Clare, I really love your point about curiosity! This class has taught and encouraged us to dig deep into our values and dream big on our vision for a sustainable future. A certain amount of curiosity about how the world works, and we can make it better is definitely needed to answer these big questions.

Thanks for sharing Sarah. I strongly relate to the idea of being vulnerable. In most academic settings, validation is important for people who are aspired to be successful. However, that mentality had impeded me (and I believe most people) from speaking about my true values. I really appreciate the environment this class has provided us to unleash our values in a judge-free environment.

Suragan, thank you for having an open-mind coming to this class. I am glad that the course has inspired you to be aware of and campaign for systemic environmental issues. Keep up the good work!

Hi Sharon! I love your reflection (and the cute bunny gif)! I relate to your sentiment of being nervous about the class at the beginning because it is so different from the other classes I have taken. I ended up really liking it because of the judged-free space to share and generate ideas.

Amazing reflection Matin! I really love your reflection on being mindful at how your individual actions can impact systemic changes. I've enjoyed hearing you share your insights in class. Keep up the good work!

I love this post Megan! The urban planner in me is geeking out right now! Urban planning can totally change the sustainability of the city to both urban wildlife and human connection to nature. Additionally, some of these "urban wildlife" actually plays a key role in maintaining the ecological balance in the city. For example, racoons and coyote can control populations of rats and other pests. Integration of urban area and "wildlife" habitat is totally possible. One great local example is the wetland ecosystem in Hinge park at False Creek: the ecosystem has even attracted a population of beavers to the area (Even though the city starts putting on chicken wires on the trees so the beavers can't chew through them).

Thank you for your post Sofia! I do think that death care, unlike a lot of other environmental issues, is so rarely talked about, mostly because of the taboo surrounded by the issue. Therefore, I totally agree with you that awareness is key regarding greener death care choices. As mentioned in the eco-death video, people will choose greener death care options like aquamation when it is available. Of course, the fighting for legality is also important so we can have these options available to us.

Thank you for the post Declan. Your post reminded me a lot of one of my urban geography classes, where are talk about the inherent rift between humans and nature in a lot of modern urbanized societies. There are certain things deemed as "good nature" that have to be kept (eg bees and birds, or even the Kentucky Bluegrass on your lawn), and there are the "bad nature" that needed to be tamed (eg the "weedy" clovers on your lawn and coyotes). In my opinion, the biggest part of rewilding involves a change in mindset, to embrace human society and nature as one big system. You don't have to tear down cities in order to "rewild" a place. If you are interested, I recommend giving Sarah Church's article on urban bioregionalism a read, where she touches on connecting environment with urban development.

Great post Sophia! I totally agree with you on the need to shift our value regarding death, and a bigger picture of socio-ecological relationship between human and nature. I love your interpretation of death as a beginning of a beautiful cycle of life rather a tragic ending. I believe with a death positive mindset and a shift in valuing the legacy of a person as nourishing other lives rather than being a "forever corpse.", our current death care practises can change to be more sustainable.

I love your post Sarah! The COVID lockdown does make a lot of people reflect on our co-existence with animals. I love the range of solutions you have. Another piece I will add is the need of ideological changes on the relationship between humans and animals. Nature and social should be discussed as one single connected system, rather than 2 different systems. We as humans have to embrace that we are co-existing with different plants and animals.

I love the wide range of innovative strategies you got there Declan! The bottom line is, regulation is IMPORTANT. We need to have society where using plastic is way more expensive that reusing glass and other types of inert containers (which it is but the price is not reflected on the price tag). We need to normalize reusing glass containers and phase out plastic.

Totally agree with you Irina! Extended Producer Responsibility is very important. Companies have been getting away from producing more plastics by putting the responsibility of "recycling" onto consumers. (I recently learn that a lot of recycling ads are actually sponsored by big corporations.) Corporations have to take back their own trash!!!

Love you list of ideas! In particular you mentioning composting facilities. Currently, a lot of compostable plastics has to be composted in certain facilities. You can't just put them into the green bin. It will be great of these special facilities are more accessible.

Thanks for sharing Christopher! I really love the deposit-free system of Vytal. UBC (and I think some cafes in Vancouver) does have a mugshare system where your pay a $5 deposit for a reusable cup, and you get your $5 back when you return it. But the few times I used it I got stares for people. I wish these kinds of system is normalized (and the ones who use deposable will get stares).

Thanks for the post Shanzeh. I was also shocked to learn about the toxicity of receipts. Not only are they toxic, they are also non-recyclable. I know a lot of people think of receipts as paper and put them into the paper recycling (wish-cycle is another issue to discuss). You are right! Raising awareness is key about this issue because a lot people don't know how bad they are. And I really hope businesses will phase out the practise of giving out receipts.

I agree with you Ravleen. Capitalism and neoliberalism are systems that distributes wealth in an equal way, making the rich richer and the poor poorer. For sure taxing the rich fully (aka closing loopholes and stopping this tax free donation bs) and use that money for the public good. With strong environmental laws and competency of the government to enforce them, the environment destroyed by these rich people/companies can hopefully be restored.

Thanks for the post Philip. Although I don't believe most business decisions is driven by actions of NGOs, I do think this is an interesting topic to discuss. Part of the problem is human psychology. There is saying "You can't shame the shameless". Big TNCs like Walmart is hard to target because of their power, so they go for somebody what will likely listen. I think the satisfaction of successfully calling out someone drives a lot of activism circle. Just like "cancel culture", you can shame the Trumps of the world so you go for some generally good person who might have tweeted something racist 10 years ago. (Can you tell I spend a lot of time online haha). To fix this, we have to notices the problem and actively change our values.

Thank you for your post Maria. This post reminded me the disgust I felt when Jeff Bezos donated for COVID-19 relief during the height of the pandemic, in contrast to the exploitation of Amazon workers at the time (and probably now). Bezos is one of the billionaires that have benefitted from the pandemic. And he chose to donate a tiny portion of his wealth to COVID relief rather than paying all his taxes or pay Amazon worker better. This is NOT Philanthropy. Billionaires cannot get away with the anymore

Thank you for your post Sophia. I have been learning about capitalism and the systematic harms it has brought to our society. However, I have never connected it to individualism. Now I think about it, the main mechanism of capitalism is exploiting the poor and put that wealth into rich people's pockets. The system is optimize individual wealth and happiness rather than a collective good. Nevertheless, capitalism has been ingrained into our society and to change it requires a change in value. I do think a lot of people are realizing the fundamental flaws of capitalism and are willing to change. I agree B-corp is a good start, and it is also a way to show society the possibility to value collective good.

I agree with you Anna. Greenwashing is a big problem under a society where companies strategize with profile in mind rather than social good. It doesn't help that companies that are actually doing good are at the line of fire from NGOs. I really like your idea of intervention. I feel like it will be more effective if there is a regulation that require companies to have such as department.