Greena, Worrier Princess
To get a taste of the approved “environmental education” activities of government bureaucrats, writes Ben O’Neill, we can do little better than looking at a games website called “Planet Slayer,” recommended for children by various Australian governments.
To assist in their “fun and games” and answer all their alleged enviro-dilemmas, children are guided by the protagonist cartoon character, “Greena, the Worrier Princess,” who invites children to use the website’s Greenhouse Calculator to “find out what age you should die at so you don’t use more than your fair share of Earth’s resources.”
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Ben,
I am astonished that you seem to believe your own absurd caricaturisation of Environmentalism. You attempt to use the existence of this single website as well as a quotation from a Sustainability Programs Officer to support your eventual conclusions, that “The environmentalist’s concept of intrinsic value is nothing but the desire to destroy human values.”
Your argument is polemical and at no point even considers the potential validity of the Environmentalism movement, which you instead misrepresent, and your assualt is wholly against this straw-man. Generally environmentalists do not consider nature to be superior to man, and to suggest that they want to destroy human values demonstrates an unwillingness to even interact constructively with their point of view.
You resort to fallacious and deceptive argument against your adversary: using a quotation from an opponent of Environmentalism to suggest your own biased version of their ‘standard viewpoint’; a false analogy between the instinctive and natural function of predatory animals and the unnatural, harmful and potentially irreversible human degradation of the nvironment; and inferring that a hesitation to confuse young children is also due to the (assumed) irrationality of ‘the environmentalist paradigm’.
Your article could be a harmless example of manipulative and shallow writing, except for the untruths you proclaim in regard to the environment. The fact is, it is necessary for humans to work in harmony with the environment in order to secure their own wellbeing. Deforestation has already contributed to increases in breeding of malarial mosquitoes, the of CFCs has contributed to increases in cancers, and global warming (althought you might deny humanity’s role in it) is increasingly threatening human existence as a consequence of humanity’s unwillingness to think that looking after the environment could reciprocally work in our favour.
While some environmentalists may go too far in their thinking, your attempts to tar a whole body of people with the same brush, your deceptive techniques and false representations, and your implicit contempt for
environmentalists render your work little but unsubstantiated vitriol.
joe dignam says:
“Deforestation has already contributed to increases in breeding of malarial mosquitoes, the of CFCs has contributed to increases in cancers, and global warming…”
all unsubstantiated/disputed claims. this is the pot calling the kettle black.
Philemon, I suggest you re-read my last post to you and my previous ones. Why? Because you’re not actually responding to what I’ve written, but instead to strawmen.
- I have NOT said that the government “message itself is not anti-human and perfectly consistent with Locke’s theory of property”. Rather, I’ve said that “on its face, the above message [one that finite commons should be shared] of this particular game seems wholly consistent with the Lockean requirements that one should
• abstain from harming others, and
• leave enough and as good for others when taking from the commons”, and suggested that it would be productive if one were to review the website more critically with these concepts in mind.”
To your credit, you have tried to address some arguments against the website, but you still use rather thin and offensive strawmen. Besides arguing agsinst the most offensive language – the hyperbolic suggestion that everyone who has used more than their fair share (practically everyone in Australia) should have died – why not question how one’s fair share is determined, by whom, for what purpose or with what consequences, none of which are explicitly addressed?
- You suggest that I should “conduct [my]self in a manner consistent with the message [I was] concerned to defend”, but I certainly was not defending a message that people should commit suicide – or the state should bump them off – when some “fair share” is surpassed.
The question of force is, of course, a perfectly legitimate one to raise.
- You suggest, without basis, that I am trying to get the state to compel others to do as I wish. One what basis do you derive that conclusion from any of my comments? None – just your fevered strawmen-mongering. Not very Austrian – though shamefully VERY representative of what passes for discourse on this blog.
All that I have been insisting on here is a little more reason and logic, and some good-faith engagement
with others – as the best way to actually influence them.
I guess that I may be asking too much.
