Some Actual Good News From 2020

You may have heard words echoing the general sentiment that “2020 is a massive dumpster fire” pretty often recently. After all, it certainly looks like it – 2020 has given us an international pandemic, ongoing battles against police brutality, almost World War III (twice!) the Australian Bushfires (yes, that was this year) to name just a few! Also, Halloween this year lands on a full moon. Which isn’t necessarily bad, just… spooky. ???? But that’s enough of that, bad news bear is off to bed!

Today we’re going to look at the smiley, happy, positive things that we’ve seen over the last 6 months, and maybe show that 2020 isn’t quite as bad as it seems! 

LGBT+ Rights are Human Rights

In June, the US Supreme Court ruled that employers cannot fire people based on their gender identity or sexual orientation. 

“An employer who fires an individual merely for being gay or transgender defies the law”, was the ruling from the highest court in the US.

This is a landmark ruling for LGBT+ people in the US, and gives millions of people confidence in their job security and allows them the freedom to express their sexuality and gender identity without fear of repercussions from their employers. ????️‍????

We’re Getting Greener

And it’s not just because of lockdown! While we’ve all seen pictures of dolphins in the Ashton Canal and air quality in cities pick up while we’re not driving everywhere, we’re actually making greener choices on the whole anyway! In a recent survey, we saw that:

• 60% of people say they are more environmentally aware now than they were five years ago.
• One in 3 said they’ve begun recycling more in the past 12 months.
• 45% said they’ve cut down on wasting food.
• 27% said they’ve made a better effort to buy products with better traceability labelling.
• 31% said they’ve cut down on plastic use.
• 70% of people said the reason for making eco-friendly changes was due to concern about the climate crisis, and two-thirds said they care about protecting valuable ecosystems and endangered species. ????

Our Endangered Species are Coming Back

On a similar note, conservation efforts have been incredibly successful recently, with many endangered species seeing their numbers rise again!

The population of Tigers in India has risen by a third since last year, with numbers continuing to rise in 2020. Increased tourism to see them in the wild, as well as land management by the local authorities, is credited with the astronomical rise in the number of tigers alive and kicking compared to the past few years. ????

Pangolins have been granted the highest form of protection by the Chinese government, which includes removing their body parts from the approved list of ingredients that can be used in Chinese medicine. These scaly friends are the most trafficked animal in the world, but with their protection now on the same level of giant pandas in China, we can hope that we’ll see them start to thrive.

And all of this isn’t even mentioning the countless ways that people rise up in the face of crises and challenges to love, help and support each other no matter what. So while things have been rough this year, it really isn’t all bad. ????