"Save What You Love," a TED Talk by Jonathan Franzen

Franzen's most important ideas from the talk

• bird habitats are in trouble

• mainstream environmental movement gave up because climate got most attention

• if we don’t save what’s left of the natural world, it doesn’t matter what happens to the climate

• motivations for climate fight: guilt, fear, self-righteous anger; caring about nature used to come from a place of love

• we’re free of monolithic obsession over the climate issue, therefore we can focus on all the other things that matter: strengthening the ecosystems we still have against human threats that we can do something about.

• we need resilient communities/nations who can handle climate shocks

What do I think of Franzen's solution to the crisis?

• Franzen’s solution of strengthening societal resiliency is an unorthodox yet entirely realistic solution to the climate crisis. Changing the world’s infrastructure to prevent climate change is difficult and cannot happen quickly enough to make enough of an impact, therefore we have to accept the damage we’ve done. Regardless, we can prepare ourselves to survive the coming change

How can I use any of Franzen's ideas, either from "Birds Matter" or "Save What You Love" for my own upcoming advocacy project?

• Although human intervention comes in many harmful forms (specifically rodenticide use for my advocacy project), we as humans hold incredible potential to help any ecosystem or species thrive. We can devote so many resources & so much time to any animal or ecosystem that we choose.

• Owls aren’t extinct yet, therefore we can keep building nests for them, to ‘employ’ them as natural anti-rodent pest control.

• I resonate with Franzen’s emotional connection to birds in “Birds Matter.” Seeing an owl makes me genuinely happy because of how rare they are. Given that I rarely see owls, every owl that an ecosystem loses due to preventable human intervention has a higher impact on owls as a species than, say, a single dead ant. There’s simply less owls, therefore anthropogenic harm has a higher chance of rendering one or more owl species extinct. They should be cherished as a symbol of nature’s beauty and natural ecosystem management (pest control in human terms). Owl conservation efforts must come from a deep love for nature, not guilt, fear, or self-righteous anger.