FAQs

What is copywriting?

Copywriting is the practice of writing to promote action. Most of the writing we see in the world isn’t content, it’s actually copy.

-Ads, emails, case studies, websites, podcasts, you name it.

-Anything that has been written to give the reader a call to action, whether it’s to subscribe, volunteer, attend an event, purchase a product or service, etc.

Including informative, authentic copy into your organization’s marketing strategy will help you build connection with your audience, promote your organization, and creates returning clients

What is intersectionality?

Intersectionality refers to the analytical concept that different aspects of our identities are “roads” that intersect with each other. Some of your roads will be on the privileged side, and some will be on the disadvantaged side.

So for instance, black women have an intersection at gender and race that many people do not experience: living within laws and systems that suppress both black people as well as women.

-White women experience white privilege and gender discrimination

-Black men experience gender privilege and racism

The goal with approaching problems with intersectionality is to look at social issues through multiple lenses so the problem can be solved for everybody.

For example, medical textbooks have historically only shown pictures of diseases on white skin/white bodies. This has contributed to medical racism because people with dark skin will be misdiagnosed or even ignored more frequently than people with light skin, and the consequences can be fatal.

Intersections can get really complex when you take more aspects of your identity into consideration.

  • Are you apart of the dominant religion in your country?

  • Are you wealthy?

  • Are you cisgender? (Do you identify as the same gender you were assigned at birth?)

  • Is English your first language?

  • Are you able-bodied?

Because a person living in the United States who is white, cisgender, heterosexual, Christian, wealthy, English speaking, and abled bodied is going to have a MUCH easier time navigating life in the United States than someone who is native American, transgender, gay, not Christian, poor, not English speaking, and physically disabled.

The first person will have an easier time

  • voting

  • buying guns

  • attending college

  • affording healthcare

  • surviving interactions with police

  • avoiding prison

    to name a few

Long story short, intersectional analysis is important because it saves lives and solves root causes of problems from multiple angles. We live in a society with many imbalances in power, we need to take that into consideration while we’re out there making the world a better place.

What is environmental justice?

Jumping from the analytical concept of intersectionality, environmental justice is based on the idea that environmentalism has historically been organized through a very white-washed lens. This means that most environmental organizations are run by white people, and most environmental issues have been tackled through knowledge produced by white people.

A few consequences of this include:

  • Trash incinerating sites are systemically located near black and brown communities

  • Local parks and access points to nature are systemically located near white and wealthy neighborhoods and are scarce in poorer and more diverse neighborhoods

  • National parks exist on land that was taken away from native people (and were initially designed for white people to enjoy —> read about the history of the Sierra Club here)

  • Focus of environmentalism is often on human enjoyment of nature instead of health of ecosystems or other species

So, environmental justice could be defined as a form of environmentalism that utilizes an intersectional lens to approach environmental issues.

How is climate justice different than environmental justice?

The two terms exist within the same topic, but climate justice is more specific to issues directly related to climate change and global warming.

Examples include:

  • Rising water levels

  • Increasing frequency of wildfires

  • Access to food being reduced to do climate change

    • crop shortages due to drought from higher temperatures

    • irregular weather patterns/storms