Insights: How to Change Peoples’ Minds - Part 1
Discussing activism with Wave Wahines founder and Surfers Against Sewage EDI Manager Yvette Curtis, and Fellow of the Institute of Actuaries (and POW UK founder) Sandy Trust.
If you’re new here - welcome! I appear to have picked up a lot of new subscribers during my brief summer hiatus. If you’re wondering what all this is about, Looking Sideways is where I examine the creative life through the lens of surfing, skateboarding, snowboarding and other related endeavours.
Looking Sideways started out as a podcast back in 2017, and these days has evolved to encompass books, live events, documentaries (try my critically-acclaimed three-parter The Announcement, which delved into Patagonia’s decision to make ‘Earth’ the company’s only shareholder), blogs, guest posts, and my vibrant and fiercely-loyal vibrant paid Insights community (find out more here).
Free subscribers receive my weekly 10 Things newsletter, my regular Looking Sideways and Announcement podcast episodes, and some of the Insights content and guest posts, like this one.
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By far the most common question I get asked when I’m being interviewed about Looking Sideways is: what have you learned?
And one slightly unfashionable answer is: that people find it incredibly difficult to change their minds or be challenged on their perspective.
About…well, anything.
Think about it. When was the last time you ACTUALLY changed your mind? And I don’t mean about what to have for dinner tonight. I mean about something significant.
When was the last time you parked your own ego and preconceptions, listened to and engaged with a challenging counterpoint, and then used this experience to change your own position? Rather than reacting defensively and then doubling down?
Tricky one, isn’t it? (And if you can think of anything, I’d love to hear from you in the comment section).
Making this podcast has taught me that changing our minds is something humans seem to find almost impossible - especially at this particular moment, with the algorithm seductively buttressing our own worldview with endless streams of subtly self-perpetuating content, making us all ever more resistant to logic, reason or challenge.
(This is why, on one level, I found Malcolm Gladwell’s recent retraction of his previous position on trans participation in sport to be so striking; whatever your position on his views, it is, at this point, very rare to hear a public figure admit they’ve changed their mind on any issue of note).
Anyway, I’ve been reminded of all this yet again this summer, as I’ve observed some of the ongoing responses to The Big Sea, the globally-renowned documentary about the environmental impact of neoprene made by my friends Demi Taylor, Chris Nelson and Lewis Arnold.
To me, the ‘point’ of The Big Sea is actually extremely simple: that the neoprene issue is one of the very rare occasions that we as surf consumers have the chance to exert moral pressure, and push for positive change, in a really straightforward, non-contradictory way.
To summarise: buying and wearing a neoprene wetsuit contributes to a harmful socio-political situation. There are readily available, affordable and sustainable alternatives at hand that work just as well. Our collective consumer muscle could help initiate significant change, and prove the case that surfing CAN be a genuine vehicle for change.
That’s basically it.
But of course the world, and especially the internet, isn’t that simple.
Because while the film has garnered plaudits from festivals around the world (among others: Best Film or Grand Jury prizes at Milan, Noosa, San Francisco and Brest; selection for the New Orleans Film Festival), there’s been a somewhat different response from certain sectors of the surf industry.
And, as ever in the action sports world, plenty of surf industry insiders and commentators have responded to the moral challenge at the heart of the documentary by attempting to pretend the conversation isn’t happening.
Or by completely doubling down on their existing position - and in the process unwittingly advertising the fact that they’re light years behind the pace of the real world debate on these issues.
(The irony, of course, is that by trying to undermine or even just ignore The Big Sea’s message in this crude way, these commentators have instead confirmed another of the film’s key points: that there is a gaping moral vacuum at the heart of most surf industry conversations around ‘purpose’ - but that’s another story).
“The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.” - Martin Luther King
This tendency is why whenever I’ve seen seemingly sensible people respond to the film by resorting to clunky, obviously transparent rhetorical devices such as whataboutery and moral equivalence, I’ve found it difficult to keep a straight face.
In the real world, that approach is so regularly dismantled that I find it baffling that anybody would voluntarily choose to telegraph their own fundamental lack of seriousness in this way.
Plus, personally, I tend to towards the MLK thesis, above. Otherwise, what’s the point?
Especially as it seems pretty evident to me that the type of ‘imperfect’ activism (to use a phrase du jour) that The Big Sea advocates IS a significant catalyst for societal change.
To take three pretty obvious examples: such activism means women have the vote, that the triangular slave trade no longer exists, and that international whaling has been largely eradicated.
