Source link: http://blog.mises.org/7813/the-nature-of-environmentalism/

The Nature of Environmentalism

February 21, 2008 by George Reisman

SHARE IT:

In my previous post, “A Word to Environmentalists,” I wrote “[t]he first step you need to take is to stop using the same word `environmentalist’ to describe both them [advocates of mass destruction and death] and you. So long as you do use the same word, people cannot help but think of you all in the same terms.”

In reply, a respected colleague of mine at the Mises Summer University, wrote the following:

I’m not sure I buy that argument. It seems to assume something like the following premise: “If many of the most prominent people who embrace the label `X-ist’ have advocated bad stuff, then one shouldn’t call oneself an `X-ist.’” But that premise seems to have some odd consequences, as follows:

Many of the most prominent people who embrace the label “atheist” (e.g. Stalin, Pol Pot) have perpetrated great evil, so Ayn Rand shouldn’t have called herself an atheist.

Many of the most prominent people who embrace the label “liberal” (e.g. Woodrow Wilson, FDR) have perpetrated great evil, so Ludwig von Mises shouldn’t have called himself a liberal.

Many of the most prominent people who embrace the label “capitalist” or ‘”free-marketer” (e.g. the GOP) have perpetrated great evil, so George Reisman shouldn’t call himself a capitalist or a free-marketer.

Many of the most prominent people who embrace the label “egoist” (e.g. Max Stirner, Nikolai Chernyshevsky), while not exactly perpetrators of evil, have at any rate advocated some pretty dubious stuff, so Ayn Rand shouldn’t have called herself an egoist.

And so on.

I mean, why let the bad guys set the meanings of all these terms?

I have quoted my colleague not so much in order to answer him in particular, but because his response provides a good starting point for providing a further explanation of the profound and inherent evil of environmentalism and why a reasonable person should no more call himself an environmentalist than he would call himself a Communist or Nazi.

It
should be realized first of all that “environmentalism” is in a very
different category than the examples of the advocacy of atheism,
liberalism, et al. by authors who also propound clearly destructive
ideas. This is because atheism, liberalism et al. in themselves
do not represent a philosophy or program that is evil on its face or
that necessarily implies evil. (In this connection, it should be
recalled that Stalin and Pol Pot committed their atrocities not in the
name of atheism, but in the name of Communism.) In addition, in all of
the examples cited there are also prominent supporters of the doctrines
who go out of their way to present theories and programs that
demonstrably promote human life and well being. Thus both Ayn Rand and
Mises were atheists, liberals, pro-capitalist and pro-free market, and
were egoists. Their writings serve as far more than a counterweight to
the wrong or dubious ideas of other supporters of these doctrines and,
indeed, make a compelling case for why these doctrines themselves in
fact serve to promote human life and well being.

However,
there are no counterparts to Rand and Mises in the advocacy of
environmentalism. (Nor could there be.) No one in environmentalism
rises to challenge the evils that its leaders and spokesmen advocate or
to show that environmentalism is the opposite of what they claim.

By
way of contrast, consider the following case. Imagine that someone
known as a prominent supporter of Austrian economics wrote an article
or gave a speech in which he advocated the enactment of wage and price
controls or the nationalization of industry. I think that everyone
affiliated with the Mises Institute, certainly myself included, would
be all over this person and make it as clear to the world as possible
that his views not only did not represent those of Austrian economics
but were in complete and total opposition to everything Austrian
economics stands for.

Now
imagine that a prominent environmentalist writes an article or gives a
speech in which he expresses the wish for a virus to come along and
wipe out a billion people. What will be the reaction of the
environmental movement? Will that individual be denounced for
misrepresenting the movement? Will the rest of the movement’s leaders
rush to assure the world that that individual was so far from
representing environmentalism that he actually represented the
diametric opposite of its principles?

Not
at all. There will be no negative reaction of any kind from within the
movement, not even a raising of eyebrows. I can say this with the
utmost confidence, because such statements have already been made, and made repeatedly. And there has been no outrage, no negative response of any kind from within the environmental movement.

Here’s David M. Graber, in his prominently featured Los Angeles Times book review of Bill McKibben’s The End of Nature: “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.… 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.”

And here’s Prince Philip of England
(who for sixteen years was president of the World Wildlife Fund): “In
the event that I am reincarnated, I would like to return as a deadly
virus, in order to contribute something to solve overpopulation.” (A
lengthy compilation of such statements, and worse, by prominent
environmentalists can be found at Frightening Quotes from Environmentalists.)

There is no negative reaction from the environmental movement because what such statements express is nothing other than the actual philosophy of the movement. This is what the movement believes in. It’s what it agrees with. It’s what it desires.
Environmentalists are no more prepared to attack the advocacy of mass
destruction and death than Austrian economists are prepared to attack
the advocacy of laissez-faire capitalism and economic progress. Mass
destruction and death is the goal of environmentalists, just as
laissez-faire capitalism and economic progress is the goal of Austrian
economists.

And this is
why I call environmentalism evil. It’s evil to the core. In the
environmental movement, contemplating the mass death of people in
general is no more shocking than it was in the Communist and Nazi
movements to contemplate the mass death of capitalists or Jews in
particular. All three are philosophies of death. The only difference is
that environmentalism aims at death on a much larger scale.

Despite
still being far from possessing full power in any country, the
environmentalists are already responsible for approximately 96 million deaths from malaria across
the world. These deaths are the result of the environmentalist-led ban
on the use of DDT, which could easily have prevented them and, before
its ban, was on the verge of wiping out malaria. The environmentalists
brought about the ban because they deemed the survival of a species of
vultures, to whom DDT was apparently poisonous, more important than the
lives of millions of human beings.

