 duration. I'm the host of Finding Our Future on Think Tech, Hawaii and today we are talking with Tabby Knutson. She is a student at University of Hawaii at Manoa. She is an environmental activist and is a leader at the Sir Friday UH Club. Thank you for being here Tabby. Thanks for having me. So I want people to just get like an intro to why I brought you here so if you can just share a little bit about who you are and your story. Yeah, so I grew up in Hoi Kai my entire life. I grew up surfing kind of like amateur competitively so that meant I was in the water like every single day really like immersed in nature and I think because of that I really formed a deep connection with it. So then throughout high school I kind of got introduced to activism and community involvement and once I got to UH I'm in my second year now I just I found like an amazing group of people and I really found a lot of opportunities to get involved and also found a lot of issues that needed advocating for. So yeah that's just kind of how I got my toes into it and now I have fallen in love with it. It's really awesome. It's a great movement to be a part of. I totally relate to that because I started activism also in high school I was 15 when I started getting involved with like nonprofit and immigrant rights work but obviously it's not very common for people that age or are age to be super involved in the community so why how would you explain why you are the way you are and you're so involved? I think well in high school like the real start I got I guess was kind of through event planning I was just like the class officer but with that we were in charge of hosting like all the events for our class so that was like planning prom or planning all these events but I feel like that was kind of more than you'd expect like 16 year old to do like we'd be in charge of contacting venues and booking everything or organizing things or getting checks and like it was really crazy but really awesome and through that kind of event planning I found out that I really enjoy the process of creating change or just the process of like creating these great things more so than maybe I even love like the end product and so just becoming like passionate in that and finding out like how I kind of operate and then it's great because I can directly apply that to something I'm passionate about and preserving the environment and stuff I can apply those skills and apply my interests and apply my kind of like work ethic in the best way so yeah that's I don't know I just really love it I guess I mean it's like more gratifying I would say because it's purposeful and I think a lot of people totally are like seeking purpose and they're you know working at restaurants so they're doing kind of like standard jobs for young people that don't have meaning or positive impact right and do you have experience doing one of those jobs and how would you compare like how the two different ones feel um what do you mean like just like a restaurant job versus like your activism so I worked at like Jamba Juice in high school which was really fun you know like meeting or working alongside like people who are my peers and making smoothies and all this stuff but it's really it's it's just kind of you go in you work and then you're done you know it's not a very like long term uh like it doesn't really impact you in the long term if that makes sense activism definitely is way more gratifying and you feel like you have a purpose and you feel like you're doing something important not only for yourself but for the community which I think that like a part-time job or job or a typical job can't really offer and so yeah I'm really thankful to have been able to find this so early and to be able to like uh given so like opportunities or to find opportunities that allow me to do that totally what is your how old are you I'm 18 years old turning 19 at the end of the month yay on Halloween yes Halloween what is your perspective on where people your age are at because I'm about 10 years older than you so like I think I have a different feel for like where people my age are at like I'm more like in the millennial and I guess you would be more like the Gen Z Gen Z so whether that's relevant to people watching or not but yeah like how would you describe like what you think is happening amongst people your age and in their consciousness right I think that like we were the generation that grew up with technology and media which is kind of a blessing and a curse but we're kind of growing up in this era where because there's so much information being thrown at us there's also a lot of exposure to all these things that need improvement or like are kind of messed up or you know like things that we can or issues that we see that we need to kind of pick and so kind of seeing all this all these issues and controversy even though it can be overwhelming it is also very empowering and then when you like see things happening globally like the global climate strike um you see all these kids all these youth coming together and it just empowers we all empower each other I think just seeing each other getting involved and I think that like our generation we really have to learn to navigate this kind of like overwhelming amount of information but at the same time we have this amazing opportunity to see what other people are doing and kind of pop on that and so I think that we just kind of like see what our peers are doing and it introduces us to it and it's really beautiful I mean I've seen like yeah I've seen like activism veganism like there's certain things that social media has really like right yeah in a way that you're just like this is insane like an amazing and really positive right because it's an awareness that can just kind of explode really naturally because people are just exposed to the things that they care about but otherwise it would have taken like you know 40 years for them to like have found these things at this rate um but obviously