WASHINGTON, D.C. — Rue Mapp always cared for nature and the outdoors. To her, nature isn’t just fun, it’s also a safe place for healing, for mediation.
But seven years ago she noticed something. “I just didn’t see enough people who looked like me in the outdoors,” Mapp told ThinkProgress.
That realization inspired Mapp to launch Outdoor Afro in 2009, a blog in which she shared her experiences as a woman of color in the outdoors, with the ultimate goal of inspiring African Americans to connect with nature. It didn’t take long for her blog to grow, showing Mapp how many African Americans felt the same way.
“I found out that when you put all the ‘only ones’ together, we actually are quite numerous,” she said.
On Thursday, Outdoor Afro opened an office in Washington, D.C. Now an organization with more than 60 leaders in more than two dozen states, Mapp said Outdoor Afro aims to change the face of conservation. “Conservation through our view point it’s not just about our parks and public lands, but it is also conservation of communities and conservation of our individuals.”
What’s been described as the first-ever black-led conservation organization with an office in the capital, comes onto the scene at a difficult time for African Americans across the country. Many feel chronically disenfranchised and even under attack as police killings of African Americans have become habitually high-profile occurrences in recent years and emboldened activists to raise grievances of systematic racism and violence.
Just this week the issue has once again risen to national prominence after the killing of 40-year-old Keith Lamont Scott — the latest African American to die in an officer-involved shooting — triggered massive protests in Charlotte, North Carolina. The city has been put under curfew and at least one protester died.
“We need nature now more than ever as a healer,” Mapp said, adding her group began leading “healing hikes” after Michael Brown’s fatal encounter with police in Ferguson, Missouri. She considers these hikes an alternate way to bring people together to protest injustices. “We’re doing what African Americans have always done, and that is to lay our burdens down by the riverside.”
“We need nature now more than ever as a healer.”
But while the goal of Outdoor Afro is on one hand to be a vessel of African American unity, or what Mapp called NAACP meets the Sierra Club; the organization’s ultimate goal is get diverse disadvantaged communities and their youth involved with nature. “We are trying to help people get their nature swagger back,” she said.
Outdoor Afro will develop its conservation agenda in the coming year as it continues its programs, which revolve around hikes, camping, and sharing history.
George McDonald, youth program manager at the National Park Service, said the introduction of Outdoor Afro into the nation’s capital is a win for federal agencies that are struggling to develop truly inclusive programs. “Outdoor Afro has access and credibility in those communities,” he said.
McDonald also said the conservation movement is poised to benefit. “For the movement to survive it’s got to get different players, it’s got to get the Rue Mapps, it’s got to get the African American, it’s got to get more Latinos,” he said. “All the up and coming generation is a lot more diverse than the generation that is in control right now… This is a critical issue.”