Green Day

Every year April 22nd is Green Day, a world wide alleged environmental educational day. This started in 1970 and many consider that the birth of the modern environmental movement happened because of Green Day. That is good because humans do pollute and destroy their environment too much. But I wonder sometimes if some of the rhetoric about environmentalism isn't killing the movement itself. The gross, exaggerations about the "global warming" theory, for example, has made many distrust anything that movement says. Falsified data, bizarre conclusions and very selective and slanted views don't help convinced others of a theory. In short, the environmentalists have dropped the ball with their poor communication skills.

Nonetheless, the Green movement has been an overall success in making many people in many countries (though few in the underdeveloped lands that struggle so much economically that being green is a pipe dream, and where much of the environmental abuse happens) better educated and more aware of the need to reduce waste and make choices that are less harsh for the environment. But I think the environmental movement has clumsily mis stepped in its attempts through the arrogance and intolerance in its confusing messages. Perhaps it should narrow its focus on real environmental threats and not demonize those who resist the gospel of the movement. If so, the public might be more receptive to the messages environmentalism sends out.

The language environmentalists use is often false, silly and deceptive (the term "climate deniers" may be the best example of disingenuous rhetoric by some environmentalists) .  "Global Warming", for instance, as a name for a theory that human beings change climate, is so wrong that the movement itself denounced the term and substituted a less silly "climate change" for it.  And ignoring the idiotic ramblings of shysters like Al Gore was a move forward.  But what is the message today about the subject? Uh, it's too bizarre to ever understand.  And this is why theories that humans control climate and are changing it should be banished from the Green crowd's rhetoric. Instead,  focusing on real environmental problems that humans know are real might be a better approach and make the world take the message more seriously.

My own suggestion is to promote the world overpopulation problem in poor nations as the single biggest environmental concern (it clearly is), and the one that humans can most easily attack. Reduce the population and all the other environmental concerns start to disappear, as resources are no longer consumed at alarmingly high levels. It's a simple concept that people see every day and fully understand and believe. Unlike politicians, who are politically correct and concerned about offending those whose support they need, the environmentalist can speak freely and honestly to point that the huge population boom is the real deleterious impact on the earth. People don't listen when the speech is nonsense, as in the global warming silliness.  But they do see overpopulation's effects every day of their lives.

I see the Green movement as one of the most important vehicles to educate and enable the population to force the political world to make the changes necessary that really could make the world run cleaner and with less damage to the environment.  Gee, if  it really would happen the way I envision maybe we can draw straws to see who gets to be a member of the Al Gore firing squad......