social media comes with its downsides so I mean what would you say is important for young people to um to like integrate into their lives to balance out you know the the impacts that social media has kind of like maybe in the more negative sense like that it's very distracting and potentially like causes some some emotional issues and things like that well before I dive into like the negative aspect like you did bring up a very great positive aspect which is that like all of these kind of environmental issues and stuff like it can kind of be translated into a trend and I think that because we are so young um we're a lot more open to like new ideas and um I guess like new perspectives and so like social media does provide a perfect outlet to kind of like introduce us to these things and then if it starts accumulating like popularity then it becomes a trend and like at least um all these people are doing it but also like that negative impact is because it's a trend people don't always look to see like the reasoning behind it or um where this kind of stemmed from and why it's beneficial they don't really like they do it because it's trendy not because it's a deep rooted behavioral change and so um I think that that's like one thing that we need to work on um in my generation is just kind of like noticing what we have but remembering to question it and question like where our knowledge stemmed from and like where these resources are kind of the perspective what they're coming from um but what were you're saying about like the emotional aspect I think it's it's very of course it's a blessing and a curse uh we just very much so um now we kind of have this outlet where we can look at our phone every day and see what other people are doing and kind of it can either empower us or it can kind of we can kind of compare to it and kind of see the faults in ourselves even though they may not actually be really valid faults and so I think just like with social media we have to figure out how to like be confident in ourselves and content with ourselves and live without this kind of like resource I guess um in order to like actually thrive and actually live I think that's what media is just it's a great tool but also as like really strong yeah I almost feel like school should be school should be teaching kids how to grapple with this I mean I feel like self-confidence wasn't as big of an issue in the past and that's just like how I feel observing society that like kids have less of these social interactions I mean actually they've been there has been science done on this that like the first kiss first date like all these social events happen at a much later age for kids because they're experiencing life more through their phones and screens rather than like with physical interaction completely I think that's delayed completely yeah that's an interesting fact I never thought of it that way but yeah I think that just like that's another important aspect of like this environmental movement or just movements in general is kind of like rebuilding this community that social media and technology has kind of like driven a wedge in between like I think we've become a lot more individualistic which is okay but not always like the best thing and so I think that's one of the most pressing issues is like you know like I should be able to talk to someone and just I don't know like say like have a great day even though I don't know them and not get like weird side eyes or you think I'm overly nice you know I think yeah weird belt yeah and I think that to me like a lot of this episode I want to be like about climate change and the environment because we're both in that field in terms of activism and focus and to me like human connection is like really such a foundational part it's not even like about you know ride your bike or like go vegan it's like like are we connecting as humans like authentically and like in a vulnerable way and are we open to each other's perspectives and can we like re-establish that value in our society because I feel like almost that's what's allowed us to you know disconnect or make bad choices every day because we're like not really in alignment with who we are and how we connect with people yeah and it's really I think that like it's such a pressing issue kind of like this loss or like it's kind of like this threat to our self-confidence but like slowly there is more awareness and more emphasis on like providing support and like resources for that which is really awesome I think that it's just now erasing the stigma and like making people feel comfortable to do that but also like you were saying with the community thing I think there was a study that said that like people are more likely to like join the movement or to like get involved in the long term if like their friends or family are doing it or you know like if they really feel like they're your peer and they respect you then they're more likely to get involved in the long term so that human connection is very very important we can't just go out and like preach you know don't use plastics it's like no yeah like we're friends I don't use my cup you can not use it I'm happy like I'm enjoying my life yeah like you see yeah you know yeah building that I think that's a very valuable tool and also just sustainability like if we're fighting for sustainability that includes mental and relationships from you know mental sustainability and sustainability within yeah exactly you just reminded me of my favorite Ted talk how to start a movement have you seen that one no I haven't it's so funny I wanted I've heard have you heard about it it's like the word of mouth super popular right it's three minutes okay and it's about the this guy it's a video of this guy like he's kind of goofy and he's dancing really crazy at this festival and he's by himself but there's thousands of people there um but he's the only one dancing and then one guy follows him so they call him the lone knot he's by himself he's crazy