Today’s guest blogger is Chelsea Sexton, my friend and costar of the 2006 documentary film “Who Killed the Electric Car?“ At a young age, Chelsea began working for GM marketing their ill-fated electric car, the EV1. She even married an EV1 service technician! Now she serves as the Executive Director of Plug In America (full bio here).
This heart-wrenching and inspiring piece reposted from her blog, however, looks at the human side of things.
Thanks to the TED conference last week, the internet has been effervescent with reports by attendees declaring one presentation or another life-changing, or game-changing, or world-changing. Of course, that’s the point. TED is something of an intellectual orgy, where the big ideas go to catch fire, and where industry and thought leaders go to network and be re-energized. Videos of the best speakers are passed around for months afterward, allowing anyone to get a hit of the potential that’s shared there. It’s voyeuristically clear, however, that nothing compares to the immersive experience of seeing it live.
Those who attend are already at the top of their game. They leave charged up to do more, taking with them an ever more expanded sense of what’s possible. And while I’d love to be a fly on the wall there someday (which is about the only way I’d get in), I can’t help but wonder if we ought not also enable such experiences a bit lower on the food chain. What if that conviction of “possible” were instilled in those who’ve never had it to begin with?
Far away from the rarefied air of TED, the most significant speaking “event” I have ever done was also the smallest. In the summer of 2007, a high school teacher in Alexandria, VA wrote to tell me that she’d shown Who Killed the Electric Car? in her class, then assigned her students to design a plan to improve the world in some small way. They’d been fired up after the movie, but were immediately daunted by the assignment, their enthusiasm deflated by the belief that one person can’t make a difference. Recalling that I was their age when I started working for General Motors, she’d wanted to know if I had any words of encouragement she could pass along.
Needing to go to Washington, DC the following week for a conference, I offered to stop in Alexandria and visit the school with a colleague. Meanwhile, I learned the rest of the story: the class was comprised entirely of kids who’d flunked during the spring, and was already slated to be cancelled because only a small handful were showing up this time. Now they likely wouldn’t graduate at all. Sadly, some at the school were amazed that we were willing to come talk to “kids like them”, but they decided to keep the class going until we did.
We spent the afternoon there, answering questions from the film, showing them the RAV4 EV that we’d brought and letting them tool around the parking lot in it. A simple presentation that we’d done dozens of times. Only after we left did my colleague share the brief but passionate monologue a student named Phillip delivered to him on the side:
You know, I used to just sit at home, watch television and clench my fists. I’d watch the people in our government lie and cheat and do whatever they wanted just because no one would stop them. They think that they’re above the rules. I’d just sit and get madder and madder. But mostly I was sad because I knew that I could never do anything to stop them. I used to believe that no one can”¦.
Then I watched your movie and I said to myself – Hey, wait a minute! If that little white girl can stand up to a huge company like GM and win, then man, I can do the same. If she can do it, then I can too! Now I’m full of energy. I am going down to that hill [referring to Capitol Hill], and I’m going to take my country back. People vote. I vote. That’s how we’re going to do it. I’m going to make everyone see what’s going on just like she did and then they’ll vote for a better way. You watch and see.
Wow- at that point we didn’t care if Phillip ever wanted an electric car. But what could happen if just one kid (or one teacher) in every high school was that passionate about any issue? Where might we be as a country? If our little movie could help, we wanted to get it into any school that wanted it. When Sony responded to our suggestion that they donate DVDs with their own suggestion that we pound sand, we started a small foundation so that along with the nuts and bolts work of getting cars on the road and teaching consumers about them, we could do projects like this as we saw fit. Nearly four years later, we’re still sending copies of the film to teachers hoping lightning strikes elsewhere.
I don’t know what happened to Phillip, though I imagine he rather enjoyed the last election. That day in Virginia was meaningful not only for what he may have gone on to do, but for how he has inspired me. His story moves me as much today as it did back then.
I’m motivated by something else too, darker and harder to name, and rarely shared at all. Coincidentally, TED week culminated with the tenth anniversary of the day a kid named Andy decided that the best way to stop being picked on was to bring a gun to his high school. Using a bathroom for cover, he randomly shot fifteen people in the courtyard as they passed between classes, killing two. One was my oldest stepson- a quiet, intensely thoughtful young man who was his littlest brother’s idol one minute and plotting a career with the FBI the next. I still ache bone-deep for the life he missed out on and for how he left this one, and I suspect I always will. That shooting wasn’t the first, or the last, or the highest-profile event of its kind- but it’s the devil I know.
