Saturday 2 October 2010

A portrait of Dorian Gray as an environmentalist [update 7]

Just as people do, just as Dorian Gray’s portrait did, movements too sometime show their real face—they let it slip—and what they reveal sometimes looks nothing like you thought they would. Behind the mask is someone quite different.

Back in April, for example, Greenpeace took time off from cuddling dolphins and claiming polar bears are becoming extinct to berate their enemies on their website, saying “We need to hit them where it hurts most, by any means necessary: through the power of our votes, our taxes, our wallets, and more…”

_Quote_Idiot The proper channels have failed. It’s time for mass civil disobedience to cut off the oxygen from denial and skepticism.
    If you’re one of those who believe that this is not just necessary but also possible, speak to us. Let’s talk about what that mass civil disobedience is going to look like.
    If you’re one of those who have spent their entire lives undermining progressive climate legislation, bankrolling junk science, fueling spurious debates around false solutions, and cattle-prodding democratically-elected governments into submission, then hear this:
     We know who you are. We know where you live. We know where you work.
    And we be many, but you be few.

The offending post was swiftly removed and quarantined, replaced with a bland acknowledgement that something had gone wrong, and soothing words about how easy it is to “misconstrue” this sort of thing—or perhaps even “take it out of context.” 

Yeah right.

Something had gone wrong, all right. For just one moment the mask had come off. That the piece had been written, published and promoted showed that no-one saw anything wrong with it at all—not until the phone calls and emails started coming in. This was how they felt.

Look, this really is how they feel. Remember this piece of fascist tripe they peddled a few years ago? A snotty kid warning his “enemies.” i.e., you and I.

Or this sick piece of inhuman gloating put out by the World Wildlife Fund.

289407be4759e9c4a23cfb25bdd4bde6Scratch so many environmentalists, and this really is how they feel.  This is what’s behind the mask. In their view, humans come a distant second to “a wild and healthy planet.” We are at best simply here to “provide stewardship for the environment”—to “sweep the rain forests and rake the beaches”—and if we’re not going to be obedient, we can go.

Fundamentally, according to so many environmentalists, “the extinction of the human species may not only be inevitable, but a good thing...

That’s how they feel.

This week the mask slipped again.

A bunch of British environmentalists got behind the 10:10 climate campaign—an anti-industrial campaign sponsored by the UK Taxpayer, ActionAid, The Carbon Trust, and The Energy Saving Trust—to produce a celebrity video they thought was “extremely funny.” Written by New Zealander Richard Curtis (writer of Black Adder, Four Weddings & A Funeral, Notting Hill etc.) and starring every luvvie looking to advance their career, it shows precisely what’s going on behind the mask. It was lovingly put together, widely promoted, then sent out proudly onto the high seas of the world’s media to make its point.

It did. People saw it, and immediately understood: This is how these people really think. This is what’s behind the fury. No wonder everyone involved is now ducking for cover.

Watch it yourself, and see why.

Dorian Gray is getting old.

[Hat tip Jonathan V.]

UPDATE 1:  Turns out O2, Sony and Kyocera helped pay for this illustrative piece of man-hating, with The Guardian acting as a “media partner.” So if you want to express your disgust, those would be good places to start.

UPDATE 2Gareth Renowden at NZ’s warmist Hot Topic blog reckons 10:10’s sick misanthropy  is “on the button,” and that those who don’t laugh must have “a sense of humour failure.”  Yes, exploding children has always been funny.
Commenters have been deservedly telling him what a vile turd he’s revealed himself to be.

UPDATE 3: Updated the post with the WWF poster from a couple of years ago. Hat tip Whale Oil.

UPDATE 4: Richard Treadgold has posted contact addresses of the main sponsors, and an apology from o2—and anyone who supports Tottenham Hotspur might want to drop them a line.  And it turns out there are rather more 10:10 sponsors than first thought.

UPDATE 5: Cuddly old warmist Bill McKibben from 350.Org announces he is ‘Shocked! Shocked!’ that his friends at 10:10 could do such a thing. [Hat tip Watts Up With That]

_Quote_Idiot The climate skeptics can crow.  It’s the kind of stupidity that hurts our side, reinforcing in people’s minds a series of preconceived notions, not the least of which is that we’re out-of-control and out of touch — not to mention off the wall, and also with completely misplaced sense of humor… There’s no question that crap like this will cast a shadow, for a time, over our efforts and everyone else who’s working on global warming.