yeah and then the first follower yeah comes and then he welcomes him so it's like the lone knot has to welcome the first follower and they have to be like dancing together and then they're saying that the first follower is really like the bravest one right because he could have left alone not alone completely but then within like two minutes by the end of this three minute Ted talk it's like hundreds of people are dancing and he's like this is how he started movement it's really beautiful yeah yeah I mean just taking away our like initial judgment you know that's it's I don't know I feel like we're not reminded to do that enough and I think that just again like we just need to remember to like question the like why we think the way we do and you know like what preconceived notions we may have that are blocking us from like meeting amazing people or doing amazing things yeah and I think that's really like one huge important thing I want to share it's just like the friendships that I formed through activism like before I was an activist my friends you know I look I'm so close with many of them and but I would say most of them like they still just like drink heavily and they're not like engaged in an impactful meaningful way in the community and I was really craving something more deep and through joining these clubs in college and I'm looking for meaningful jobs even if they didn't pay that much allowed me to like now have this incredible community that shares the same values and lifestyle and it's like really committed to helping all these global issues we're facing and like that to me is like more important than anything like you know I could like lose my job tomorrow but I know like I have like my friends and like it's like all about community and like that's really what's gone missing yeah totally yeah and just if you think about the environmental movement as a social movement like it just provides this amazing opportunity to band together and kind of like rebuild our society and how we function in the ways that we think yeah it's really cool like if you think about it it's not just scientific yeah totally cool well we're gonna go to a quick little break and then we'll be right back hello I'm Jane Sawyer with the Small Business Administration and one of your hosts for Adventures in Small Business a partnership with ThinkTech and with the Hawaii Small Business Development Center the Mink Center for Business and Leadership and the Veteran Business Outreach Center all serving small businesses in Hawaii and telling you the story about their strategies their ideas their drive and the way they help Hawaii succeed and be a bright light in small business you'll find it here every Thursday at ThinkTech thanks for joining us and we hope to see you soon. Hi guys I'm your host Lillian Cumick from Lillian's Vegan World and I come to you live every second Friday from 3pm and this is the show where I talk about the plant-based lifestyle and veganism so we go through recipes some upcoming events information about health regarding your health and just some ideas on how you can have a better lifestyle eat healthier and have fun at the same time so do join me I look forward to seeing you and hello. Hi my name is Durey we are at ThinkTech Hawaii and the show is called Finding Our Future we're here every other Wednesday at 1 p.m. so today I'm with Tabby Knitzen and she is a 18 year old student at UH Minoa and is in the surfrider UH club and is a youth activist something kind of a journey that really is similar to mine so like I really love just talking to story with you and seeing like where your perspectives are at and what you think is happening today so we talk kind of a lot about like where youth are at in terms of like social media impact consciousness environmental involvement and I want to know because it's like a journey being an environmentalist totally it's it's a roller coaster so what would you say is like how would you describe something that you've been surprised by or you think is like important for people to know based on the journey you've been through about the movement about yeah or like environmental impact or action okay so I I think one of the best things that I was pleasantly surprised about was to find out that like the community that's within the environmental movement are just so respectful like respectful and empowering and loving like it's not at all like oh my gosh you're just starting this movement like okay you're kind of a newbie it's like yeah like come on like let's go do all these amazing things which is just such a blessing and it's so just inspiring in itself so I think that that's a great thing to know but also what I've learned is just exactly how much impact you as an individual has and I think that a lot of people don't realize that but like you have so much power just as a consumer what you buy what kind of food do you eat like your daily habits people often think like oh like it's just one cup or it's just like you know a straw like but it does accumulate so if you were to cut it out like that's we need isn't that there a quote where it's like we don't need one person doing a bunch of things we need like like millions of people doing one little like small things yeah I was like we don't need one person doing something perfectly we need to really in things doing it imperfectly yeah which I think is really important thank you for saying that totally and I think that like just people don't realize how much power they have and so reminding them of that is just so valuable totally like there's that woman Lauren Singer who's like that zero-waste girl and she has all her trash in a mason jar which I think is like really cool but for me it's also like very off-putting because I'm like I'm like I can't even like I just have questions like to me it's not inspiring because I just have like so many follow-up questions like how can you possibly do this and in Hawaii it's very impossible to do that because we don't have like the waste