for Climate Justice | Bioneers 2023 Keynote

Saru Jayaraman – We the People: Workers Rising for Fair Wages | Bioneers 2017 Keynote

This is an episode of the Bioneers: Revolution from the Heart of Nature series. Visit the radio and podcast homepage to find out how to hear the program on your local station and how to subscribe to the podcast.

What we do to each other, we do to the Earth. To protect our common home, we’re being called upon to bridge our differences to create beloved community and peaceful coexistence. A new generation of visionary change-makers is reframing the race conversation, and designing new tools to transform our unconscious biases and create justice. With: Racial justice pathfinders Rinku Sen, Saru Jayaraman and Malkia Cyril.

This is an episode of the Bioneers: Revolution from the Heart of Nature series. Visit the radio and podcast homepage to learn more.

After World War II, the U.S. government worked with industry to create a single-use, disposable consumer culture as a way to ensure ongoing market prosperity. Who benefited? Consumer product companies like Coca-Cola, and the fossil fuel industry, whose petrochemicals are at the source. The result? Plastic pollution is now found in virtually every living organism – including humans – and is one of the worst threats to ocean ecosystems. Now, a global resistance movement is rising to abolish petrochemical plastics and to shift to a zero-waste, circular economy. With: Anna Cummins, Deputy Director and Co-Founder of the Five Gyres Institute.

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This is an episode of the Bioneers: Revolution from the Heart of Nature series. Visit the radio and podcast homepage to find out how to hear the program on your local station and how to subscribe to the podcast.

Youth movements are rising to restore people and planet. De’Anthony Jones, a former President of the Environmental Students Organization at Sacramento State, Chloe Maxmin, co-founder of Divest Harvard, and Xiuhtezcatl Martinez, hip-hop artist and Youth Director of Earth Guardians, say there’s no better time to be born than now because this generation gets to rewrite history. It could be known as the generation that brought forth a healthy, just, sustainable world for every generation to come.

This is an episode of the Bioneers: Revolution from the Heart of Nature series. Visit the radio and podcast homepage to find out how to hear the program on your local station and how to subscribe to the podcast.