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Ecological activism used to be confined to “crazy liberals.”  You know the stereotype well: a makeup-boycotting, doughy woman who wore knitted socks with Birkenstocks and had her car smugly decked out in green bumper stickers.  The hideous car was an early 80’s Mercedez-Benz that had been converted to run off of vegetable oil.  And every time said woman hit the “gas,” you’d smell french fries.

Well, not much has changed.  Except that the doughy woman has been replaced by Leonardo DiCaprio.  And the canola-guzzling Mercedes has been replaced by any number of innovative cars that don’t make the air smell like a McDonald’s kitchen.

See, while the doughy Birkenstock monger was on to something, she was alienating her audience.  It’s no longer only radicals who live off the grid who are using alternative fuels, it’s your favorite actor or singer.  There’s no need to write off the Green Revolution as extremist; everyone’s doing it.

Leonardo DiCaprio has been one of the environment’s most vocal defenders. Having starred in Titanic (the most successful film ever, grossing over $1.8 billion worldwide), Leo has used his fame to bring attention to the cause.  He drives a hybrid, has solar panels on his house, co-wrote, co-produced and narrated 11th Hour, a documentary about the state of our planet.

Vanity Fair was so impressed with Leo that they granted him their cover for a second time. The May 2007 issue highlighted his work as an environmentalist.

And Leo’s efforts have had a ripple effect in Hollywood.  In February 2007, Orlando Bloom announced that he was building an eco-friendly home in London, complete with solar panels and energy-efficient light bulbs.

Resist the temptation to be snarky and say “Must be nice to be able to afford that.”   Unplug your stupid cell phone charger when you’re not charging it.  Turn off your TV when you leave the room.  Unlike our earlier blogs, this doesn’t take the handiwork of a rocket scientist to figure out.

Being green is easy. And cool. And as Leonardo and Orlando are proving, you don’t have to smell like patchouli to do it.

This entry was posted Wednesday, December 19th, 2007 filed under: yatrips by kumar