The deaths
that have already been caused by environmentalism approximate the
combined number of deaths caused by the Nazis and Communists.

If and when
the environmentalists take full power, and begin imposing and then
progressively increasing the severity of such things as carbon taxes
and carbon caps, in order to reach their goal of reducing carbon
dioxide emissions by 90 percent, the number of deaths that will result
will rise into the billions, which is in accord with the movement’s
openly professed agenda of large-scale depopulation. (The policy will
have little or no effect on global mean temperatures, the reduction of
which is the rationalization for its adoption, but it will have a great
effect on the size of human population.)

It is not at
all accidental that environmentalism is evil and that its leading
spokesmen hold or sanction ideas that are indistinguishable from those
of sociopaths. Its evil springs from a fundamental philosophical
doctrine that lies at the very core and deepest foundations of the
movement, a doctrine that directly implies the movement’s
destructiveness and hatred of the human race. This is the doctrine of
the alleged intrinsic value of nature, i.e., that
nature is valuable in and of itself, apart from all connection to human
life and well being. This doctrine is accepted by the movement without
any internal challenge, and, indeed, is the very basis of
environmentalism’s existence.

As I wrote in Capitalism, “The
idea of nature’s intrinsic value inexorably implies a desire to destroy
man and his works because it implies a perception of man as the systematic destroyer of the good, and thus as the systematic doer of evil. Just
as man perceives coyotes, wolves, and rattlesnakes as evil because they
regularly destroy the cattle and sheep he values as sources of food and
clothing, so on the premise of nature’s intrinsic value, the
environmentalists view man as evil, because, in the pursuit of his
well-being, man systematically destroys the wildlife, jungles, and rock
formations that the environmentalists hold to be intrinsically
valuable. Indeed, from the perspective of such alleged intrinsic values
of nature, the degree of man’s alleged destructiveness and evil is
directly in proportion to his loyalty to his essential nature. Man is
the rational being. It is his application of his reason in the form of
science, technology, and an industrial civilization that enables him to
act on nature on the enormous scale on which he now does. Thus, it is
his possession and use of reason–manifested in his technology and
industry–for which he is hated.”

Thus these are
the reasons that I think it is necessary for people never to describe
themselves as environmentalists, that to do is comparable to describing
oneself as a Communist or Nazi. Doing so marks one as a hater and enemy
of the human race.

Whoever
believes that it is possible to be a “free-market environmentalist” is
guilty of a contradiction in terms. The free market rests on a
foundation of human life and well-being as the standard of value.
Environmentalism rests on a foundation of the non-human as the standard
of value. The two cannot be reconciled. It’s either-or.

I know that
these conclusions are upsetting to many people. It’s got to be
upsetting to realize that one is advocating destruction and death. But
fortunately, there’s a simple and ultimately happy solution: just stop doing it. Stop being an environmentalist!

Copyright © 2008, by George Reisman. George Reisman, Ph.D. is the author of Capitalism: A Treatise on Economics (Ottawa, Illinois: Jameson Books, 1996) and is Pepperdine University Professor Emeritus of Economics. His web site is www.capitalism.net and his blog is www.georgereisman.com/blog/.

{ 75 comments }

← Previous Comments

Geoffrey Allan Plauche February 22, 2008 at 5:14 pm: “We won’t know what you are lacking until you come up with something.”

In other words, you have no evidence against me but nevertheless you want me to prove myself (regarding what you won’t tell me). I’ve already proven myself.

Meanwhile, you have offered us no evidence that you are a credible Austrian or libertarian.

And yet, the evidence that I am is online for all to see. What’s more, if you like, you can contact Jeffrey Tucker or Roderick Long or Walter Block or Stephan Kinsella or Joseph Salerno and they will verify my credentials. What are yours?
Jimmy Jam February 22, 2008 at 5:39 pm: Prove yourself and find some evidence for this global warming racket. Credentials mean nothing.
We would want some evidence that extra CO2 is bad for the environment. And when you sort it out that extra CO2 is good for the environment than you ought to be as outraged by the environmentalists as any of the rest of us.
Bruce Koerber February 22, 2008 at 5:59 pm: My questions for the environmentalists are:

Where does the idea of human rights enter into the mix?

How can you logically make a separation between human rights and property rights?

Why not redirect your energies towards refining property rights so that human rights are protected?
Geoffrey Allan Plauche February 22, 2008 at 6:08 pm: Jimmy,

If you bothered to learn anything about me then you would have known that I am skeptical of anthropogenic global warming and I don’t believe in the alarmists claims that catastrophe is looming over the horizon. Moreover, there are other issues important to environmentalists than just global warming, you know.

Bruce,

I don’t make a separation between human rights and property rights. I don’t know why you would think I or Alex Peak would. (I can’t speak for TokyoTom; we disagree on important issues.) I’m an Aristotelian libertarian influenced by Roderick Long and Murray Rothbard.
Brent February 22, 2008 at 8:10 pm: Geoff: “Those percentages sound made up for one thing. And a lot of it depends on how you classify various types of environmentalists.”

You admit that there are so VERY FEW free-marketers that also label themselves environmentalists! This is so silly — ask the man on the street if he’s heard of an environmentalist. I’ll save you time here: he has heard of environmentalist and he believes environmentalists want to use the government to plan a “better environment” and/or he believes environmentalists are whack-jobs. The common perception of environmentalists is not a good one for pro-marketers who despise the needless destruction of resources to give to themselves by labeling themselves environmentalists.

