Having finally gotten the memo that the debate on climate change science is over, conservatives now need a new attack on green advocates. It appears they're reverting to an old standby: hypocrisy. Watch (via Hugg) as FOX News' Sean Hannity lays out the charge against Al Gore:
The hypocrisy attack on environmentalists is extremely common, so it's worth discussing why it's almost entirely bogus. I've inveighed against it numerous times (see here, here, here, here, and here), but once more for the cheap seats.
Hannity fails to mention that Al Gore works hard to mitigate his impact on the climate. Gore purchases offsets to account for the carbon emissions of all his air travel, just as he did for his movie and his book. He purchases green power for his home, drives a hybrid, and flies commercial when possible. But he's no doubt slipped up and there's no doubt more he could do. A snide, tabloidy cable-TV debate over Gore's personal rectitude is just what conservatives want. It's red meat and character assassination rather than substantive policy debate (i.e., it's FOX).
But it's utterly beside the point. Nobody -- least of all Al Gore -- would claim that it's possible in today's world to be a high-profile issue advocate without negatively affecting the environment. It's scarcely possible to be a functioning citizen of a developed country without having a substantial environmental footprint.
The merits of carbon offsets are hotly debated, so erring on the side of caution would mean abjuring all carbon-emitting activities. That rules out all non-self-propelled travel; it means going off-grid and growing all one's own food and neither participating in nor purchasing the results of any industrial process. Etc. It's possible to reduce one's environmental footprint substantially, even to get it close to zero, but it requires extraordinary effort and self-discipline, and a life far, far out of the mainstream in any developed country.
Almost by definition, very few people are going to attempt that kind of lifestyle. Does that make all greens who fall short of that mark hypocrites?
Of course not. The primary message of the green movement is not that everyone should become monks. The primary message is that we need to change the system -- the laws and physical infrastructure that underpin our collective life. We need a new industrial revolution that makes eco-friendly living the default choice, the one that requires little thought, much less heroics.
On the positive side, that means changing the way we produce electricity. It means creating benign ways of traveling. It means figuring out how to build zero-impact houses and buildings, shifting to sustainable agriculture, and creating dense, walkable, safe cities. On the negative side, it means putting a steep price on carbon, either through taxes or cap and trade systems. It means removing subsidies from fossil fuel industries, internalizing pollution costs for other industries, and pouring massive amounts of R&D into clean energy. (For more on green solutions, see here.)
These are the kinds of things Gore is out stumping for. If he helps achieve these changes, the good that results will outweigh his personal environmental footprint by many orders of magnitude. If he can't succeed in generating these kinds of changes, reducing his personal environmental footprint will amount to pissing in the wind. The system's got to change or we're all screwed, whether or not Al Gore occasionally flies on a private plane.
Living an eco-friendly lifestyle is a mark of personal virtue, but nothing will substitute for systemic changes in the way the world economy operates.
Gore's personal environmental footprint is irrelevant. Don't get sucked into Hannity's distractions.
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Comments
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TariffDude Posted 9:06 am
21 Feb 2007
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David Roberts Posted 9:19 am
21 Feb 2007
www.grist.org
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Biodiversivist Posted 9:49 am
21 Feb 2007
In the end, it all comes down to biodiversity. Poison Darts--Protecting the biodiversity of our world
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David Roberts Posted 10:00 am
21 Feb 2007
www.grist.org
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Biodiversivist Posted 12:33 pm
21 Feb 2007
In the end, it all comes down to biodiversity. Poison Darts--Protecting the biodiversity of our world
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Tod Posted 12:47 pm
21 Feb 2007
To the Grist readers who believe we've time on our hands (like Boxer and her fifty year plan):
You do realize that we are absolutely and undeniably fucked, right? The United States, as the primary culprit, must become a leader in environmental reform yet between our two parties (what a joke), neither is dedicated or interested in making immediate, massive changes in the way we live, work, play, eat, commute, consume. No, they are both concerned with the popularity of such legislation, and losing the power base of their party. They still (and most ignorant U.S. citizens - kept that way, mind you, so it isn't their/our fault, right?) don't get it: If we don't act RIGHT NOW, the Earth as we know it will be unlivable in a few short decades. I've seen Barbara Boxer's proposal to reduce emissions by 2050. Who the hell is she kidding? By 2050, it's all over. Yet, do people really give a shit? I don't think enough of us do. So many I see are still overly enamored with their iMacs or their iPhones or their brand new homes. So many dumb-ass ostriches with their heads in the sand. Sure, they're wearing ear buds attached to their iPods, listening to a mix of NPR and Arcade Fire (if this is you, pull that iStick out of your ass and get with the program), so they know what is happening and they talk the talk (they even browse Treehugger and Grist and, of course, own a copy of Worldchanging), but they don't really, ultimately, give a shit. If they did, they could not, would not, will not, place blind faith in a political party (take your pick but we know that which party these cookie-cutter folks vote for) to take us to the promised land. Keep an eye of the 2008 presidential elections. When it's over, millions of `liberals' will have voted for either a rabidly pro-war candidate with zero points for environmental progressivism (Hillary) or one who knows very little about the issue and believes in liquid coal as the future (Obama). When it's over, so too, will we be. And, yet, some of you still think we can save ourselves with the ballot box. I HATE YOU and your willful ignorance.