Of course, McKibben certainly knows what crap looks like and how to keep it hidden, because he’s been keeping up his mask since his 1989 diatribe The End of Nature, in which he quoted approvingly this “benediction to alligators “by John Muir, founder of the Sierra Club.  "A good epigram" he called it:

_Quote_IdiotHonorable representatives of the great saurians of older creation, may you long enjoy your lilies and rushes, and be blessed now and then with a mouthful of terror-stricken man by way of a dainty.

And in a glowing review of Bill’s diatribe, National Park Service biologist David Graber showed he “gets it” too.

_Quote_IdiotWe are not interested in the utility of a particular species, or free-flowing river, or ecosystem to mankind [said Davo]. They have intrinsic value, more value—to me—than another human body, or a billion of them.… It is cosmically unlikely that the developed world will choose to end its orgy of fossil-energy consumption, and the Third World its suicidal consumption of landscape. Until such time as Homo sapiens should decide to rejoin nature, some of us can only hope for the right virus to come along.

“McKibben is a biocentrist,” said Graber, “and so am I.”

If “wishing for the right virus to come along” is what it means to be a “biocentrist” – if wishing alligators “a mouthful of terror-stricken man” is what it means to “get it,” then what Bill and his comrades can go and get is to get fucked.

NB 1: More similar quotes from McKibben’s confreres here.

UPDATE 6: George Reisman comments on the Toxicity of Environmentalism here, which discusses McKibben while neatly putting this whole discussion into  context—making clear why none of these ads or statements are any accident.

_Quote Recently a popular imported mineral water was removed from the market because tests showed that samples of it contained thirty-five parts per billion of benzene. Although this was an amount so small that only fifteen years ago it would have been impossible even to detect, it was assumed that considerations of public health required withdrawal of the product.
    Such a case, of course, is not unusual nowadays. The presence of parts per billion of a toxic substance is routinely extrapolated into being regarded as a cause of human deaths. And whenever the number of projected deaths exceeds one in a million (or less), environmentalists demand that the government remove the offending pesticide, preservative, or other alleged bearer of toxic pollution from the market. They do so, even though a level of risk of one in a million is one-third as great as that of an airplane falling from the sky on one's home.
    While it is not necessary to question the good intentions and sincerity of the overwhelming majority of the members of the environmental or ecology movement, it is vital that the public realize that in this seemingly lofty and noble movement itself can be found more than a little evidence of the most profound toxicity. Consider, for example, the following quotation from David M. Graber, a research biologist with the National Park Service, in his prominently featured Los Angeles Times book review of Bill McKibben's
The End of Nature:
   
"This [man's "remaking the earth by degrees"] makes what is happening no less tragic for those of us who value wildness for its own sake, not for what value it confers upon mankind. I, for one, cannot wish upon either my children or the rest of Earth's biota a tame planet, be it monstrous or--however unlikely--benign. McKibben is a biocentrist, and so am I. We are not interested in the utility of a particular species or free-flowing river, or ecosystem, to mankind. They have intrinsic value, more value--to me--than another human body, or a billion of them.
    "Human happiness, and certainly human fecundity, are not as important as a wild and healthy planet. I know social scientists who remind me that people are part of nature, but it isn't true. Somewhere along the line--at about a billion years ago, maybe half that--we quit the contract and became a cancer. We have become a plague upon ourselves and upon the Earth.
    "It is cosmically unlikely that the developed world will choose to end its orgy of fossil-energy consumption, and the Third World its suicidal consumption of landscape. Until such time as Homo sapiens should decide to rejoin nature, some of us can only hope for the right virus to come along."
    While Mr. Graber openly wishes for the death of a billion people, Mr. McKibben, the author he reviewed, quotes with approval John Muir's benediction to alligators, describing it as a "good epigram" for his own, "humble approach": "`Honorable representatives of the great saurians of older creation, may you long enjoy your lilies and rushes, and be blessed now and then with a mouthful of terror-stricken man by way of a dainty!'"
    Such statements represent pure, unadulterated poison. They express ideas and wishes which, if acted upon, would mean terror and death for enormous numbers of human beings.
    These statements, and others like them, are made by prominent members of the environmental movement. The significance of such statements cannot be diminished by ascribing them only to a small fringe of the environmental movement. Indeed, even if such views were indicative of the thinking only of 5 or 10 percent of the members of the environmental movement--the "deep ecology," Earth First! wing--they would represent toxicity in the environmental movement as a whole not at the level of parts per billion or even parts per million, but at the level of parts per hundred, which, of course, is an enormously higher level of toxicity than is deemed to constitute a danger to human life in virtually every other case in which deadly poison is present.
    But the toxicity level of the environmental movement as a whole is substantially greater even than parts per hundred…
    There is something much more important than [environmentalism’s toxicology], however--something which provides an explanation in terms of basic principle of why the mainstream of the ecology movement does not attack what might be thought to be merely its fringe