Geoff: “And I don’t see how you get the mathematical result that I’ll be spending 99% of my time explaining to people how everyone who calls themselves an environmentalist is really a fake.”

Just in this forum, which is full of people who know where you are coming from, you are spending tons of time trying to suggest that the environmentalist label is different from what you want it to be.

Dr. Reisman is right. Many Germans called themselves Nazis and many Russians called themselves Communists to escape the harsh consequences of failing to do so. But once the Nazi / Communist Party fell, the “good” people quit calling themselves those names. In most parts of the country, you are not yet shamed for rejecting environmentalist propaganda… so most people have no excuse for calling themselves environmentalists.
Geoffrey Allan Plauche February 22, 2008 at 8:33 pm: Brent,

“Just in this forum, which is full of people who know where you are coming from, you are spending tons of time trying to suggest that the environmentalist label is different from what you want it to be.”

I chalk that up mostly to reactionary conservative knee-jerking at anything that smacks of leftism. I’m not worried about this type of anti-intellectual. Also, much of my time was been spent dealing with an ignorant and lazy troll.

One thing that you and Professor Reisman neglect to take into account is that among the general populace Nazism and communism are considered to be bad. Environmentalism on the other hand is not considered to be bad by the general populace. Part of the population thinks it is but can be persuaded by a free market version of it (because some conservatives ARE concerned about the environment), but at least as large if not larger a portion thinks it is good while anti-environmentalism (which is what they’ll say Professor Reisman is espousing) is bad.

You really have yet to address my main arguments in favor of not running away from the environmentalist label.
Bruce Koerber February 22, 2008 at 10:11 pm: Dear Geoffrey,

Since you responded to me I assume you consider yourself to be an environmentalist. So you are perfectly qualified to answer my third question: Why not redirect your energies towards refining property rights so that human rights are protected?

In this context of property rights and human rights the concern for the environment is straightforward and non-coercive. Non-coercive, that is, if it is executed at the pace equivalent to the refinement of property rights.

If you want a more environmentally friendly world then it is up to you to work hard to refine property rights.

Out of ignorance of this essential step or out of laziness to do the hard work of refining property rights the ‘so-called’ environmentalists are acting oppressively, very similar to the ego-driven interventionists.

with regards,
Bruce
Geoffrey Allan Plauche February 22, 2008 at 10:20 pm: Bruce,

I believe I already answered all that in my previous comment. I suppose I can only add that the free-market environmentalists are largely doing just that, providing arguments for how a fully voluntary, free market, property-based justice system can better protect the environment and promote prosperity. Many free-market environmentalist arguments involve either showing the harm that statist policies will cause to the environment and to human beings, or showing how much of the pollution, environmental damage, etc., environmentalists are concerned about are primarily the result of a lack of well-defined or properly enforced private property rights. I recommend checking out some of the articles and books I referenced somewhere up there among the earlier comments.
Jimmy Jam February 22, 2008 at 11:01 pm: “One thing that you and Professor Reisman neglect to take into account is that among the general populace Nazism and communism are considered to be bad.”

Thats not really true is it. I mean the Nazis did tend to alienate foreigners. But communism had a lot of cache. And certainly facist Italy was popular around the world. I don’t see that there’s a real big difference here.

Perhaps its the indirect nature of environmentalist mass-murder which gives some truth to what you are saying. So they bureaucratise DDT and kill tens of millions of people indirectly. Or they just inhibit economic development and property rights. And particularly they inihibit energy production, which will kill millions down the track… But since the killing is indirect they may not have soured their reputation like the German facists tended to, pretty early on in the piece.

So I’m just labouring some, to get your point of view and your strategy. If you want the environmentalist lable you’ve got to wrench it off the others and give them another name. And if you don’t want to do that you better get another name for yourself, one that denigrates the current environmentalist movement just as much as it pushes your own.alternate wannabe movement.

“If you bothered to learn anything about me then you would have known that I am skeptical of anthropogenic global warming and I don’t believe in the alarmists claims that catastrophe is looming over the horizon.”

SKEPTICAL??????

Isn’t that a bit of a tepid word to be using at this late stage of the game? This is the problem here. Either you are going to muster some stridency against what these ritualised mass-liars are up to, or you will merely be adding legitimacy as to what they are about.

It wouldn’t be so bad if your first salvo as a voluntarist-biodiversity-fetishist ,was to immediately pick a fight with the mainstream criminals by being in favour of extra atmospheric CO2. And if you are authentically into this biodiversity caper you cannot but be in favour of higher CO2 levels. Since it is higher CO2 levels that stimulate net primary production.

Taking this approach would immediately put you at odds with the mainstream, and you might stand the chance of acheiving some good work. In taking this position you could also be in favour of the homesteading of so-called government land, and of the oceans. But with nature corridors for the feral animals. Since it is surely nature corridors that in the long run which would assist in the stimulation in the variety and diversity of the feral plants and animals.

That would be the strategy surely. To steal their name and give the facists another name, or find a new name for yourselves, and to promote those things that are immediately going to start a fight with these energy deprivers and anti-capitalist goons.
TokyoTom February 22, 2008 at 11:12 pm: Geoffrey, Jimmy Jam is a rude, crude and unsophisticated “empath” spun off by Dr. Reisman`s mighty emanations. I don`t know what he did with Graeme Bird on this thread, but he is, in fact, his sock puppet.