Many things went wrong in the lead-up, red flags that were unobserved or outright ignored by dozens of people who later admitted they knew it was coming. There is plenty of pain and anger and blame to go around, and I have at times indulged in each as I’ve watched loved ones struggle in the aftermath. Mostly I am shocked that in one generation, incidents like these have ceased to surprise us- a fact that in my more judgmental moments I find as repulsive as the original crime.
Even after a decade to process, I an certain of little more than that we must somehow convince our kids and each other that violence is not an acceptable or effective path to attention, help, and relevance. That not all press is good press, and public self-destruction is not entertainment. That it gets better. That being marginalized is not the same as being marginal, and that “regular” people can indeed take their country back. We need more Wael Ghonims and fewer Charlie Sheens. A deeper sense of both personal potential and responsibility, and less entitlement to a particular experience. A broader definition of “possible”- yes, for the current group of leaders and innovators, but even more so for those who come next. More Phillips, and fewer Andys.
Because we have an unfathomable amount of work to do. Economically. Geopolitically. Environmentally. Pick your issue, and there is more work to be done than there are people lining up to do it. Even in my comparatively tiny industry, this is true.
There’s a lot of talk about “legacy”- mostly in reference to the condition of the planet we’ll leave to future generations, environmentally and otherwise. But for all of our good intentions, we are deluding ourselves in thinking we are going to solve the world’s biggest problems before our kids inherit them from us. Yes, we should do what we can, but the most important legacy we can leave our children is the ability and compulsion to continue what we’ve started- or, frankly, to start where we have failed to do so. To teach them that it’s both possible and worth the work, because it’s going to take an awful lot of it.
I’ll settle for reaching one at a time at a random high school if I have to- but it’s not nearly enough. We need hundreds, and thousands of kids (and adults) to feel as inspired and empowered as Phillip, to believe without doubt that they can move their world, and to go forth and try. Our legacy – and their future – is riding on it.
And the consequences if we don’t are hell.
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And how sad this was, people are ready to make lifestyle changes with the EV1 and they are not allowed and the car is taken from them instead! Really looking forward to watch the sequel of the movie.
And things start to take up pace, for example in some countries, i.e. Hong Kong and around the world we will have Co2 free city centers.
Chelsea: Thank you for your work and your witness. You continue to inspire us.
I’m not surprised Sony would not donate DVDs to schools when I consider what happened with Gore’s offer of 50,000 free DVDs of An Inconvenient Truth for schools via the National Science Teachers Association. And we thought the NSTA were the good guys, right? Well their political structure seems marinated in oil as well. More at
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/11/24/AR2006112400789.html
Some might ask why promote a DVD filmed in 2006 to students? Well for the same reason as the title of your article – to get to know “our” devil… As George Santayana said, “those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it.”
I suspect much/most of middle America thinks an EV like the one in your movie is still on the drawing board – not yet possible or affordable. I did, until I saw your film last month, and like Phillip, I’ve been clinching my fists ever since. I recommend the film at every educational event I give and conference I attend. At the very least, it should be in all community libraries.
I’m glad the film is online for free viewing at: http://topdocumentaryfilms.com/who-killed-the-electric-car/
even if the subtitles are in german (?) It is an important film with terrific interviews that deserve a much wider audience than it has received to date.
How can the CP community help promote this url to schools and libraries? Otherwise, we’re sure to repeat the mistakes of the past a la Santayana…
Hope you will continue to guest post here. All the best to you.
Thank you so much, 350 Now! This little movie has lived on word-of-mouth, and we continue to be thrilled to hear reports like yours!
You’re absolutely right- these films and stories are indeed important to keep telling, for more reasons (as we learned with Phillip) than appear on the surface. “Who Killed” is out there in a variety of places for free, including youtube- and a new film, “Revenge of the Electric Car” premieres at the Tribeca film festival next month. It follows the efforts of a few automakers and individuals to bring electric cars back to market. I agree with you that too many people still don’t realize that plug-in cars are possible, when in fact a few of them are available today. These films are just one way through which we’re hoping to change that fact.
