The Origin of The Term “Tree Hugger”

Knowing the etymological roots of the term I always get a warm feeling in my heart when people called me a tree hugger. Most do not mean it as a compliment, but in their ignorance they are actually bestowing a great honor in referring to someone with that term. The term tree hugger was born of the beautiful courage, compassion and gumption of brave women putting their bodies on the line defending the sacred oak forests of the Himalayas.

It has its roots in a movement where women that depended on the oak forests of the Himalayas for foraging food, medicine , animal fodder, soil stabilization and water saw the Indian government clearcutting their livelihood and source of symbiotic resilience with the land and they decided to hug the trees and refused to move.

It became known as the Chipko movement in India, which saw rural women, famously hugging trees to prevent commercial logging in the 1970s Himalayas. This was a unprecedented powerful act of nonviolent ecological resistance against ecocide known as “hugging the trees” (Chipko means to hug).

These courageous women inspired the later organized movements to defend the sacred (stopping old growth logging through chaining themselves to trees on the west coast of the US and Canada).

The Chipko women inspired generations to stand up for our sacred forests resulting in brave young women like Julia Butterfly Hill climbing up into that Redwood in the 90-s and putting her life on the line embracing that tree for nearly two years to ensure she was protected.

I will tell you that as someone that was raised among the ancient trees in BC, and someone that has family in both the logging industry and those that were activists chaining themselves to our tall rooted elders to protect them against logging industry interests, that the Chipko women were a catalyst of truth, courage and healing, embraced by those dear to me here in Canada in the 90s

Those wise (yet not conventionally “educated”) Chipko women continue to inspire courageous action today where women and men are embracing ancient trees in the Walbran valley and Fairy Creek on Vancouver Island, defending the sacred in the face of goverment and corporate greed.

The human beings that inspired the term “tree hugger” with their actions chose to live in a way that sends out a prayer into the universe and declares what a human being is and what we are capable of when we choose love over fear. I am grateful for their gift to this world and though I may not have put my life on the line as courageously as those women in India, I am honored to do what I can and honored when someone calls me a “tree hugger”.

So next time you are disparagingly accused of being a “tree hugger” by an ecologically illiterate capitalistic statist suffering from spiritual poverty, you can smile and genuinely tell them “thank you, what a kind thing to say!” :)

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Update 4 pm, Feb, 20th, 2026

Modern Day Chipko Ancient forest defenders out west need our help right now!

The rare temperate Rainforest watershed called Fairy Creek is under threat right now with Teal Jones targeting old growth right against the ridgeline.

I put together this video with many links to pertinent ecological info and in depth photojournalism articles from when I explored Fairy Creek to raise awareness, please watch and help me get the word out