Graeme himself is real, though nearly two-dimensional, and his hotheadedness, ad homs and potty mouth – which are legend (there are pages on him at Wiki, and he posts regularly at http://catallaxyfiles.com/) have had him escorted off this board a number of times.

Graeme and his pal Sione, who like my new friend Mr. Chodorov thought that the best way to win arguments was to tell everyone that the person you disagree with is a liar, were two of the most prominent “friendly faces” and Reisman-worshippers I met when I first visited this blog two years ago.

Like Dr. Reisman, they have surrendered their reason and ability to address anything but strawmen, and fallen into the more emotionally satisfying and reflexive partisan hostility trap that I mention here: http://mises.com/blogs/tokyotom/archive/2008/02/19/cool-rationalists-or-conservatives-and-neocons-on-the-environment.aspx
How sad that so many self-stlyed “libertarians” prove themselves to be precisely the arrogant and status quo defending conservatives that Hayek dislkied so much.

I do harbor some small hope for engagement from Graeme, so I`m afraid I have to take responsibility (as he has once again proven incapable of such responsibility himself) for his presence on this thread. Mea magna culpa, and apologies.

Allow me to strongly disagree with you on your engagement with Dr.ã€€ï¼²ï½…ï½‰ï½“ï½ï½n. His approach is not simply “strategically” wrong as you argue, but fundamentally wrong. It does not reflect or flow from Austrian or libertarian principles, but rather is a refusal both (i) to engage in good faith with those you disagree with and (ii) to explore Austrian understandings of the frustration of catallaxy in the absence of markets and in the presence of the state and public choice understandings of rent-seeking. Dr. Reisman would have us rushing off to locate and eliminate our “mortal enemies”, without bothering himself to identify or asking us to inquire as to WHO exactly IS the enemy, much less even ponder whether, once successful in dispatching them, we will thereby have resolved the problems that purported trouble those man-haters.

You are of course right that Reisman`s approach is strategically wrong, but let`s not gloss over its moral emptiness and side-stepping of principle. But besides that, his approach informs those whom we wish to influence that we have no wish to engage with them. That is hardly the best we have to offer, and of course is a virtual guarantee that our influence will be, on the contrary diminished and the likelihood of policy mistakes greater.

But like the narcissistic arrogance and paranoia that lies at the heart of neoconservatism and their morally bankrupt approaches to foreign and domestic affairs, I fear that failure would simply reinforce their tribal conviction that they alone are right, and all others evil.

Dr. Reisman loves to talk about evil, without understanding what it is or how mundane it is.

I hope that he and others will consider the immortal words of Walt Kelly`s Pogo, “I have seen the enemy, and he is us”. (Or are those simply the self-loathing words of an evil enviro? Dang, this stuff is so hard!)

Regards,

Tom
Geoffrey Allan Plauche February 22, 2008 at 11:16 pm: What is your problem Jimmy Jam?

“Isn’t that a bit of a tepid word to be using at this late stage of the game? This is the problem here. Either you are going to muster some stridency against what these ritualised mass-liars are up to, or you will merely be adding legitimacy as to what they are about.”

Don’t you understand the difference between climate science (and any scientific evidence or lack thereof there is for AGW), on the one hand, and ethical and politico-economic criticisms of public policies for dealing with it, on the other? My focus is on the latter, on challenging the statists on their public policy proposals. I let the climate scientists like Patrick Michaels and others challenge them directly on the climate science side of it.

If you think about it, and I know that’s tough for you but do try, you’ll see that whatever the answers are on the climate science side of the issue they don’t necessarily entail any particular policies. So even if AGW is true, statist policies for dealing with it would still be wrong. Simple enough for you?
Jimmy Jam February 23, 2008 at 12:49 am: You see that. You are not even requiring the movement to show up with any evidence. Them not having any evidence, nor feeling they need to have any evidence, is just fine and AOK with you.

With this weak me-tooism against this facist movement (not even against it) you are really lending weight to it.

I mean this is really and truly a repulsive movement. So if you want to push voluntary biodiversity preservation, or whatever it is you are trying to push, you have to roll out your own program with a total campaign of condemnation and exposure against the environmentalist movement proper. Or you cannot but help to add to their momentum.

Its got to be a two-pronged approach. You are young and naieve and have no idea how the bullshit-momentum rolls out. You do not understand the potential harm that you do.

The minor principle of the preservation of natures museum, as someone else proposed, might lend some value to some of your activities. But the idea of the intrinsic value of nature, independent of such minor considerations, must be opposed. And a more realistic view of nature out to be taken into account:

See one animal ripping apart another. See the female praying mantis feeding off the brain of the male praying mantis even as they are mating. This is the appalling violence of nature. And we don’t want to rap too much sentimentality towards nature, around the evil principle of intrinsic value, if we wish to take an objective approach to these matters.
Per-Olof Samuelsson February 23, 2008 at 3:06 am: Geoffrey Allan Plauche; “By all means, Per-Olof Samuelsson, let’s not give in to evil but proceed ever more boldly against it (but with a strategy that will actually be constructive toward our goal).”

OK, but I do not think it is a good strategy to pretend that environmentalism is less than evil.

As I wrote before, I think there are people who accept environmentalism “in good faith”. They are not aware of such things as David Graber’s or Prince Philip’s viruses. They need to be told.
scott t February 23, 2008 at 3:08 am: here are some examples of how my local newspaper uses the word ‘environmentalist’

“Alaska political leaders have ardently supported the opening of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge to oil drilling, despite strong opposition from environmentalists and politicians in the Lower 48. The issue is still before Congress.

