‘I’ve seen the impact of modern technology on our ecosystems… and I’m not a fan’ – Nathalie Kelley, Actor

Toronto – June 20, 2024

Actor Nathalie Kelley hit out at the effects of tech development on the environment on Thursday.

Speaking at Collision in Toronto, the actor (pictured above) expressed her passion for environmental conservation, citing her indigenous background as an influence on her views: 

“I’m lucky enough to have been raised with a mother that taught me to be very proud of my Indigenous ancestry. 

“She raised me to really understand the value of what my culture has to offer the world, which is a way of life that is in balance with all living beings.”

“Indigenous people were the first climate scientists. We know better than anybody else how to steward these lands.”

“I’ve seen the impact of modern technology on our ecosystems. I’ve been to the Amazon, I’ve seen the parts of the Amazon that are so destroyed by Mercury mining for gold, that will end up in our iPhones that you can see the destruction from space.  And I have drawn the conclusion that I’m not a fan.”

Nathalie’s comments come as the climate crisis continues to worsen. The actress pointed out that the responsibility for dealing with it will now fall to people who did not cause it – and that crucial decisions will have to be made in the near future.

“I’m not a Luddite. I don’t hate technology. I want to liberate technology from the hands and powers of corporations that have designed these technologies as tools to enslave us to a consumer monoculture. 

“I am inherently embedded in the system and want to own my hypocrisy now before anyone can point it out to me. We’re all a part of this. We’re all in it together. Neither one of us here created this world, we inherited it. But it is our responsibility now as in this generation, this crucial generation in these 10 years that humanity has left to turn it around to decide the direction we want our technologies to go… And so my question is what kind of future do we want to leave for our children?”

Natalie stressed the importance of working together to solve climate issues: 

“One of the biggest lies that we’ve been sold and it’s definitely a strategy by multinational corporations is to make us think that individually we can have an impact.” 

However she went on to call for industries to take responsibility also: “We have to demand that these industries take accountability for their enormous waste and ecological destruction […] We’re on a finite planet with finite resources and we need to have a very serious sober look at that.”

“Humans survived 300,000 years without plastic […] Now men have, it’s just been discovered, microplastics in their testicles. How can we trust these corporations who are developing these technologies when they tell us that it’s all sustainable, and carbon neutral and safe when they don’t have the greatest track record?”

Nathalie’s comments were made as part of a wider discussion on big tech and indigenous technologies at Collision, which is returning to Toronto for its sixth year. Global founders, CEOs, investors and members of the media have come to the city to make deals and experience North America’s thriving tech ecosystem.

More than 1,600 startups are taking part in Collision 2024 – the highest number of startups ever at a Collision event. 45 percent of these are women-founded, and startups have travelled to Toronto from countries including Nigeria, the Republic of Korea, Uruguay, Japan, Italy, Ghana, Pakistan and beyond.

In total, more than 37,800 attendees have gathered at the event, as well as 570 speakers and 1,003 members of the media, to explore business opportunities with an international audience.

739 investors are attending Collision, including Vinod Khosla, founder of Khosla Ventures; Wesley Chan, co-founder and managing partner of FPV Ventures; and Nigel Morris, co-founder and managing partner of QED Investors, as well as nine companies on the Forbes Midas List, and 12 investors from those firms.

Top speakers at Collision include:

• Geoffrey Hinton, Godfather of AI
• Maria Sharapova, entrepreneur and tennis legend
• Aidan Gomez, founder and CEO of Cohere (an AI for enterprise and large language model company, which raised US$450 million at a US$5 billion valuation in June 2024)
• Raquel Urtasun, founder and CEO of Waabi (a Canadian autonomous trucking company)
• Jeff Shiner, CEO of 1Password (a cloud-based password management tool)
• Dali Rajic, president and COO of Wiz (a cloud security platform)
• Alex Israel, co-founder and CEO of Metropolis (an AI and computer vision platform)
• Jonathan Ross, founder and CEO of Groq (an AI chip startup)
• Keily Blair, CEO of OnlyFans
• Autumn Peltier, Indigenous rights activist

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Useful links

• Collision website: https://collisionconf.com/ 
• Collision media kit: https://collisionconf.com/media/media-kit  
• Collision images: https://flickr.com/photos/collisionconf 
• About Web Summit: about.websummit.com