How Environmentalism Entered the Mainstream

If you've been reading this blog for some time, you know I've been highly critical of the modern environmental movement. It is by no means something new. It has evolved over the centuries to evoke different meanings with different ends. However, it has only recently broke into being the mainstream. I'm pretty sure when someone 20 years from now asks what the 2000s were like, I think environmentalism will be what defines it just as much as hippies did in the '60s. It will be one of those movements that gains mainstream ground for a decade of so to the chagrin of realistic thinkers but by decades out, likely around the mid 2010s, it will have lost its steam.

Environmentalism, as we know it today evolved with the hippie movement in the 1960s and began to bloom out in the 1970s. Greenpeace got its start in the 60s, founded by environmentalists such as Hunter Thompson, best known to younger audiences as a disheveled man who used to read from newspapers in his bath robe on CITY TV's Breakfast Television.
I think we all remember Jane Fonda's "China Syndrome" warning us of the perils of nuclear energy, which turned out to be mostly false. Chernobyl being the one major exception due to its lack of proper safeguards but even many experts say that aftermath of the disaster was largely inflated by the media. Indeed the 70s and 80s were filled with fears of the "nuclear bogeyman" as Mr Burns of Simpsons fame put it. The 70s also hailed fears of global cooling. That we would be entering another ice age by the 2000s. That idea was developed as early as the 1950s but never came to pass. Then in the 90s we had the rain forest "crisis" and "save the whales." The Ozone Layer hole was another big thing in the 1990s. This eventually transitioned into global warming.
Global warming itself is not new either. It was first talked about in the late 1800s. At UTM in Mississauga Ontario, there is a photo from a news clipping taken around that time of smoke stacks, captioned with worries about pollution.

The environmental movement has always been preaching apocalypse. The global warming "crisis" is no different. What has perplexed me is why this has become a mainstream issue. The problem with humans is that we are sheep. We'd follow the flock of the end of a cliff if the Sheppard directed us there. The Christian church has been using the sheep analogy for centuries now. We have to stay with the fold or else we've strayed. That explains the stigma against those people who have done the research and choose not to believe in global warming based on hard science. Celebrity has largely been feeding the anti-global warming movement. Big names like Arnold Schwarzenegger have feed the flames. Al Gore, once regarded as a dull, bland second banana to the charismatic Bill Clinton has now gained celebrity status in his own right, surpassing the fame of his former boss. I think its worth noting that Schwarzenegger was the first person to own a civilian Humvee. Before, the gas guzzling leviathan of the roads was strictly an armored military transport. Shortly after, the H1 was introduced for general sale. Al Gore himself lives in a huge mansion more than double the size of George W Bush's ranch house in Texas, and consuming just as much more electricity. That coming from someone who's advocated downsizing to reduce energy needs. Gore also flies everywhere in his own private jet, rather than commercial. Ironically, he demands that only sedans, not SUVs pick him up at the airport to take him to events. I highly doubt that Gore (or more precisely his hired help) drives that Prius to 7/11 when he has a midnight craving for Twinkies. I also doubt that Gore's gardener cuts the grass of his massive property using a push mower. These people are hypocrites in every sense of the word yet people still follow them, blindly.
Gore's reasons are obvious. He's an attention whore. I haven't yet ruled out of running for president in 2008 either. He says he won't but most think he will. It would certainly give him quite the edge over his competitors, namely Hilary Clinton and Barack Obama. The latter of which being the only breath of fresh air in the US Democratic party, which has flip flopped on nearly every single issue, particularly Iraq. The same reasons go for the Governator Arnold. Arnold is a Republican (who won be default I might add) in California, a stanch Democratic state. He needs the issue to stay in office.

All that though still doesn't explain why ordinary people hopped on the bandwagon to be led to slaughter. Why people would now pay $200 for clumsy and inefficient push mowers and buy hybrid cars that do 0-60 in 3.6 minutes and use no less gas in the long run. I guess there's no doubting the lemming effect and human stupidity in general. Humans are very easily frightened. Disturbing indeed because once you get them scared, they will do just about anything.