@2 FYI: the subtitles are in Dutch
Has anyone made a documentary describing how the automobile, petrol and rubber interests got together in the US to buy up public transport, mostly trolley-cars I believe, then ripped up the tracks and destroyed the lot? In Australia (it rhymes with failure)we got rid of ours in most cities, including Sydney. I vaguely recall riding on a Bondi tram, the last line, as a child, then they were gone. What followed was fifty or so years of building motorways to ‘reduce traffic congestion’, which always grew instead. They’re still at it. When they tried to build about eleven kilometres of new rail line, it has taken about twenty years, at gigantic cost, only to discover that the sleepers are of the wrong type and cause intolerable noise levels in the tunnels. Meanwhile the Chinese built several metro lines in Beijing for the Olympics with dozens of new stations in one tenth the time. One of the biggest problems facing us is that our political, bureaucratic, and governmental elites have grown so incompetent and and accident-prone, under the selective pressure of having to always please the business masters of society, and follow the market fundamentalist dogma of ‘leave it to The Market’, that they are incapable of doing anything efficiently, any more.
Mulga- the main documentary I know of about the US streetcar story is called “Taken for a Ride”. More about it here: http://bit.ly/ihgsZ2
Youtube- thanks.
Getting Our Nation Back On Track
Electric cars are part of the transportation solution. Another part might be to rebuild the nation’s urban rail transit system, which a number of municipalities are moving forward on.
New technology being incorporated into personal vehicles should be able to be used in “Autonomous Streetcars” where no overhead wires would be required. Hydrogen supplied fuel cells, storage batteries, regenerative braking and photovoltaics (solar) on the roof to supplement, along with electric motor drive would provide traction. This might prove especially viable in flat, sunny regions across the globe. Multiple benefits beyond energy are perceived including reduction in traffic overload, alleviating issues of car dependency, reduction in pavement footprint and encouragement of “smart growth” economic development.
Thank you Chelsea.
evchels #6, thank-you.
Chelsea,
As a teacher, I thank you for your work, for sharing your personal story, and for this post–especially the central message that there is so much to do and that each of us can make a difference. And that we must work–on the ground, in classrooms and neighborhoods–with our young people.
TED is an exciting, high-profile, ego-driven event. It would be amazing to somehow get to attend. However, the real work of change, as you point out, is elsewhere.
There are thousands, if not millions of us working at the grassroots level. Few have heard of us, and we might have little individual influence in the wider scheme of things. We, like you, and like that high school teacher, are working daily on the twin goals of chipping away at whichever part of the larger problems we have been led to address and helping young people understand what real challenges there are, and that they, themselves, are capable of taking them on and making a difference.
Gandhi was a great man, a true catalyst for great change. But he understood that real, non-violent change depended on all those others making up their own minds that they were going to do what was necessary to achieve it. Without those individuals he could catalyze nothing.
Fantastic piece. As a father of two young kids, your last three paragraphs hit hard.
Thank you Chelsea.
Hi Chelsea and educators working to integrate EV education in the classroom,
I have a few resources online for creating student-led campaigns for EVs in local communities. Feel free to check them out here: http://www.misselectric.com/?page_id=1144. If I can be of any assistance to teachers out there, please feel free to reach out. Our future is dependent upon the next generation feeling empowered and equipped to lead the next wave of change.
Thanks for this very thoughtful post, Chelsea!
My employer Alliance for Climate Education is educating high school youth about the science of climate change and working with these students to complete carbon-reducing projects on their campuses.
I’m proud to say that I work with inspired, steadfast young climate heroes all over Southern California. Currently, my colleagues are doing the same thing in New York, New England, Colorado, Chicago, DC, Northern California, the Sierras, and Atlanta. You can check us out here: http://www.acespace.org
We’re also up for the same award (different category) as Joe Romm here: http://www.climatechangecommunication.org/award.cfm
Adrian, couldn’t agree more. This “battle” is fought in the trenches too. Really appreciated your perspective.
@ Chelsea:
Thank you for both your work and your moving story, and I’m so sorry for your tragic loss.
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@ evchels:
Thanks for the link!
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@ no one in particular
One of the things I’ve become convinced of lately, is the need for the USA to dramatically change the rules for it’s electoral system in order to effect positive change. Overturning Citizens United vs. the FEC is a start, see democracyisforpeople.org for more. But, IMO the entire electoral system needs a complete top-to-bottom overhaul to break the cycle of corruption. Will it happen? I sincerely hope so.