Maybe it's the Obama presidency, but there's a LOT of magazine and newspaper coverage of "green" issues. For example, the latest issue of Make magazine is about "sustainability", and I picked up a Chicago magazine that features the best backyard gardens, which touted the greeness of growing your own food.
I've notices that a lot of the green coverage is about "what can you do to lower your carbon footprint", or similar claptrap. They go on to offer almost meaningless ways to lessen energy or materials usage.
For example, one article wanted you to lower your water usage by using low flow fixtures.
The reality is that replacing perfectly good fixtures with low flow ones is false economy. It takes energy to make the new fixtures. It will be years before you get any payback on that.
But doing so makes you feel better about yourself. There is some existentail satisfaction from making the changes.
This is not unlike saying the Rosary or some other prayer. Thus, I think that, for a lot of people, environmentalism is filling a void in atheists souls. They don't have the internal satisfaction that comes with being a believer in a higher power. In the past, they filled that void with socialism or communism (which were VERY religion-like). Now they fill it with environmentalism.
In the aggregate, my energy usage is almost meaningless. CO2 levels are where they are because of past fossil fuel usage, and even if we all stopped emitting any CO2, it would take decades for CO2 levels to come down. So what's the point of being green?
It's the existential satisfaction. It's not logical, it's spiritual.
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3 comments:
buzz, if you want a good read go to the library and pick up "unstoppable global warming". I can't recall the authors off the top of my head, but they are listed on my website. its about natural global warming vs. man made and why the facts are much more in favor of natural, unstoppable global warming. The authors won a bunch of awards for it in the environmental community, but you won't hear Al Gore talk about it.
While you may not pay off your investment for many years, the water that will be saved will be well worth the extra cost
Anon, no it won't. If you're throwing out a perfectly good toilet, or shower head, or light bulb, how is that "green"? What about all the energy that it takes to build that new fixture? The energy that it takes to get it from China to your home? What about the landfill that your old fixtures are going in to?
I've noticed that corporations have totally bought into "green". It's a way to make you throw out your perfectly good stuff and buy new ones. Instead of "conspicuous consumption", we now have "green guilt".
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