There are two book authors, a German television crew, and three teams of documentary filmmakers. Everyone is required to wear a yellow badge identifying their status. But it's gotten to such a crazy level that you can't move. Worse, you can't speak your mind. Like Roselle, Sellers cut his activist teeth working for Greenpeace, and Ruckus modeled its camps after the action camps Greenpeace held until funding ran out in 1991.
Funding comes from philanthropists and corporate foundations.
Until recently, Sellers says, the Ted Turner Foundation was a major contributor. The site for this camp has been provided by local philanthropists who live on the land and have asked not to be named. Knowing that they have limited control over the presentation, they cultivate terminology like tender shoots of newly planted trees, correcting improper usage, examining etymology. The too-rigorous attention to language can make some Ruckus people sound rarefied and airless. I overheard one facilitator declaiming before two young participants.