Integritus Prime

I’ve been noticing a lot of well-meaning efforts to help people, building on my post last week about service. Many of us want to do the right thing. In fact, it’s a strong motivator for human beings in general.

However, when we engage in helping people, often we don’t think broadly about the impacts of our actions. Examples:

• A local climate change institute was spreading the news about a special meal deal for university students – hot dogs and soda – by a neighboring junk food establishment.
• A fundraising drive for bike safety was serving hot dogs
• Another fundraiser was serving hotdogs to athletes
• A nonprofit that that works on diabetes prevention and control promotes and serves meat, and red meat and poultry is known to increase the risk of type 2 diabetes by a whopping 48%.

These examples are cringe-worthy for a few reasons. First of all, since when did hot dogs become a staple Fijian food? Eeek! Secondly, a climate change institute supporting processed meat is like a doctor promoting smoking. Processed meat is a known carcinogen and red meat is a huge contributor to climate change. Ouch. Thirdly, why would we want to encourage bikers, who are doing the climate movement, air quality, and their bodies a favor by riding their bicycles, to destroy their bodies with carcinogenic hot dogs. Don’t even get me started on the refined carbohydrates in the hot dog bun! Fourth point – why would an organization that is working on diabetes and stress reduction, as well as climate change and food security, encourage meat consumption, knowing it to be a carcinogen, a risk factor for diabetes, AND a contributor to greenhouse gas emissions?

The reason is linear thinking. We serve the meat because it’s local or traditional and a social norm. We serve hot dogs because they are trendy. We are contributing to the risk of cancers, and to global warming, and instilling negative eating habits for children and adults. Time to think more holistically.

The climate crisis is global and worsening as we speak, and we have a well-known lifestyle disease crisis in Fiji – people are dying of diabetes and heart disease. Obesity is on the rise. And the food of choice at do-gooding events are contributing to that crisis. The least we can do is be mindful of how we do good – by doing well, as my late mentor Steve used to advise.

Here are four tips for how to live, work, and conduct community service in a more integrated way so that we don’t cause harm with the best of intentions:

1. Evaluate the task or event itself: Is it inherently a “good” i.e. non-harmful task or event? Let’s take the bike safety event. Is bike safety a good thing? Yeah! OK, let’s do it.
2. Assess the logistics and services being offered: Is the venue accessible by bike or will everyone need to drive to it? Advertise the bike routes and bus options! Are you serving hot dogs (eeek)? How about serving fruit and filtered water? Is your corporate sponsor willing to not only sponsor but change its own behavior in terms of its own staff’s biking safety? Ask and advocate!
3. Look at the life cycle of the event or task or product: Are you giving away plastic promotional items made in China? What is the carbon footprint of that? How about switching to locally-made products that support women and children? Is there a nearby caterer you could use instead of the one on the other side of the city? Do they have plant-based (low-carbon) options?
4. Add something that does better than just good: Ask the local bike shops to come and offer free repairs or discounted bicycles, and teach bike safety to children. Make it a community event by inviting families to bring healthy food to share, thereby solving the hot dog issue altogether. Expanding your focus helps more people feel connected to the cause too. Be inclusive.

As we begin to think more holistically and take an integrated approach to everything we do, we can further reduce our harmful impact on each other, and the planet as a whole. Otherwise, we’re engaging in hypocrisy and wasted efforts, no matter how good our intentions.

Of course, there are limits to what we can achieve, but the more we think integratively, the better we can do. And, we can sleep better at night knowing we did our best.

If you like where this is heading, contact me and let’s discuss what you’re working on that needs integrating.