Last week, Wal-Mart, ExxonMobil and the American Automobile Association (AAA) announced new programs that promote sustainability and a cleaner planet. The three corporations may have turned over a new leaf, but their efforts may actually be a case of corporate greenwashing. In today's economic climate, many companies are taking advantage of consumers that don't have the funds to be choosy about the environmental-friendliness of their purchases.
(As someone who spent years trying to make lifestyle politics a foundation for something more, I could not agree more with what this diary has to say. A MUST read. - promoted by Paul Rosenberg)
[Title changed to fit with Part II]
On the door of my local co-op is a green sign that says:
It's easy to make a difference!
Then it tells how to recycle your batteries.
But, of course, the ecological impact of recycling one battery (or ten, or a hundred) is so miniscule as to make no discernable difference at all. It literally DOES NOT MATTER whether I recycle a battery or not.
This is true for so many things that we are urged to do as our civic contribution to the world. It is, in fact, NOT easy to make a difference.
The lie of lifestyle activism is important in part because it bleeds off much of the energy that does exist in the world for social action. It also reveals some of the ways we deceive ourselves about effective civic engagement.
As many of you saw, San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom gave a green speech introduction for Van Jones on Sunday at Netroots Nation. But immediately after his green speech, a local blogger asked a very important question:
I just asked Newsom if he would support the Clean Energy Act. At first, he said yes -- absolutely. Then he said, "oh are you talking about the one about PG&E?" I said yes. He said, "oh no it's horrible." I asked him to elaborate, but he would not. I then asked, "is that because your consultant [Eric Jaye] is working for PG&E?" Newsom denied it, but really. It was kinda pathetic.
Indeed. As we all know, Al Gore thinks the entire country needs to go 100% clean electrically by 2019 and Mayor Newsom won't try for his city to do the same by 2040?
So there's this sudden faux-grassroots movement on the right to open up all of our wildlife reserves and our shores for oil drilling, under the pretense that it'll reduce our dependence on foreign oil and lower prices at the pump. It's even got a catchy, easily memorable slogan: "Drill Here, Drill Now, Pay Less." And it's all the rage in East Wingnuttia.
Too bad that it's completely wrong and as far from the truth as one can get while still being in the same space/time continuum.
