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March 23, 2007

An Inconvenient Truth and Trendy Environmentalism?

I was reading this NY Times article about a family experimenting in a low-impact lifestyle that includes using no paper- even toilet paper. It reminded me of the headlining article in the UTC Echo this week, which was on the favorable response towards the possibility of a $10 fee that would help fun cleaning up UTC's pollution and increase cleanliness suggested by campus environmental group Campus EDGE. Not three years ago I tried to draft and distribute a survey in conjuncton with whatever group was EDGE's predecessor on a similar topic. Sadly, my survey on retrofitting buildings and instituting programs to improve campus sustainability never made it past the huge batch of e-mails I sent to professors and other univeristy admin requesting the distribution of the survey to their classes. A friend happened to pick up one of the papers while I was standing next to the news stand today, and I told him about how EDGE has finally succeeded where I failed, and I asked, "I wonder what's changed in the past three years to make this possible." He responded, "An Inconvenient Truth."

It seems that between the Bush administration's blunders and Al Gore's timely concern people are starting to think about the planet again. Even Oscar competitor Jesus Camp made some mention of how environmentalism fits into today's culture-- the topic of conservation was brought up to one of the Evangelicals the film was following, and the subject responded with something about how God put the Earth's resources here for us to use, and they'll last until the second coming/rapture/apocalypse, etc.

I sure hope this trend lasts longer than the Earth Day fuss in the 80s...

Posted by Spike at 01:05 AM | Comments (0)

March 15, 2007

Inconsistancies

I have been gone from this blog for a long time-- too much to do that isn't interesting enough to make time for blogging. However, something that has been on my mind a lot lately seems very bloggable.

I was once quite active in the local environmental and activist scene. I did my stint as a dirty hippie and have given interviews on why I objected to a certain logging project while hanging 50 feet up in a tree. However, I gave up on that lifestyle and scene a long time ago, after getting really frustrated with the inconsistancies in the hippie lifestyle. Some friends of mine I continue to have a very deep respect for. They know where they stand, why, and don't run into a whole lot of hypocrisy as they attempt to live completely by their ideals. However, others I encountered during my flower child phase and even today have a peculiar lack of education into matters that they supposedly feel so strongly about that they prosthelatize to every tom dick and harry who passes by. Little matters like vegitarians who promote soy as an environmentally-friendly alternative to meat, ignoring that most soy products in the United States are grown from Roundup-Ready soy beans, which are genetically engineered to resit Round-Up brand herbicides, pesticides and fetizliers. While the real deal about genetic engineering hasn't been figured out yet, it does pose some potential environmental risks, and the use of chemicals in agriculture has been shown to have a negative impact. Also, those inside and outside the hippie scene who modify their diets to avoid the cruelty that exists in the industrial meat industry suddenly seem to ignore the plight of animals who are tested upon by beauty product manufacturers. Keroacean roadtrips are favored above airplane trips, which despite the amounts of fuel used pose less impact that cars (although this may certainly be due to there being more car fuel burned than jet fuell).

However you want to cut the pie, living by one's beliefs rather than the image of one's belief seems to be easier said than done.

Posted by Spike at 06:55 PM | Comments (0)