As the person who runs Joshua’s Trust’s social media, I have found it difficult to figure out how to address the pain, the fight, and the small steps toward change that have happened over the past week throughout our country. I’m not even sure I’ll be able to articulate what I hope to convey in this blog. And I’m not sure that as a land trust with few people of color involved, we are the best to be speaking on racism.
Everyone in our nation has been invited to take a step back and examine their own racial biases and organizations must ask themselves what more they can do to create an environment where Black Lives Matter. Joshua’s Trust is not excused from this invitation because of our lack of diversity. We are not excused from our responsibility to ensure that people of color are involved in community conservation. Because true community conservation requires that everyone in the community has a space at the table: black, latinx, white, and that means that everyone deserves equal right to enjoy the beauty, the serenity, the health benefits, that natural spaces have to offer.
Though that may be the way it should be, that’s not what many people of color have experienced while enjoying a hike. I’ve said enough, I would now like to link you to the stories of black men and women and their experiences, because if you are white like me, you may not even realize the privilege you have to walk into the woods without fear.
How to Deal with Racism Outdoors – Leah Keinama Hasse
We’re Here. You Just Don’t See Us – Latria Graham
‘Bad things happen in the woods’: the Anxiety of Hiking While Black
~ Kailyn Murphy
I encourage you to read “The Unlikely thru Hiker” by Derick Lugo, the recollections of a man of color with dreadlocks hiking the AT. It is amusing , warm, sensitive—and reassuring in view of the comments in the referenced articles. Carl Lindquist
I love to hike, but as an older woman I never feel completely safe. Because I like to hike in silence to best hear nature around me, It’s rare I do hike any more. Sad.