Phew. Yeah, I lifted it from my lame blog, but I just don't have the energy to spew twice in 24 hours. Need to take a nap in between, don't you know.
Oh, do I care about Gore's jet travels? Not a whit. It's inane to criticize him for this when he can be hung from a high tree for many other crimes of negligence. Would I vote for him in '08? Probably.
"Because the world doesn't matter if you don't have the strength to go ahead and choose something that's really true." - Julio Cortazar
http://www.todbrilliant.com
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ccdangelo Posted 3:07 pm
21 Feb 2007
Chip chip cheerio.
Caroline
http://www.scrambledtoast.blogspot.com
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OffGridNick Posted 6:49 pm
21 Feb 2007
And Al is a tired, discredited old hack who is preaching only to the converted. The huge influx of newly converted green supporters pay no attention to him, and he is actively damaging the cause by associating himself with it.
Please see my article "Gore is a Bore" on http://www.off-grid.net for full details.
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amazingdrx Posted 10:21 pm
21 Feb 2007
It is THE wakeup call on GHG global climate disaster. What has "Insanity" (Hanity) done about any vital issue ever? Helped get the Iraq war started and keep it going.
Good job! Insanity has helped bring the world to the brink of nuke-you-ler crusade over oil.
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog
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tomatlee Posted 2:21 am
27 Feb 2007
I'm not talking about using the existing system to change the existing rules (e.g., lobbying Congress for a carbon tax). I'm talking about changing the system itself, so that wiser decisions get made.
I discuss many innovations for that on the Co-Intelligence Institute website (especially "Using Citizen Deliberative Councils to Make Democracy More Potent and Awake") and the Innovations in Democracy Project site, as well as my book The Tao of Democracy: Using Co-Intelligence to Create a World that Works for All. Many of the best of these innovations aren't just good ideas, but have actually been done and proven, here and there around the world. I just pull them together into a bigger picture of possibility.
Since I'm interested not just in democracy, but in wise democracy -- and we've all seen landslide support for truly stupid initiatives or candidates (even occasionally when there isn't gross manipulation of the system) -- I'm interested in democratic approaches that can elicit the latent capacity for diverse ordinary people to come to decisions that are wiser than any of them could have made alone.
When the environmental movement puts significant resources into campaigns to institutionalize that sort of democracy, then every law, policy and budget we want to propose would at last get a sensible hearing because we have changed the SYSTEM in which society's decisions get made.
Gore is doing a fabulous job putting climate change on the public agenda. But we can't expect him to do everything. It is up to us to put systems change on the agenda. If we in the environmental movement -- including Grist, Worldchanging, WISER Earth, etc. -- were to put as much emphasis on change in the decision-making systems as we put into regime change, new laws, and changes in industry and lifestyle, our work would become progressively easier and easier.
The challenge of climate change has inspired more of us to begin to think systemically about natural feedback loops and our economic and industrial systems. I hope that the only reason we have so far neglected to think systemically about our democratic system is that most of us don't see how it could be improved to make it actually up to the task it faces. In that hope, I offer the resources above.
For an example of the kind of on-the-ground initiative I'm talking about, see Healthy Democracy Oregon's Citizen Initiative Review.
The conscious evolution of social systems is underway. We can make it more conscious. co-intelligence.org
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dhwert Posted 1:51 am
28 Feb 2007
Sure, "the system" needs changing, but to act as if individual actions are unimportant and system changes are all important is a terrible mistake. And one that's all too common, as shown by quite a few "revolutions" in the past century or five.
A collection of individual actions do change the system; witness the organic foods movement.
No, we can't all be monks, but who am I more likely to listen to, Thich Nhat Hanh and Thomas Merton (speaking of monks), or some upper-middle-class enviro blogger who says, "do as I say, not as I do"? Easy answer. Personal integrity leads to being taken seriously. Hypocrisy does not.
How, in fact, do you propose changing "the system" when you don't even expect individuals to change? How can "the system" (involving millions and billions of us making daily decisions) magically change if people can't? Isn't "the system" made up of people? If it's so hard for individuals to become "monks", how can we possibly make "the system" a monk (for that is what you are proposing, in essence)?
Good luck with that.
If environmental footprints are relevant in general, then no one's individual environmental footprint is irrelevant. Otherwise you're saying they only matter for those people over there, you know the ones, they drive big cars, go to Nascar, that sort of thing. Please. We're all in this together.
Dave
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dualdraco Posted 6:02 pm
19 Feb 2008
THE SYSTEM. It DOES need to be changed. Top-down, bottom-up, laterally, quietly, by revolution, doesn't matter. The current system (talkin' world governmental/social/economic system for the most part) is the death knell for the Human Race as we know it (not the world--she'll regenerate after we're gone.) And yes, I REALLY believe all that. Read Robert Pirsig (the first book, 'Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance', for some fantastic views on the "System." A real expert there, Pirsig...an INTELLIGENT expert!
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