Andrew Wetzler of Natural Resources Defense Council, one of the groups that sued to protect polar bears, said the state’s position, scientifically speaking, is “mostly gibberish” and “motivated by economic concerns and political concerns.”

He said that there is considerable evidence of a decline in polar bears in Canada and Alaska – with some of the animals starving, turning to cannibalism…”
http://www.newsobserver.com/2188/story/959915.html
–
“Joe Coley knows what it’s like to tell a good worker he doesn’t need him anymore.

And he’s afraid he’ll have to do it again.

Coley is a landscaper and an environmentalist who is helping others cope with Stage 2 water restrictions that went into effect Friday because of the drought that’s lingered for about seven months….”"more organic practices in landscaping as well,â€ he said. We’re trying to be good for the environment.â€

Coley said he’s been conserving for years, and is fed up with last-minute decisions to conserve water by public officials that he considers ineffective and draconian.

“I haven’t heard how they’re going to solve this problem. ”
http://www.easternwakenews.com/front/story/2086.html
–
“Outside this year’s Emerging Issues Forum, more than a dozen protesters from environmental groups rallied against Duke Energy’s recently approved Cliffside coal plant, about 50 miles west of Charlotte. Duke Energy CEO Jim Rogers is among other speakers scheduled for the forum today.

The environmentalists say Rogers is hypocrite because he promotes energy efficiency while building new power plants that pollute the environment. The group plans to try to disrupt Rogers’ speech today, said organizer Jim Warren, with the N.C. Waste Awareness & Reduction Network.”
http://www.newsobserver.com/news/story/937080.html
–
“For an electric power company located so close to Appalachian coal, “carbon neutrality” would be a major shift, even if it’s not the coal-plant cancellation that environmentalists still seek, and even if it requires a 10-year time frame. Holding CO2 output level will encourage energy efficiency and create openings for solar power — another benefit? It may also lead to increased use of nuclear energy as an unavoidable trade-off, and to higher prices for electricity in what’s now a relatively low-cost state — a further incentive to conserve.”
http://www.newsobserver.com/print/saturday/opinion/story/918825.html
etc…

‘most’ of the media usage (that i have looked at) of ‘environmentalist’ seems seems to mean some person or group that desires other people to do with less – because of an alleged harm to the earth and themselves.

heres another…”We must either take our own bag to the store or use paper bags, which environmentalists argue aren’t much better than the plastic ones; after all, we need those trees to soak up the carbon dioxide spewed by our SUVs.”
http://www.newsobserver.com/987/story/954011.html
Alex Peak February 23, 2008 at 10:15 am: Mr. Koerber asks three questions, directed toward “the environmentalists.” I contest that we are all environmentalists here, even the people who do not wish to call themselves such, because we all want a healthy environment. Moreover, I would argue that our libertarian approach to solving environmental problems is a far superior approach than that of the interventionists.

But since Mr. Koerber asks his three questions, I’ll be happy to answer.

The first of Mr. Koerber’s three questions is:

Where does the idea of human rights enter into the mix?

Property rights are human rights, and are essential in the mix. Without property rights, I would not be able to sue someone for polluting my property. In fact, without property rights, all land would be unowned or “public” property. Thus, there would be no disincentive, without property rights, for polluting.

Mr. Koerber then asks,

How can you logically make a separation between human rights and property rights?

That’s like asking me how I can levitate. I can’t. “Human rights” is simply a term refering to rights held innately and equally by all humans. “Individual rights” simply refers to rights held innately and equally by all individuals. Logically, they’re the same thing. “Property rights” are the rights of humans/individuals to justly acquire (either through homesteading, exchange on the free market, or as a gift), maintain (defensively), and control property. All human/individual rights are derived from property rights, including the innate right of self-ownership. There can, in short, be no logical separation.

Mr. Koerber finally asks,

Why not redirect your energies towards refining property rights so that human rights are protected?

I don’t understand. How do property rights not already protect human rights? Are not human rights derived from property rights?

Mr. Brent writes,

Dr. Reisman is right. Many Germans called themselves Nazis and many Russians called themselves Communists to escape the harsh consequences of failing to do so. But once the Nazi / Communist Party fell, the “good” people quit calling themselves those names. In most parts of the country, you are not yet shamed for rejecting environmentalist propaganda… so most people have no excuse for calling themselves environmentalists.

I’m about to pull a bunch of numbers straight out of my hind quarters, so don’t take any of this as being precise.

We can divide Americans up into two groups, the intellectuals and the regularly-educated. The first group may comprise three percent. (Totally made-up number.)

Among the regularly-educated, we find three groups: liberals, conservatives, and libertarians.

The regularly-educated liberals hear the word “environmentalist” and 100% see it as a good thing. (This group is either unaware of the pro-virus faction, and those that are suspect it to be a tiny minority.) This group is usually unaware of the free-market environmentalist arguments, but are not repulsed by them. This group is the major target for free-market environmentalists, who know they have no shot at convincing the anti-humanist types, but do believe they have a good shot at convincing your run-of-the-mill regularly-educated liberal environmentalist.

The regularly-educated conservatives hear the term “environmentalist” and only 75% think it’s a good thing (another made-up number). This group hates liberals, and the Green Party, with a passion, but they don’t hate the environment, and want to make that very clear. They like the environment, just not Al Gore, they’ll tell you. This group is another target for free-market environmentalists, because they’re already concerned that the regulations put forward by liberals will fail and make things worse.

