Alexandra Paul is a woman on a mission to save the world

On Thursdays, you can find her signing up people to vote. On Saturdays she may be helping at a soup kitchen. Just about every day actress Alexandra Paul is doing her part in making the world a better place.

She is an activist and environmentalist and she is passionate about everything she does. The former “Baywatch” beauty also continues to act. 

The thing that is close to her heart right now is peace. I’ve been a peace activist since I was a teenager and when I was in my 20s I went on the Great Peace March for nuclear disarmament that walked across the country for five weeks. I’ve been arrested at the nuclear testing sites protesting the use of nuclear weapons.”

The population issue is also something that concerns Paul. “The global human population is growing too fast,” Paul says. “We won’t be able to clean up the rivers or the air or deal with our toxic waste if our population continues to double. We add a billion people to our population every 10 years. The population has doubled in my lifetime. It’s a fundamental environmental issue. When I was born in 1963 the population was 3 billion and now it is 6 billion. It’s terrifying. We can’t afford that. It’s in our face but it’s not in our face in America. Our family size is small in America, and we need to keep it down to two kids per couple. I know that is a very hard thing for a lot of people. My parents had three kids, but we need to encourage people to have smaller families for the good of their children.”

Paul has some great ideas on recycling too. “One thing people could wake up and do tomorrow morning is instead of buying something new, they could buy something used,” Paul says. “Say, they want a new TV, they could go and buy a used one. Or they could get the one they have fixed. It seems a simple concept in conservation, but it’s hard to apply to your life. Every once in a while I’ll try going a month without buying anything new, except for food and soap. You have to be clean and fed. At first I panicked, then I realized I didn’t really need anything. I had everything I needed and I felt this huge weight being lifted off of my shoulders that I wouldn’t have to want, yearn or search for anything. We really do have everything. We could live on so much less and we don’t realize it.”

Her activism comes naturally Paul says. “My mother was a raging democrat and my father a raging republican,” she laughs. “We were always very aware of issues in our household. They didn’t rage at each other, but my mom voted, recycled, she gave blood and didn’t do it with a lot of fanfare. It was just a part of our life. When I was seventh grade I was at my friend’s house and I saw a cat food can in the garbage. I’d never seen a can in the garbage before. I was just stunned. I know that sounds strange, but we just didn’t throw things away. My mom was from England and grew up in the war and you just don’t waste things. It is something I feel like we have forgotten in this country.”