management and diversion systems at California that or yeah where she lives in California in New York um so anyway like I think that's why it's important the imperfect thing to really push out like no one's like advocating for extremism but we do want to be like real about how urgent the situation is with climate change yeah so what like would you say from your perspective and your research and studies are you a sustainability studies major yes um would you say if because people always ask like what can I do right if you only could tell people two or three things that they can do today that doesn't involve activism right it's just like in their life you know simple things that they can change that's going to have a really positive impact what would you tell them I think that the most impactful thing is just um like don't use they use uh like cup straws utensils I think that's like the easiest thing to cut out and then second reducing meat I think that that's just like no impact on I'm sure all about that and then um gosh I think that apart from activism I mean I would just maybe like not using maybe using like all natural products yeah that don't contain chemicals and stuff that pollute our oceans and water supply and yeah I like that because that's actually one that no one and I don't really even talk about it either but something that kind of just happened naturally because I started um like going vegan from being vegetarian and then I was like okay I'm going to shop it down to earth and whole foods more instead of like the traditional grocery stores because they just have better options right and then I was like well they don't have chemical soaps I'm just going to buy the natural soap right and shampoos and and then you start being like oh maybe I use a bar instead of the plastic bottle yeah it just becomes this like really cool journey which people get really intimidated by yeah but I really want to share it's like one thing at a time you know like there's certainly things that are like the most impactful but regardless of where you start most of us end up in a pretty similar place like we're making similar food choices and we're like reducing waste and you know we're thinking about how we're moving around the world like vehicles and stuff kind of like a snow wall effect like once you start you just kind of like you're like I'm doing one good thing like and you know I can do all these other good things but I think that like like you were mentioning the extremism I think that there's there's always a stereotype associated with like anything any name or label so like once you label yourself as an environmentalist people automatic for a lot of the time people automatically say oh my gosh you're crazy like you go full vegan cut out yeah I don't know you just think it's crazy and I mean I used to be intimidated by it too but just realizing that it's not very at all it's just people kind of reduce their impact which is so powerful and everyone can do it and like doing the right thing right and like for me I've realized like sometimes you will get labeled as extreme because yeah you're doing things that are like fundamentally like disrupting the status quo and like beautiful yeah but it is intimidating yeah but it's also necessary yeah it's like what I learned recently that was crazy is that Martin Luther King had a 75 percent disapproval rating when he died oh so he was very unpopular in America he was like not liked and there was news against him like he's a liar all this stuff and now he has national holiday and obviously everyone sees him as a hero yeah and so I think that's really important for environmentalists to understand is like yes we want to like write a message in a comfortable palatable way but we also can't bring too far that way because if we meet culture where it's at we're not going to make the changes we need to as fast as we can like we need to be visionary and bold and be okay with disrupting people's comfort zone right because this is a crisis it's a crisis and so it's kind of like that balance of both which I've been really inspired just to learn that statistic about Martin Luther King it's important for us to be like grounded in that clarity right yeah that's like that's amazing I never really thought of it like I do agree like I think that as an activist or as like being a part of an environmental organization like you want obviously as many people to get involved as possible and I think that you might sacrifice you know a bit of like your efficiency I guess if you try to cater it to people like making them feel comfortable enough you know it's like like we can make you feel as comfortable as much as possible but you have to take that leap yeah and we also have to understand like that social movements don't happen by like appeasing the majority but that we get the minority with passion and power to like grow our power and agree on a vision even if it seems far-fetched like what Martin Luther King was advocating for was really far-fetched at the time but they were able to achieve it with a minority you know and that's really important I think is to not like look for people who are like really far from the consciousness that we're coming from but to get the people who like kind of get it and they just need like a lending hand to be like join us like join the movement and we only need a small percentage of people to like win yeah totally and my high school teacher told me like this I don't know he always used to preach this where it's like dream big and then scale back so dream big and then like figure out the steps in between you know work backwards and then that way you can do it exactly like the vision yeah the moonshot they call it um it's never too big yeah it's never too big like just go for it and like see where kind of the stepping stone is in between that like what's your first act exactly so we talked about like individual action which I think is important and what I've kind of like where I am now is like from