The regularly-educated libertarians hear the term “environmentalist” and also 75% think it’s a good thing. Free-market environmentalists will target this group because this group wants to have arguments under its belt to present to its liberal friends about how interventionism fails and the free market works, and free-market environmentalists can provide some of these arguments to the regularly-educated libertarian’s arsenal.

The intellectual liberals are 90% in favour of environmentalism. There is really no point in targeting them.

The intellectual conservatives (what few exist) are only 25% in favour of environmentalism (do you love these made-up numbers yet?), but will react positively to free-market environmentalists because they recognise that we aren’t the anti-humanist types, and in fact we’re just libertarians who want to try to explain to people how property rights will, if respected, help promote the health of the environmentalist. Plus, we’re not Al Gore.

The intellectual libertarians are 50% in favour of environmentalism (that’s my last made-up number).

Add all this up, and we can see that the vast majority of Americans see “environmentalism” as a term denoting something good, even if it sometimes attempts to attain this good through ineffective or detrimental means (e.g. interventionism).

Conversely, the vast majority of Americans see communism, Nazism, and fascism as denoting something bad. If there ever comes a point in time when the vast majority of Americans start associating “environmentalism” with anti-humanism, as Dr. Reisman does, then I’ll re-evaluate my use of the term. But for now, there are two things keeping me from rejecting it:

A) Most Americans favour “environmentalism” and do not associate it with a desire for a virus to wipe out humanity, instead associating it with “the desire for a healthier environment,” and

B) it’s the only term that seems to easily fit the definition “the desire for a healthier environment.”

The question for all of us should be: how best do we get our message out there, how best do we go abour promoting the free market, private property, peace, non-interventionism, voluntaryism, and anti-statism? How best do we do it?

Do we do it by calling outselves “anti-environmentalists,” thus alienating 75% of our potential audience, ensuring that they won’t even listen to us?

By simply calling ourselves “free-market environmentalists” instead of “anti-environmentalists,” we quadruple our audience. (Okay, I was wrong. I have more made-up numbers. But you get my point.)

It’s not hard to simply point out what we mean when we call ourselves free-market environmentalists. “We want a healthier environment, but we believe this can be best achieved through a free market, not through interventionism. We are not the anti-humanist types of environmentalists.”

See? Two quick sentences.

Try explaining to someone what you mean by “anti-environmentalist,” and you’ll need to present paragraphs and paragraphs, as Dr. Reisman has done above. But even those many paragraphs were not enough, since, as you can see, a debate now broils, a debate over terminology of all things. And we’re libertarians! Try this with one of your liberal friends, and I suspect it will be a hundred times harder. (Yes, another made-up number.)

I see Dr. Reisman’s approach is, simply, poor strategy, and that is why I do not condone it.

Mr. Jam writes,

So they bureaucratise DDT and kill tens of millions of people indirectly. Or they just inhibit economic development and property rights. And particularly they inihibit energy production, which will kill millions down the track…

You’re saying the same thing free-market environmentalists say, Mr. Jam. The only difference is that you are claiming that the “they” are all of the environmentalists, while free-market environmentalists claim that the “they” are only the interventionist environmentalists.

Talk to a regularly-educated person and tell him/her that all environmentalists are responsible for this, and you’ll find yourself not being listened to. You will find your arguments ignored.

Talk to a regularly-educated person and tell him/her that this is the result of interventionists or anti-humanists within the broader environmentalist movement while telling him/her that you are an environmentalist and that your free-market solutions will help protect the environment far more effectively than will interventionism, and you will find that people are listening to you.

Which would you prefer, to get your message out to virtually no one, or to get your message out to many people? Unfortunately, Dr. Reisman’s approach ultimately lends its weight for the worst segments of the environmentalist movement by turning off would-be allies in the fight against interventionism and statism.

Samuelsson writes,

OK, but I do not think it is a good strategy to pretend that environmentalism is less than evil.

I don’t think it’s a good strategy to pretend that libertarianism is anti-environmentalist; or that, to be an environmentalist, one must support interventionism, coercion, aggresson, and slavery. Can’t we do what we do with the feminist movement, i.e. promote our own brand of feminism while simultaneously saying that any form of feminism that proposes that “men ought to be subserviant to women” is evil?

Sincerely yours,
Alex Peak
TokyoTom February 23, 2008 at 10:41 pm: Bruce:

- “Where does the idea of human rights enter into the mix?”
- “How can you logically make a separation between human rights and property rights?”

It’s hard to know exactly what you are driving at, as none of these questions is clear. The mix of what? Who is trying to make a separation between human rights and property rights?”

Our environment has no intrinsic value; rather it is WE who appreciate IT. I don’t separate human rights from property rights.

- Why not redirect your energies towards refining property rights so that human rights are protected?

Great question, as it is a core Austrian insight. You might not have noticed, but that’s precisely what I’ve been calling for for the past two years.

Rather, it is Dr. Reisman who feels that the best way to defend property rights is to rub out those humans who worry about resources for which there are no clear property rights. So why don’t you as k HIM precisely the same question?

TT
TokyoTom February 23, 2008 at 11:22 pm: Unfortunately, because Dr. Reisman’s insists on tilting at strawmen and adamantly refuses to engage honestly (either with despicable man-haters or with his milder interlocutors here) from an viewpoint that accepts basic understandings of (i) the need for property rights and law and order to be able to express preferences through private transactions and (ii) the persistent problems of rent-seeking when government is involved, it simply impossible to take him seriously, except as an object lesson for how difficult it is to hold tribal cognition/reaction patterns in check and to actually use our Reason. Emotion is always easier than Reason.

