Last Saturday we saw “An Inconvenient Truth” with a crowd of perhaps 5,000 people in Los Angeles*.  It was an outdoor screening, a free show, a merging of the L.A. Film Festival and the Grand Performances summer concert series.

The fact that a film of this topic has captured the public’s attention sufficiently to draw a crowd of that size is indeed Positive Environmental News.

The fact that this crowd is from L.A. - the heart of “… the billion or so middle-class people across the planet who, more than the numerically few rich, consume the vast bulk of the planet’s resources”** - is powerful Positive Environmental News.  The fact that L.A. Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and council member Jan Perry were celebrity presenters at the screening is further hope for real changes within this city.

The fact that the L.A. Times and its Sunday insert Parade Magazine each carried a front page article on global warming the next day, is thrilling Positive Environmental News.  The issue is now openly discussed.

For those of you who have seen the movie, and for whom the silently rolling credits were insufficient answer to “What Can I Do?”, I offer these links:

What Can I Do?

Legacy: A Story of Hope

There is a tremendous amount we can do and we must do.  Come join us.

*concert organizers later estimated the viewing crowd at approx. 5,000 while the numbers of people turned away at barricades were another 5-6,000

**quote is from David Holmgren, Permaculture: Principles and Pathways Beyond Sustainability