It Isn’t Easy Being Green

As people assemble on the National Mall to celebrate Earth Day today, the idea that man-made global warming is threatening our future seems a foregone conclusion.  But even the left-leaning New York Times recently featured an opposing view from famous physicist Freeman Dyson.  Keith Lockitch, a fellow at the Ayn Rand Institute, has been campaigning against environmentalism for a while now, and I encourage you to look back today at his 2007 article discussing the roots of the “green” movement.  Lockitch writes:

It isn’t news that environmentalism has gone mainstream in a big way–with organic food in every grocery store, hybrid cars on every freeway, and every mass-market magazine declaring green the “new black.” More than ever before, consumers are buying into environmentalist ideology–and buying products that purport to impact nature less, in order to impact nature less.

One would think that serious environmentalists would be thrilled about this trend–thrilled that the public seems willing to take ecological marching orders and do its duty to the planet. But they aren’t: A backlash against “buying green” has arisen in environmentalist circles, with critics disparaging the new eco-consumers as “light greens,” and condemning the “Cosmo-izing of the green movement.”

Surprising? Not really. Not if one grasps the deeper meaning of environmentalism.

Read the rest here.

Photo by Katherine.