It is in consequence of this (and because it is difficult not to grow tired of pointing out, to no avail, the well-known bases on which Austrians may fruitfully engage others on “environmental” issues) that I have frequently responded at the same level that his posts appear to be – tongue-in-cheek parody:

- Standards of Environmental Good and Evil: Why Environmentalism Is Misanthropic, November 17, 2006,
http://blog.mises.org/archives/005910.asp

To which I responded as follows:

“So many environmentalists, who are the philosophic and mortal enemy of the human race! How do we identify them, how do we enlist and when do we start to eliminate them? Will it cost us less than half a trillion? Whom to we get to hate and scorn? Point the way!

“Do we start with the Christians? http://conservation.catholic.org/cornwall_declaration.htm

“Do we get to bump off anybody who sues anyone else for an environmental harm?

“Do we get to eliminate the the Clean Air Act, Clean Water Act, NEPA, the EPA and FDA?

“Can we execute people who want clean air and water? The attorneys general of state that bring nuisance claims against others?

“Do we get to eliminate economists such as Cordato, Block and Rothbard, John Baden, Terry Anderson, Gary Leal and legal scholars like Jonathan Adler, who allege that environmental problems stem from unclear and unenforceable property rights? How about Nobel prize winning economists who say that such failures result in expensive “tragedies of the commons”?

“Do we get to eliminate the hunters who form the backbone of conservation groups like Ducks Unlimited and NWF? Fisherman who call for ITQs?

“And after we eliminate all these, then everything will be fine, right, because there never really were any real problems with corporate irresponsibility or corporate statism – just a bunch of evil and jealous people-haters who lived downwind or downstream from all that makes America great, right? Responsible corporations that can act with limited liability (backed by investors who have even less liability).

“I`m with you, Dr. Reisman!! You`ve convinced me. Hating America and hating the human race are wrong, and loving nature is evil! Let`s keep our focus on this vicious threat.

“And by the way, don`t ask me to pick up my litter; that kind of request for “responsible” behavior clearly masks a hatred of mankind.
Posted by: TokyoTom at November 18, 2006 10:44 AM”

In reply, Dr. Reisman kindly welcomed me back to the human race in his post, “It’s Over: Tokyo Tom Concedes”, November 18, 2006, http://blog.mises.org/archives/005916.asp

My reply to him is at November 20, 2006 9:15 AM.

TT
TLWP Sam February 24, 2008 at 1:33 am: Good points TT! Suppose an wealthy African landowner has a large workforce whose families live and work on estate and he has a love of nature on his land such that he’s forbid DDT from his property and has the workforce signing an agreement to the tune of ‘tough luck if you get malaria’? Is this guy a human-hater too? Similarly, from an example I’ve given before – suppose a section Amazon forest is unowned and local farmers want to clear the forest to feed a growing population, but at the last moment greenies ‘homestead’ the forest (if they actually could, I’m not sure) and declare they own it and forbid any clearing? Likewise of the notion of ‘people privately owning land and sea to sue polluters’ ‘human-haters’ because they are restricting progress and population growth? Indeed how could progress continue to progress when a slip could see the crap getting sued out of you?
TokyoTom February 24, 2008 at 3:29 am: TLWP Sam:

As Mises, Yandle and others noted, the development of property rights (both private and shared) is an essential key to wealthy societies. But the resource demands of those wealthy societies create pressures that result in destructive exploitation of open-access, ineffectively-owned and public resources in other countries (and leave elites free to privatize the natural wealth once held and managed by traditional societies.

Both phenomena (absence of are clearly at work in the Amazon, which you seem to like to refer to, as I noted here:

http://sciencepolicy.colorado.edu/prometheus/archives/climate_change/001043lahsen_and_nobre_20.html.

Of course the same thing happened in North America, and can be seen not only in the near extinction of the bison but the continuing ravaging of salmon populations:
http://mises.com/blogs/tokyotom/archive/2007/12/17/bison-markets-the-tragedy-of-the-commons-and-the-indian-war.aspx.

How the developed economies can assist in the development of clear ownership and sound management of resources and rule of law in other countries and in unowned commons like the oceans and atmosphere is the very sticky problem we are facing now.

Regards,

TT

PS: Yes, I know that I have just again proven my profound hatred for mankind for pointing to issues like this and indicating that I care about them. And yes, I know that, in contrast, it is Dr. Reisman and others upthread who are the ones who expressing a TRUE love of mankind, by combining their hatred of misanthropes with a blithe unconcern for any sick dynamics relating to ineffectively owned resources.

So be it.
Aussie Mike February 24, 2008 at 6:37 pm: how do I print this? I’m finding that I can only print one page on all articles on the blog site. Is this universal or just a problem of mine? It used not to be like this(six months ago). Is there someone who can help me? BTW I’m a great fan of Dr. Reisman & I like to print out all his articles. I find his reasoning impeccable.
Raheem February 25, 2008 at 8:36 am: Its pretty easy to see where Tokyo Tom is coming from. He’s a spammer whose been trying to neutralise the message of Reisman by recourse to relentless cyber-stalking. Which makes me think that the mises institute has gone soft on environmentalism and in fact has, since the death of Murray, developed a fear of the C-word. That is they do not wish to be called “cranks” with regards to global warming.

Its pretty easy to see where the fanatic, crank, and cyber-stalking spammer Tokyo-Tom is coming from.

But this Goeffrey fellow and this Allex Peak fellow. Where on earth are they coming from?

I guess the kids are spineless. They don’t wish to call out evil for what it is.