I’m speculating, but were the people involved in the campaign to, say, stop kids working down coal mines, also coming up against moustache-twirling, Victorian-era Reply Guy bellends, gleefully pointing out that because they also use coal, their position on child labour was somehow hypocritical?
I think we all know the answer to that one.
The wider point, as you’ll be aware if you’ve given this topic any serious thought, is that attempting to be sustainable and mindful amid the consumerist hellscape we all live and operate in is a constant series of insidious, unpleasant moral trade-offs.
Personally, I’d rather spend my time understanding how I can achieve my own moral equilibrium in the face of this reality, rather than engage in a pointless conversation with somebody who hasn’t paid the debate the compliment of at least understanding the terms of the argument.
Trying to find our own answer to these ongoing ethical questions is one reason why my wife and I are currently spending half the year trying to become self-sufficient on a patch of clay in northern France.
It’s why, when a neoprene brand got in touch to ask my agency All Conditions Media if we’d help promote their boots through the UK surf community earlier this summer, we said no.
It’s also why I made my series Type 2 and The Announcement (which is basically about this very topic); and why supporting my community through the weekly 10 Things email is such a big part of Looking Sideways.
And it’s why the straightforward case made in The Big Sea seemed to me to be such a rare moment of achievable moral clarity.
So yes, with all that in mind, I’ve found some of the responses to the Big Sea to be an instructive reminder of how practically impossible it is to get anybody to change their position: however progressive they think they are, whatever the evidence, or however compelling the argument.
As you can probably tell, I’ve been thinking about this all summer.
And it’s why, for this new two-part Insights series, I decided to speak to four people involved in what you might call ‘activism’ about the business of changing minds.
Among the questions I was interested in understanding:
How DO you actually implement change on an issue you purport to care about?
Are we morally obliged to speak out on certain topics?
What drives them to dedicate their lives to their chosen causes?
And how do you go about getting people to engage in a way that involves more than just sharing something on Insta Stories?
Here’s Part 1, with Wave Wahines founder and Surfers Against Sewage EDI Manager Yvette Curtis, and Fellow of the Institute of Actuaries (and POW UK founder) Sandy Trust, which is free-to-read for all.
The next instalment, with Calum Macintyre and Linzi Hawkin, will be for Insights subscribers only.
1. Yvette Curtis
How do you describe what you do?
I usually just say I'm Wave Wahines surf club founder, and an Equity, Diversity & Inclusion Manager.
If in a broader context, I say that I raise awareness around the ways different communities are excluded.
Or put even more simply - I ruffle feathers!
How long have you been doing this?
Probably longer than I realise. I’ve seldom been one to sit on the sidelines when I see something that I fundamentally disagree with, such as sexism, racism or homophobia.
If you mean in the way people associate me with raising my voice about the lack of people of colour in the UK in surfing and ocean spaces - then probably the past eight years in total, although more assertively in the last five.
So I guess highlighting stuff in the public arena is fairly new to me. Usually it would have been very private, and just within my community. Now I definitely feel more pressure - but also a responsibility, as so few people are really acting on this stuff.
What inspired you to follow this path?
My parents! A few years ago I called out the clear lack of people from diverse ethnic backgrounds in UK surfing, and suffered some crappy trolling. It led to me having had the biggest conversation on these topics that I’ve ever around with my dad.
We discussed the things both him and my mum have endured over the years, and how he’d been unable to speak out; a result of the systems that have been actively designed to work against a man of his skin colour.
I realised that, in this day and age, I could speak with confidence.
And that if I wanted to help break a cycle of systems that is ultimately designed to exclude and divide, I’d have to put my own hat in the ring. What was my motivation? Really to try and ensure that things will be better when my own children grow up!
Deciding to speak up is one thing, but at the beginning I didn’t really know how to say what I wanted. I think I was lucky that, in the early days, a few people listened to what I was saying, and gave me the platform to begin to explore my own views on these issues.
Without this, I think it would have been even more difficult to find my voice. Having somebody you look up to put faith in you really boosted my confidence, and helped me feel that it was safe for me to speak up.
So often it’s not just as easy as making the decision. You also need to feel safe, and have the support to follow up on that initial decision.
Is it your full-time job?
My paid job is Equity, Diversity & Inclusion Manager for Surfers Against Sewage. Being a parent is the heart and soul one, while my surf club Wave Wahines is the one that forms every decision, as it's absolutely at the heart of what I do.
What are you trying to achieve?
I want to see more people like me, from diverse ethnic backgrounds, in surfing spaces at all levels; and in ocean advocacy, activism and conservation spaces at all levels.
