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Wilson, an actor best known for his role inThe Officeas Dwight Schrute, has made it clear over the years that he is a huge advocate for climate change awareness, an example being when he brieflychanged his nameto “Rainnfall Heat Wave Extreme Winter Wilson.”
“I had this realization about four or five years ago that climate change is something that I’m passionate about, and climate change education, but all I was doing was sending out occasional angry tweets,” Wilson said in an interview withEatingWellwith Gail Whiteman, Ph.D., prior to the New York event. “I knew I needed to actually do something and get off my butt and not be a keyboard activist.”
Want to Live Longer and Fight Climate Change? Eat More Plants
It was around that time that he was introduced to Whiteman and her nonprofit, Arctic Basecamp. From there, Wilson joined her in the organization’s efforts to spread awareness and physically help the Arctic.
“We started doing all kinds of stuff together: we went to Greenland, we went to the World Economic Forum in Davos, camped out in tents, we hauled an iceberg to COP26 in Glasgow, Scotland, and bottled the iceberg water as glacial melt,” Wilson said. “We’ve done lots of online events, and as we’re moving more in the direction of a unique climate publicity and activations, we’ve founded this new organization, Climate Basecamp, as an offshoot of Arctic Basecamp.”
PHOTO: Climate BasecampPHOTO: Climate Basecamp
Wilson is now one of the founding faces—alongside Whiteman and television comedy writer Chuck Tatham—ofClimate Basecamp. As of yesterday, Climate Basecamp went live with their mission: using food, entertainment, sports, fashion and music to bring attention to the issues of climate change.
“One of the things that scientists are talking about now is that we’re in danger of having severe limitations to some of the flavors that we’ve come to know and love and rely on, like vanilla, chocolate, strawberry and mango and pistachio [and coffee]. So it’s important to just bring some attention to that in a memorable, sticky way … sticky in two ways!”
“It’s less water, or more water in some cases, it can be changes in the pollinators, it can also be the bugs that eat the plants or viruses or fungi, and of course extreme weather events,” Whiteman listed as some of the threatening factors to the ice cream flavors' origin plants. “All of those flavors are actually endangered.”
While climate change is an extensive issue, spreading awareness and eating consciously are simple changes to make in your routine to help support Climate Basecamp’s mission, according to Whiteman and Wilson.
“I think that eating well is eating consciously, and unfortunately most of our culture is eating sloppily and fast foods that have a negative climate impact,” Wilson said. “As soon as you can support local farmers, you can eat locally, you can eat consciously. Shop at farmers' markets … I think that’s a great way to go. I think eating well actually goes hand-in-hand with climate activism.”
For more information on Climate Basecamp, check out theirnewly launched website.
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