The Mises-institute has to tackle this science-fraud head on. I’ve seen people make jokes about the warmers. But I’ve only seen Reisman and Higgs talk about this science-fraud as if it were simply another governmental racket of some sort.

Take me off moderation, ban the multi-year spammer Tokyo Tom. And let me fight it out with these kids.

What you older Miseans might not realise is that some of the youngsters amongst you have been brought up with this nonsense along with Mothers milk. Its quite likely that Geofrey is a CO2-bedwetter with a superstitious fear of Mother Natures revenge.

Lets take the gloves off and sort it all out now. But leave the spammer outside.
TLWP Sam February 25, 2008 at 9:46 am: Geez, could you be more specific Raheem? Enviros still equal Communists, Nazis, baby-eaters, reptilian aliens with a taste for human flesh, etc. So what if global warming if doesn’t exist or does exist but is so slow that it’s not going to cause appreciable effect on anyone’s lifestyle for the next 10 million years? The greater question is should people care about ‘the environment’ at all? Do you hear the claim for nature reserves (even if they’re private ones) equivalent to denying people the right to farm land and feed their ever-growing families? That to show concern for any particular endangered animal should be seen as bad as anyone who would call for protection and breeding programs to restore the malaria-carrying mosquitos to their former population?
Raheem February 25, 2008 at 10:06 am: Yeah I would like to be more specific. But I’m waiting for the go ahead to be able to fight this one out in a knockdown argument.

After all there have been claims made that Professor Reisman is wrong.

Wrong about what?

If there are some side issues to attend to I still don’t see that these CO2-bedwetters have shown that Professor Reisman is wrong about anything.

I”ll accept that there might be some side issues. But that this is a criminally-insane movement ought to be clear. We can joke about it but its really not funny anymore. Too many black kids to bury under the floorboards to keep the laughter sustained.

So we can talk about the side issues. But this idea that this is a criminally-insane movement AS IT STANDS ought not be in question. And the philosophical principle that accounts for its rampant evil….. The principle of INTRINSIC VALUE is an evil principle. This ought to be seen as an actual principle and a truly evil principle. And the other thing is that this wicked principle is in fact the driving force of the movement. We ought to admit that it is in fact driving the movement. This wicked principle.

We ought to come clean and admit that the Professor is right in this arch-tripod of his case.

In all these matters the Professor is right. You ought not take him head on on these matters because he’s right and you are wrong.

But if there are some sort of tangential matters, to do with heritage ….and biodiversity as part of that heritage, well you know, we can talk about that.

First we need an admission, that the movement as it stands is criminally-insane and homocidal.
David February 25, 2008 at 2:10 pm: Quote: “Whoever believes that it is possible to be a “free-market environmentalist” is guilty of a contradiction in terms. The free market rests on a foundation of human life and well-being as the standard of value.”

Wrong. The market rests on whatever individual interests and values parter for exchange of pursuing said values in voluntary exchange. There is no litmus test for whether you’ll buy a razor blade or rope for your “well-being.” You don’t have to give a rat’s about human life or whatever anyone’s subjective definition of “well-being” for a free market to thrive. The assumption Reissman makes is that markets depend on a totality of Randanoid objectivist participants to function. People buy cigarettes, cut themselves with blades, deprive themselves of nutritious protein by becoming vegetarian, and do other things that I, for example, would avoid for the sake of “well-being,” but other people have different values and will buy recycled goods for the sake of the pursuit of those values. This is the point that Reisman has missed.

“Environmentalism rests on a foundation of the non-human as the standard of value. The two cannot be reconciled. It’s either-or.”

Wrong. Environmentalism rests on multiple standards of value, a main one being a sustainable environment for human life to thrive. Depends on the environmentalist. Not all people are the same. Shocking as it may, but it is possible to posses value for other forms of life in addition to human life. It does not have to be an exclusive devotion. It is not either-or, and such an assumption illustrates ignorance of anything but the most extreme fringe forms of anti-human “environmentalism.”

Dictionary.com uses this definition, and I think it fits:

“Advocacy for or work toward protecting the natural environment from destruction or pollution.”

Advocacy/Work can mean anything. It could just mean some random guy owning a plot of land with nature on it and not letting people dick around with it. If you’re going to discuss environmental extremists or government involvement in environmental matters, then call it that. Better yet, just invent a new word for it. That’s how “Islamofascism” was born.
Raheem February 25, 2008 at 8:19 pm: “but other people have different values and will buy recycled goods for the sake of the pursuit of those values.”

Come on man. Anyone who would take a loss to buy recycled goods has been mislead by this wicked movement. They are delusional. Its not about individualist values. Its about the utter ridiculousness and fundamental evil of this movement.

Look if this movement weren’t criminally insane and they wanted to authentically help the environment they would be for more and not less industrial-CO2. Since industrial-CO2 stimulates the environment.

Or supposing they were fooled but fooled in good faith in regard to industrial-CO2? Then like Lovelock they would be so in favour of nuclear energy that it would be considered as an urgent thing. Which it is. Hence they, if so deluded, would be against coal and in favour of nuclear. Lovelock offered to have any nuclear waste retained in his back yard.

This is the giveaway to the repulsively evil nature of the movement. They are against both coal and nuclear. And they are intensely stupid in matters like recycling.

The environmentalist movement would be a minor movement in favour of nature corridors and things if it weren’t about hard-core evil.

And there’s no reforming it if we don’t come clean about this and bash these people relentlessly. Its not even ok to be voluntarist-environmentalist if one shares their wicked goals. Because we don’t want people to be voluntarily not setting up those nuclear power plants with the liquified-coal plant beside it.