It's changed my life entirely for the better and has given me such a connection to my heritage, and the watery world we live in, that I struggle to understand how it is still such an exclusive space.
Actually, that isn’t true; I know why it is. But I want to change this, so that more people can feel the joy, connection and sense of protection that I do.
What is the most effective way of changing somebody’s mind?
For me, it's empathy. Understanding other peoples’ experiences, what their priorities are, and how you can meet them in their space.
We expect people to come to us, but the reality is, only those in a certain area will find you that way.
Make the effort, learn, listen, have empathy and ALWAYS be aware of the privilege you may hold.
“Accept that not everyone will change their mind. And that's ok, too. Maybe they’ll reflect on the exchange of views, and to talk about them with somebody it does have an impact on. But the key words are empathy, privilege and listening”.
How do you respond to the classic ‘You fly, so you’re a hypocrite, so who are you to try and get me to change my mind?’ whataboutery argument?
I hate whataboutery. This stuff is not that binary, and trying to deflect and imply you need to be perfect to have a viewpoint is utter crap, and really a politician-style way of not actually having a proper discussion about a topic.
I usually just say, ‘That's just avoiding what I want to talk about - I'm talking about X not Y, and whataboutery isn't going to change the conversation'.
It's the typical ‘All Lives Matter' deflection, and it just doesn't hold with me any more.
Do you think people are morally obliged to speak out on certain topics?
I think if they are safe and have the ability and confidence to do so - then YES!
But I think this question is really dependent on privilege, if I'm honest. I speak out on a lot of things now; more so than I would have previously, because I feel more confident, and I feel able.
But sometimes, if it's a topic that I have raised so many times before (which is increasingly the case), it becomes exhausting.
“Sometimes I just want to hear from an ally, who perhaps isn't impacted in the same way I am by the topic, but has power in their privilege to raise their voice. Safety is the consideration on this, and knowing what being an active ally is as well”.
What's the thing you worry about most when it comes to your work?
My family. Race, gender and LGBTQIA+ issues are all quite polarising topics, and can lead to pretty gross online abuse and comments.
So I always worry that my family read will them and be affected. Or, even worse, be accosted in person, or teased for what their mum/wife does.
I stood outside a building that was hosting a Reform meeting as a protest by presence with my local Stand Up To Racism. Standing up for these things can put my safety at risk but the potential fear that it will affect my family will always be my primary concern.
What’s your proudest achievement?
Probably my children, and how they talk about diversity of identities. It makes me really proud to hear their views, and it gives me hope that there could be a better future for people and planet.
In a professional context, my proudest moment has just happened. After so many years of discussing and raising the topic around ethnic diversity, surfing and ocean advocacy, I have just been awarded a Churchill Fellowship to learn more about this topic and bring that learning back to the UK.
I became a mum at 22 and left college with one A-Level, so to have such a prestigious organisation say, ‘We think you are the right person, with the right skills to do this work that will have drive real change - and we believe you can do it’ has given me real validation.
What’s your most disappointing experience?
That's really tough, as I am pretty hard on myself at times. I applied to work with British Surfing and advise on their EDI but wasn’t successful. That was really hard to get past, and knocked my confidence and faith in myself. But what I realised is my most disappointing moments come when I don’t believe I’m good enough, or that I deserve to be here. So I try and remember that.
What's your advice for anybody hoping to do what you do?
Ha, well I got here in such a crazy and life-based way. It was definitely never an active career choice. It was something I was exposed to and totally consumed me and still does, so I guess I would say do it for the right reason.
I definitely care about what I'm campaigning and calling for; it's the absolute core of me, so I know I am here for authentic reasons. Staying true to yourself and your beliefs is so important.
What have you learned?
That we all have value. The importance of being honest about what you're doing and why you’re doing it.
“There are different paths to the same destination, so if yours isn't the same as others, that's ok. The biggest lesson of all is to remember: ‘I’m enough, and I deserve to be here’.”
2. Sandy Trust
How do you describe what you do?
As Director of Sustainability Risk at Baillie Gifford, I try to bring people together to create system-level interventions.
I work in financial services, so am lucky enough to be able to reach and work with a wide range of actors that includes pension schemes, insurance companies, occasionally policymakers, and others.
Current initiatives are Planetary Solvency in partnership with Tim Lenton down at Exeter University, and Transition Finance Scotland, a new entity we’ve created to look at solving the various problems that exist around financing the energy transition.
I’ve previously worked in the charitable sector and set up the UK branch of climate action charity Protect Our Winters.
How long have you been doing this?
