You accuse me of cardboard cut-outs and once again raise the spectre of my allegedly arguing for the destruction of the environment. I say, again, not that old canard. I have never stated that making the world uninhabitable would be a good thing. Straw man argument. Once more for the road: I am arguing for a rational approach to resource use based on human need.
The left does, or at least did, stand for complete human freedom. Clearly you have not read Marx who spent a lot of time criticising the bourgeois conception of freedom as half-formed.
"political emancipation itself is not human emancipation." "Bourgeois 'freedom of conscience' is nothing but the toleration of all possible kinds of religious freedom of conscience, and that for its part [socialism] endeavors rather to liberate the conscience from the witchery of religion." Critique of the Gotha Program
"[Communism is] the positive transcendence of private property, or human self-estrangement, and therefore the real appropriation of the human essence by and for man [...] the complete return of man to himself as a social being." Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts of 1844
Just two random examples, there are hundreds more.
That you're not aware of this simply illustrates the crapness of the left over the last fifty years. Surely, though, you must be aware of anarchists' commitment to complete human freedom, even if it appears to be largely rhetorical to me at least?
The Barbelith thread I linked to may well be absurd but that is part of my point: there seems to be a cultural inclination for enjoying worst case scenarios.
I think that in the context of the third world the concept is indeed a "ruling class stalking horse", though I put the term in quotation marks because I do not see it as some kind of organised policy, programme or, indeed, conspiracy. Things just seem to have worked out that way.
On the penchant for selling green and psuedo-green products, solutions and, let's face it, indulgences, I would expect no less from capitalism, a form of economic organisation that would happily sell me a box of Ronald Reagan's faeces (or Karl Marx's for that matter) if it thought I might buy it.
What I find sickening, though, is that at one of the things that the left prided itself on was its support for the third world liberation, supporting people in their struggles against old-fashioned imperialism. Today I see no such thing, just ridiculous schemes such as 'drop the debt' et al which compound the problem with their strings-attached approach and demands for consumption to be cut. China is, I believe, about to pass the US in terms of its carbon output. Given that freedom is dependent on economic development, something that history has made absolutely clear, what can be said about that? Should the people of China be condemned to the current social relations which are far from ideal, to say the least?
What about India? What about Africa? These people need jobs, real jobs that pay real money. For comparative purposes, think of microfinance. It's a sham, a chimera of economic development that does virtually nothing to improve people's conditions and yet, apparently, it's the best we have to offer the poor. To hell with that.
I admit that that issue is more nuanced in the first world. The idea that consumption is somehow pushed on people I have some difficulty with. I accept that society and economic are certainly organised for consumption (much to the detriment of production, a serious problem with all manner of consequences) and that, to a degree, finances are buoyed-up by personal debt and spending. On the other hand it is impossible to argue that people are consuming against their will. On one level the ability to buy more things represents, quite simply, having more money and as such is something to be celebrated. If one wants to divorce this from energy or resource consumption one might make an argument for some of the alternative technologies discussed elsewhere in this thread.
Nevertheless, I think it's impossible to say that the tide isn't turning. A few years ago confirmed capitalists didn't even make a pretence of being interested in environmental matters. Now we see the likes of the Financial Times articles I pointed to along with all manner of things such as cap and trade and carbon offsetting, both of which, I might add, have been lambasted as idiotic by some environmentalists. I say the ruling ideas are those of the ruling class.
If the capitalists really wanted to see untrammelled development and increased consumption why would their house journal be publishing the likes of this:
"Though the picture of climate change painted in the report is bleak, the report showed signs of agreement that the costs of avoiding the worst effects are not as great as had been feared. Prof Grubb said: “You could not conceive that this report would have been agreed two years ago, when the US was in a completely different position regarding the economics of climate change.”
"Price of climate action 3% of GDP, Financial Times
Beware the carbon offsetting cowboys, Financial Times
"Climate change is no longer a fringe issue; even investment bankers are worried about it."
Climate change, Financial Times
That is just three articles. The FT publishes them daily. Visit the site and have a look around. Is it too much of a stretch to suggest that these people might have a different class interest from me? If it is too much then I must demure on the grounds that political debate has apparently been rendered obsolete by rising temperatures.
Here's some more on the business elite's changed position from a leftie that is happy about it, though dismissive of their efforts so far.
My take on Gaia theory is very much the mainstream one, I'm sorry to inform you. I cited the Taylor article, among others, but I did so critically as you can see from my comment: Distressingly, the article continues: "And while each of these perspectives has its merits". Do they? I can't see any.
Lovelock is deeply problematic. I see that no-one had attempted to address my questioning his statement that the UK is "so urbanised as to be like a large city", something which is clearly and demonstrably bunk.
You say: "Ill-informed opinions are a problem, I agree, but if anything, common scientific misunderstanding more often leads us to err on the side of ecosystem destruction. Yes that's a potential (well, actual) problem, but could happen regardless of how egalitarian or oppressive a political system is."
They might and they might not. I don't have access to figures but I suppose the balance may lie in the direction you indicate.
However, we see poor science in the opprobrium over thalidomide, DDT, GM crops—all for what seemed like good reasons, but all three have much to contribute. Thalidomide has proven its usefulness again and again when used appropriately. DDT made a massive contribution to the eradication of malaria in many places, something we won't even countenance now in Africa.
In all three cases criticism was not unwarranted but I don't think much was achieved by knee-jerk banning. |
