A blog by Calgary freelance writer Jeremy Klaszus.
Greenpeace grabs more headlines — but to what end?
Posted by Jeremy Klaszus in Klaszus CornerI spent a bit of time this morning watching live video of Greenpeace's latest tar sands stunt — this time at Shell's Albian Sands mine, where activists spread a big banner on the ground ("Tar Sands: Climate Crime"), chained themselves to stuff and talked about the importance of stopping the tar sands. Predictable Greenpeace fare, in other words.
Lots of folks will be impressed by this stunt. I'm less impressed — especially after reading the cover story of the latest Walrus magazine, a scathing critique of the modern environmental movement by Calgary writer Chris Turner. If anyone cares about climate change and sustainability it's him, and yet he sees Greenpeace-style environmentalism as a failure. Proof? Despite the anti-industrial efforts of environmentalists, "the earth’s natural wonders have never been closer to collapse," he writes.
Turner offers an alternative to all the protesting and chaining and blockading — but you're gonna have to read the story to find out what it is.
There's no question that Greenpeace is good at grabbing headlines. They succeeded at it again this morning. But is that enough? Is it ultimately helpful? Chris's story will likely get you thinking about these things a little differently. The Walrus even has this nifty little trailer as a foretaste:
Coming soon: video trailers for Fast Forward cover stories! (Okay, not really...)
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Comments: 4
active.citizen wrote:
Not having read it yet (obviously), I have to point out the fallacy in concluding that Greenpeace-style direct action doesn't work because the "earth's natural wonders have never been closer to collapse". In the absence of Greenpeace (as an example), maybe the natural wonders would have collapsed a decade ago. Fortunately, we don't have a controlled, random study for comparison.
on Sep 15th, 2009 at 2:14pm Report Abuse
Dr John O'Connor wrote:
At the end of the day, with the direction we have been pushed in, all of us MUST be Activists.
The driving force and the motivation for all of the environmental destruction we as a species have witnessed on this earth has been money. Whether it be jailed pensioners in the west of Ireland trying to protect centuries-sacred wetlands ripped apart for Shell, Aboriginal communities fighting for the preservation of their livelihoods and lives, or conscientious young adults courageous enough to stand up for what is right, we must respect their efforts.
Few if any of us have been trained for the job of defending the earth.
on Sep 15th, 2009 at 8:22pm Report Abuse
Jeremy Klaszus wrote:
active.citizen — even if the environmental movement has delayed disaster by a decade, the situation is still worse than it's ever been. I do agree with Chris when he says the environmental movement has been largely ineffective... it doesn't resonate with many people and environmental destruction — mining the tar sands, for example — keeps on. Trying a new approach seems like a wise idea to me...
John: good to hear your take on this. It's too bad that as a society, we attach so much value to cash but less value to our air, our water, trees, animals etc. That definitely needs to change somehow... I guess soon we'll have no choice but to change that.
I like Chris's story because he's proposing a whole new way of approaching and dealing with these questions. Thought-provoking stuff.
on Sep 15th, 2009 at 11:25pm Report Abuse
kreve09 wrote:
on Sep 17th, 2009 at 8:05am Report Abuse
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