10 years. In 2016 I read a report called Climate Change – A risk assessment which was (in hindsight) an incredibly far-sighted and strategic piece of British diplomacy to accelerate climate action in India and China; Downing Street having rightly concluded that unless those two countries were moving it would be virtually impossible to succeed in stabilising the climate.
It was a collaboration between the UK, US, Indian and Chinese governments that looked at risks, rather than science, and anecdotally it was very influential at a policy level.
Anyhow, I read that after I volunteered for the actuarial profession’s Sustainability Board, and it changed my life.
It became very clear to me that climate change was a huge threat and that we were in much more trouble than was broadly realised. Sadly, I still think this is true.
What inspired you to follow this path?
One reason was it seemed stunningly stupid and short-sighted to just blindly accept all the risks that are coming our way from climate change. I felt that if we could communicate the risks more effectively to decision makers, we might see better risk-informed decisions.
“The other reason was because my kids were two and four when I first learned properly about climate change. I became quite depressed and would say I went through a grief cycle. It was clear to me that this was the most important issue I could work on if I wanted them to have a future. I see it as part of being a father”.
Is it your full-time job?
Yes. I’ve had a career of two halves (post a short interlude in the Alps after Uni). The first half was as a traditional insurance actuary, then in the second half I moved into the sustainability space.
Initially it was quite tough making the transition to sustainability as climate change really wasn’t my job. But I was lucky enough to be backed by Sacha Romanovitch at Grant Thornton and Gareth Mee at EY, a couple of fantastic bosses and organisations who wanted to get into this space, and which gave me the opportunity to build my experience in this area.
What are you trying to you achieve?
My eleven year-old daughter easily understands that we’re part of nature, and that the substrate we exist in is the biosphere – that thin layer on the outside of the Earth which is the only place we know of where life exists, and which is about as thick as an apple skin.
And yet for whatever reason, in western society we’re used to thinking of ourselves as separate from nature, despite the fact that nature is our life support system. It provides our air, food, water, the raw materials for our economy, our energy; the list goes on.
“We mess with it at our peril. We need a shift in human consciousness, a Galilean-level mindset shift that enables us to remember these fundamental facts, and wonder anew at the anti-entropic miracle that is life on Earth”.
And this new understanding needs to flow into how we run things - our economic system, our rules and regulations – so we can re-establish a balance with nature and stabilise the climate.
What is the most effective way of changing somebody’s mind?
I’m not a psychologist. But love, greed and fear are all powerful motivators. We need to speak to people in their language, on the issues they care about, and help them to see that a majority of people want a stable climate. So, for example, speak around migration, inflation, growth or whatever the hot button topic is.
But we are a storytelling species, and once a story is embedded people’s minds it can be stunningly difficult to change, even when stark facts are presented to them.
So we also need to find trusted messengers who can tell a new story for people to believe. This is part of what we tried to do with Protect Our Winters UK – working with credible athletes and brands.
How do you respond to the classic ‘You fly, so you’re a hypocrite, so who are you to try and get me to change my mind?’ whataboutery argument?
I usually start with plastics and the story of the Crying Indian advert. In the 1950s, US Congress first started asking questions about what was going to happen with all the plastic.
The plastics industry saw this as a threat and created some nice sounding NGOs (eg Keep America Beautiful or similar), through which they were able to very successfully change the narrative from ‘this is a societal problem that policy needs to solve’ to ‘this is a personal lifestyle choice, and people need to recycle’.
This playbook has been copied by the oil and gas industry, who very successfully planted the message that the entire story is all about personal lifestyle choices. Few people realise this, and they’re generally quite surprised when they find out.
To be clear, we don’t have lots of wind power in Britain because we as consumers decided we wanted it. It was government policy.
Similarly, EV adoption in Norway is high because government policy made them cheap – driven by a big campaign backed by A-ha back in the day.
So, of course, we should all live examined lives and make the positive choices we can. But this is ultimately a conversation about systems change. So I tell people to let go of their guilt, make the positive choices they can, and think about how they can lean into systems change.
Do you think people are morally obliged to speak out on certain topics?
Yes. The famous quote on this is ‘The only way for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing.’
I’m not sure it’s that simple, but if people don’t speak out, vote, or take five minutes to write to their MP, then nothing will change. All the big forward steps in society have been bitterly fought for. Stabilising the climate and getting back in balance with nature is no different.
That doesn’t mean it’ll be easy – particularly when vested interests continue to peddle a very individualistic message, which is amplified more than ever by social media.
What's the thing you worry about most when it comes to your work?
That we are too late. That we have passed a tipping point on the way to a radically different climate future; a Mad Max world in which remnants of humanity battle for survival on an increasingly hostile (to human life) planet.
