I am a lazy environmentalist in many ways and love that she works so hard but I found myself annoyed by everything about her approach.
Firstly I never really understand, "Women's environmentalism" in the same way that I don't understand "Catholic environmental" groups. There are certainly policy differences between environmental groups but these aren't along the lines of sex or religion. Anyway I won't get into that.
I don't blog EVER and I suppose that is because in my time learning to be an academic I have come to dislike hastily blocked together arguments. Lets see if I can get over that here.
My main problem came with her argument that the Iraq war protests "didn't work" and so protest is basically useless and democracy is somehow failed in that way.
I hate that argument. It suggests that a big protest is the equivalent of a vote and that the people that shout the loudest ought to be listened to the most. If there had been a referendum on the Iraq war before we went I am in no way sure that we would not have voted in favour.
Check the Polls here for dates just before the war http://ukpollingreport.co.uk/blog/iraq they are pretty inconclusive. Where the no's have it there is a significant number of undecideds.
But that isn't really the point. The point is that a large protest does not equal a majority and a small protest does not mean that nobody cares. The size of a protest is as much about the political activism of the interested parties as anything else. Very few scientists are likely to march in the Science is Vital campaign (and it is by the way) not because it isn't important or correct or because it wouldn't win a referendum. Scientists just aren't that political. Organising them at all is like herding the proverbial. If they were politically active they would be paid better have better/some job security and.... I'm off the point
She then decides that civil disobedience is the only way forward.
Well... i'm not AGAINST civil disobedience. i think protests are important... But I suppose I can't help but notice how much fun it all looks. The guys who are boarding boats for greenpeace strut around like eco-commandoes they love it....
How much of what they do gets into the news? How many of their direct action campaigns actually cause serious damage to energy companies. in short who give a crap? I hadn't even heard of the Climate rush which took 1000 people to shove some police rather gently for a little while outside parliament.
I don't fault their energy but I suspect that they choose the path they consider the most fun rather than the path which would actually change things the most.
If you really want to help the job isn't to scream at government. What should be happening is far more individual and boring. We should be getting activists to learn as much as they can and then go out to convince the people... House by house.. school by school...
I love abseiling and shoving people around. I just save that for the climbing wall and rugby pitch.
If you want to save the world I'd start with your next door neighbour. Not that I will. But I'm lazy and will stick to doing sums for t'environment.
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