what I've learned and heard from experts in our community and you know just everywhere is that it's you know like food choice like reducing me increasing plant-based foods um flying okay didn't actually really know it's like such a big impact now Greta is raising tons of awareness about that and having kids and so or how you know having less than two zero to two is the recommended amount so um it's been interesting going from like advocating for just like reducing plastics then being like well actually it seems like these three things are specifically the most impactful ways great yeah go ahead oh no no no I mean it's difficult because like you know it's like the baby steps but then it's also like we need the bigger steps too yeah so again it's just that balance yeah and like just never being content I guess yeah like always kind of be bigger you know so let's go bigger so yeah from individual action what have you what do you feel is important for people to understand about systemic change and institutional change beyond once you get comfortable with the individual change which I feel is important for like growing the movement and building like that army that we need of like advocates um what's like next in terms of like thinking bigger I think just again kind of realizing how much power you have as an individual um you can go to like your politicians for your representative's office you know and you have the power to put pressure on like the system and kind of hold them responsible like that's kind of your job is to hold them responsible for whatever they're doing and so um yeah I mean that I guess systemic change is very intimidating but I think that I don't know you just kind of have to take that leap and just be strong in your beliefs and confident in yourself and the cause um both as a group and as an individual and just kind of go for it you know like it's needed um very badly you know and so just go for it yeah I don't know systemic change is very very difficult for us it's also I mean I think it's frustrating for me but I mean okay I love it and I've seen great success like saving a family from deportation through like a petition and a social media campaign and calling a legislator like that's stuff that works yeah banning styrofoam at the UH campus like when I was in the Sirfighter UH club very easy not hard just takes a little bit of organizing and meeting a few meetings but at the same time like yeah I mean we've tried to ban styrofoam city and statewide for years like 10 years 30 years I've heard depending on who you ask and yeah it's failed every year but you know this might be our year and we've included three other single use plastics so it's like there's like this like patience um and also persistence that I feel like and like this um this like acceptance that you will fail you know like knowing that you can also organize so well that you can fail less and like these how these are as well like Beyonce and Michael Jordan like all these people who are like or Albert Einstein like failed hundreds of times or got rejected and now they're like known as some of the most successful in their field but I think it's just important for people to like have the strength to like fail at something and not just like live this comfortable life where they're never gonna fail because it's not filling even to be like that you know yeah it's it's that's one of the hardest parts of being an activist but definitely like if you don't attempt or if you don't keep crying you know like you completely reduce your probability of like actually being successful the more you try the more chances you haven't been successful and I think that's kind of not the strongest motivator but a really good motivator you know it's kind of discouraging but also like you know well yeah it's better to like win once and try 10 times until like try zero times and win zero times it's just like better yeah totally like your growth yeah and if you like if you don't do anything then nothing and you're gonna feel kind of shitty like that's I feel like what causes depression and a lot of young people is like they know the problems and they're not doing anything about it like they're missing the action yeah feeling fulfilled every day yeah I think that like I don't know maybe it's just growing up here I don't know what it's like elsewhere but I think that I luckily had like a really amazing teacher who really encouraged us to live life with meaning and I think that I don't know a lot of youth like while we are empowered and while we see all these things happening a lot of them also just either don't prioritize trying to find what they're passionate about or what gives them purpose or just our content you know like where they're at which is not bad but also like you know like experiment find find things that you're into and it can be a lot more yeah so if what I hear from you is like find a mentor right and I think I want to just um go off of that and just say that being content is really like not great like I think people like are just good with just being good I want people to like feel like they can thrive yeah on top of being content and comfortable and you can do that I think your activism or community involvement so we have to close up so do you have any like final like what's your like message that you would want people to like take away or something you haven't shared yet I think that again like you do have the power you are incredibly powerful just as an individual in society and just realize that and be confident in yourself and your beliefs but also I think like my mantra is to educate empower and celebrate and so like remember that like it's about awareness it's also about empowering people but it's also about like taking the time to appreciate everything that's there and to celebrate it you know there's a balance that's you yeah awesome well thank you for joining us and thank you Tabby for being here today it was really awesome yeah thanks for having me I'm glad to be here