That we create so much pollution and mess on our way down that we drive the sixth mass extinction and exterminate most higher order life on the planet.
What’s your proudest achievement?
Collaborating with leading Earth system scientists to bring together the deep understanding of risk with the risk expertise of actuaries.
We’ve written a series of papers which are starting to get traction with a range of influential stakeholders, such as ministries of finance.
We’ve recently created the concept of Planetary Solvency – essentially learning to drive the planet like we own it, not like we stole it. Or put another way, a dashboard to help us live within Planetary Boundaries.
What’s your most disappointing experience?
Half my team being poached by another internal team at EY. I built a team of around 40, having the privilege of recruiting some incredible individuals. As ESG and sustainability got bigger, it got more competitive. I totally failed to anticipate this. It was an excellent lesson in the power of incentives to drive action.
What's your advice for anybody hoping to do what you do?
“Start. Find your tribe. Find your community. Take the first steps. Be resolute. Foster a deep connection to nature, and a sense of reverence and awe. Expect disappointment and set backs. Dream big. Have fun”.
And take time out; burn out is strategically short-sighted. Work in sprints. Find allies. Learn about the science, about movement building, about spirituality, about business, about money, about politics. Never stop learning.
Laugh. Cry. Start every day by writing what you will focus on, what you will let go of and what you are grateful for. Exercise. Find the balance between multiple projects, and the focus needed to drive things forward. Not everything will work.
Take action. Talk is cheap. Find your heroes, meet them, work with them, be inspired. Recruit great people and marvel at their brilliance.
What have you learned?
To be resolute. That there is hope as we have all the solutions we need and can move much more quickly than we think when adopting new technologies.
Science and risk think radically differently – to be conservative in science is not to say anything when you’re not sure. It’s the opposite in risk – you highlight the risk. The risk element has been missing from climate change analysis and communication.
“It is also hugely important to realise that incumbents will do literally anything to protect their position. I hugely under-estimated this. It’s one reason why we are currently losing the information war”.
Our economic system is the root cause of a lot of this. As is our reductionist mindset - seeing ourselves as individual rather than connected to the greater whole.
Activism is fun.
Purposeful organisations still have complex people issues.
What did you think of this piece? And when was the last time you changed your mind?!
Hey Matt,
As usual I really enjoyed this eloquent dissection of a topic that I’ve also been mulling for a number of years and have been confronted with on a sometimes daily basis. I think you have a very elegant way of folding together complex issues into a succinct and coherent thesis.
Reply Guy bell-end (that’s going to be a new go-to ha ha), Head-in-the-sand Ding-Dongs, Ghost-Supporters (hey i’m right behind you just not in any way at all) - there’s seemingly as many methods of avoiding critical thinking or engaging with a topic as there are people dodging it. On wetsuits my favourite was the industry ‘legend’ who said if he thought he had surfed in Neoprene from Cancer Alley it would ‘Rock the foundations of his world’ and while I spoke to him at length about it, I could see the information passing through him like a sieve and out the other side, unable to find purchase, leaving his world safely ‘un-rocked’.
However I do think - in the case of Neoprene and its social and environmental impacts - there is a difference between ‘industry’ and ’the real surfing world’ and many of those unable to countenance a change of worldview fall within an ‘industry’ where there has been a lack of critical thinking for decades. Group think is ingrained. Very few want to put their hands up and speak in class - except that guy Matt Barr, Surfers Against Sewage and few other brave souls.
Out in the real surfing world there are still many who don’t want issues of social responsibility and ecocide to muscle in on their purchasing decisions. In the aftermath of Brexit there was research that came out that said it was virtually impossible to change someone’s mind on an issue where they had put a cross on a ballot paper in favour of it. Hence the fact that nearly 30% of the population still back Brexit even though it has been proven to be such a complete and utter failure on every front. And I guess being a loyal customer to one specific surf brand is the economic equivalent of putting a cross in the box of that brand.
However I’m still super positive about this. For every blinkered diehard or fact dodger I’ve spoken to there have been a hundred people who really want to embrace change. They want to buy a wetsuit yes that performs well and is at a good price point - but ultimately they’re prepared to switch brands to get to a non-petrochemical product that’s not linked to environmental racism. But I think I’ve only managed to cut through the chatter by getting out on the road and hearing this face to face - because the voices you hear loudest are usually the Reply Guy Bell-ends of this world. But change is coming… at least in the wetsuit world.
Great piece, good to know the Summer hiatus didn’t slow down the old typewriter