 Read on to discover that principle…

These are the sort of people who might like to consider joining the Voluntary Human Extinction Movement, before they do the rest of us further harm.

16 comments:

Anonymous said...

My response on watching that is "fuck you cunts", I am so offended by that and the sneering little oik vid. Who the hell do they think they are? Perhaps its time for them to lead the way in decreasing the population of the earth with a mass suicide at midday on MOnday. Included in the planet saving venture whould be every fucktard who has ever given succour to the shit for brains outfit.
Fuck them. May an islamofascist suicide bomber visit each of their houses and do the world a real favour

Anonymous said...

damn I liked Sony electronics too, ho hum, screw them then. Kyocera is not a problem, had one of their phones once and it was shit, so avoid them like the plague now. The guardian and o2 are pommie crap so no chance of me supporting them.

Dave Mann said...

This kind of sick bullshit is often sponsored worldwide by well known corporations and business which, one would think, would have the most to lose if people took their messages seriously and acted on them effectively.

A case in point is Genesis energy recently advertising for us to cut our energy consumption, and last year's Earth Hour propaganda being sponsored by TV3, Toyota, TradeMe, Powershop and MoreFM.

For a so-called civilised society to wholeheartedly embrace this demented anti-humanity message as enthusiastically as it does, there must be something really deeply wrong. The industrialised world must have a death wish surely?

When I encounter the environmentalists' idiotic ravings in whatever form they seem as ridiculous as saying, oh, I dunno, "we must cut off our feet to save stepping on lizards". Stupid, yes. Divorced from reality, yes. Visciously anti-human, yes. Humanity hating, yes.... but WHY oh WHY do governments and huge businesses SUPPORT them? Thats the bit that I cannot understand.

Anonymous said...

Contemptible. Yes, revealing indeed. The fascist soul: no wonder they bleat so much about fascism: it's called projection. The likes of Curtiss don't deserve the luck of being born into a free country and the opportunity for poking witty fun it affords (and pays well for). Pity, but it will be hard to enjoy Blackadder the same again.

Anonymous said...

But, perhaps the silver lining is the own goal scored here. The eco movement's just surrendered any moral high ground it had. Watch its mainstream support scurry for the exit. Toast.

Anonymous said...

What an awful child in that Greenpeace video. He makes the choice against his future quite easy. As for his claim that there will be no fish in the sea in twenty years time, well, let him eat cake instead...

Anonymous said...

Somebody call Sue Bradford, I have this urge to backhand an obnoxious little brat in a hoody right into the middle of next week.

Andrew B said...

Posted through their Contact Us page:

"To the PR department and the board.

This week I was about to move my personal mobile to O2 from Vodafone. The service I received through my work mobile was excellent.

Last night, a 10:10 campaign video came to my attention which showed the totalitarian views of those who would get rid those of us who dare to think for ourselves on global warming and climate change. In the video, people like me are killed at the press of a button when we say we're not buying into the whole self-whipping cult. I then found out that O2 subsidises the organisation that put this thoroughly authoritarian video together. I won't be switching to O2 while I know this is the case.

When will O2 desist from funding such disturbing propaganda?

Regards,

Andrew Bates
London."

Libertyscott said...

Epic fail indeed. Good.

I will take a drive tomorrow around London just for fun, I will fly next time I go to Brussels and I can't be arsed to recycle.

The false nature of the "peace" and "non-violence" of the environmentalist left has long been clear to some of us, now it is shown to them all - it's funny to depict murdering people (terrorist style) for disagreeing with them.

Hilarious own goal.

Greig McGill said...

Holy *crap*. That's just incredible. Two things struck me which seem to sum up the whole screaming econazi greenwash movement.

1. Nobody asks those not wishing to participate why. They just get killed/silenced, perpetuating the annoying assumption that there is no other side to the argument.

2. The entire thing is, I assume, supposed to be funny, but is completely devoid of humour. What has happened to Curtis? I can't even look at it objectively and say "oh well, they're a pack of fascist homicidal cunts, but at least it was funny."

There's a third thing two. I'm not sure I can ever listen to Radiohead again now, and that makes me very sad.

B Whitehead said...

So there arguement is 'do as we say or else..'
Screw them.. in the 1980's, they were telling us there was going to be another ice age, now they are are saying theres global warming & bad things are going to happen in the future, yet they still can't reliably tell me what the weather is going to be like tomorrow..
I have no time for people that can't back up what they preach with facts & reason.

Twisted Scottish Bastard said...

Good post.
Not really news though is it?
Many of us realise that the green/eco nazis have their own extreme agenda. Actually I believe that their real wish is to wipe out humanity so as to make the Earth (or Gaia hahaha) safe for the poor little animals. Like tapeworm.

Keep up the good non-PC fight. As a teacher in NZ, we need as much help as we can, to keep a balanced message going out to our kids.

Anonymous said...

Other than the exaggerated response of murder, nothing in that advertisement violates any Libertarian belief in principle, since persons are permitted to initiate force in defence against those who threaten lives or property, and one can make a good case that doing nothing now about emissions will threaten lives or property in the near future.

The case isn't different in principle than a farmer initiating force against his neighbours who refused to fix the dam on their property such that it was overwhelmingly likely to destroy his property unless action was taken. It would certainly make no difference if everyone had voted him down beforehand, because Libertarianism does not allow voters to trump basic rights through legislation.

Thus, it is just dishonest to pose this as a question of Libertarians versus fascists, because virtually any moral system would permit the use of force to defend rights against future threats, including Libertarianism.

The dispute over the climate is a dispute over facts, not political values. Libertarians who believe in the reality of threatening climate change would give exactly the same answer as the so-called "ecofascists" in this case, and that would be to use force as a last resort on those who pose a threat, whether they mean to or not.

Libertyscott said...

Anonymous: The idea that if someone doesn't support a campaign that the person is "doing harm" to the "greater good" is exactly in keeping with the hysteria of the Maoist Cultural Revolution.

This is not a campaign about science, or even public policy, it is a quasi-religious campaign of armageddon, which has at best a barely discernible link to reality, but driven by a venal belief that violence trumps argument, individual rights and even democracy.

mike said...

The case isn't different in principle than a farmer initiating force against his neighbours who refused to fix the dam on their property such that it was overwhelmingly likely to destroy his property unless action was taken.

the initiation of force is immoral. No man has the right to initiate force, he may have the right to use retaliatory force but he will not have the right to initiate force.

Next there is a lot of context missing here.

Is the Farmer's land on a flood plain created by the damning of the river in the first place?

If so I would say that he should have confirmed that he would have legal recourse against the owner of the dam before he bought the property.

If the above is not true and the land is adjacent to the river but the seasonal cycles of the river have been mitigated by the dam which is no longer being up-kept I would say that again, a clause in the farmers title deed stating that the dam was to be maintained would be the first course of action.

If there was no such clause I would say no, because the Farmer who lives downstream of the dam can not demand that the owner of the dam spend his money, time and effort to control the natural cycle of a river (or any similar natural phenomenon) just so that he does not have to do it himself.

context is crucial

peterquixote said...

The new religious dogma here is carried to the extent that non believers, even doubters should be destroyed. And its funny and good to kill them. Thats religion