TT
Hi Joel,
Thank you for your post. The allegedly ‘absurd characterisation’ of environmentalism that you refer to is in fact consistent with the ethics of environmentalism as interpreted by many of its supporters and critics. The notion that nature is to be evaluated as valuable for its own sake, rather than for its use to man is central to many theories of environmental ethics — this is often referred to as ‘deep ecology’. Contrary to your posting, it is not merely my own characterisation — rather, it is a viewpoint which has a wide scholarly literature, both from supporters and detracters of the theory. The paragraph I cite from Michael Berliner is merely a small example. For further information on this ethical paradigm see:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deep_ecology
This page lists at least thirty well known environmentalists and environmental theorists who adopt the deep ecology paradigm. The statement cited in my article that “the environmentalist’s concept of intrinsic value is nothing but the desire to destroy human valuesâ€, aside from not being my eventual conclusion as you state (rather, it is a prepatory quotation made in the third paragraph of the article), is also supported by large numbers of critics of the deep ecology doctrine, including Ayn Rand, George Reisman and Michael Berliner. If you google search “environmentalism†and “anti-human†you will find plenty of articles on this topic from plenty of different people. Again, far from being my own ideosyncratic interpretation, this is a viewpoint for which there is a wide literature by many critics of environmentalism.
The quotation from Michael Berliner correctly represents the ethical paradigm underlying environmentalism. The fact that many people who call themselves ‘environmentalists’ are not aware of the ethical paradigm of deep ecology or the philosophical roots of the environmentalist paradigm (and may not support them) does not change the nature of environmentalism. It simply means that these people are not environmentalists in the proper sense of the word.
You are correct that in my article I do not consider the potential validity of the environmentalism movement. That is because my article is not about the validity or invalidity of the environmentalism movement. It is about the illegitimate use of public schools to indoctrinate children with allegedly desirable behaviours rather than giving them genuine education. As you can see from my above post (made before your post), I would have the same objection if children were indoctrinated with pro-capitalist ideals in primary school (despite the fact that I support these ideals).
You refer to “untruths [I] proclaim in regard to the environmentâ€, however you fail to cite even one example. I presume that this is because my article makes no assertions about the environment at all. I do not discuss whether the factual assertions made in the Planet Slayer website are correct or incorrect, nor do I assert anything about deforestation, malaria mosquitos, CFCs or global warming. The topic of the article is the indoctrination of primary school children, not the truth or falsity of environmental propositions.
As far as the assertion that I use a single example to make sweeping claims, I have included an entire section of the article stating why we may make a more general inference from this example. I cite the fact that the website is funded, created and hosted by government agencies and the fact that at least four government education departments (that I am aware of) recommend the website for children. This means that a very large number of bureaucrats must have seen and approved of the content of the website. The Planet Slayer website is one example – the many bureaucrats involved are many more. Moreover, if you have a look at the various blogs on the internet discussing the website, you will find plenty of parents and others with substantial experience dealing with environmentalist indoctrination in public primary schools — the Planet Slayer website is the tip of the iceberg.
I hope that clears things up.
Cheers,
Ben.
TT: “Rather, the website that you link to is obviously focussed primarily on “sharing” resources and the environment, that is, on some concept of comparative social justice based on the premise that use or consumption of some resources may adversely affect others.”
Let’s review.
“Use our Greenhouse Calculator to find out when you should die.”
This seems to be pretty clear-cut to me. Not “when you will exceed your fair share of emissions” or “when you should stop emitting CO2″. Should. Die. “Should” is a normative word. If I steal from someone else, I “should” be made to pay back twice what I stole. The victim has a right to demand that of me. In this case, if I emit more CO2 than X amount, I should die.
Can you justify such a stance without resorting to intrinsic value? Only if it could be proven that my emitting of X amount of CO2 caused the death of one person. Anything less than that and suddenly we are putting people to death for property destruction, personal injury, or damage to a commons. Now that’s hardly justice, is it?
You might argue that this one statement is an anomaly amongst other “good” messages on the site. If so, it’s akin to a pro-war article being posted on the front page of Mises.org.
“…why not question how one’s fair share is determined, by whom, for what purpose or with what consequences, none of which are explicitly addressed?”
That’s another problem I had. How do they profess to know the “ideal” amount of CO2 to emit, per capita? Given the choices the site has for us, a long life means extreme poverty. (And maybe that’s the real message. It seems to me that if people were “educated” to believe that such poverty is necessary to save the planet, they will be more amenable to repressive action by the government.)
Like you, I want the truth. The only difference is that I am not yet convinced of what you take for fact. In the spirit of promoting truth, I urge you to quit apologizing for those in the environmentalist movement who use fallacious arguments to advance their cause. Just as I believe that “Fahrenheit 9/11″ actually had the opposite of its intended effect by straying too far from the facts (inviting plenty of justified criticism), hysterics from the environmental movement aren’t going to win people over. Even the majority of people who rarely engage their critical thinking ability have developed a certain (healthy) cynicism. Until the environmental movement purges the alarmism and sticks to factual arguments, I’m going to resist taking anything from them at face value.
Scott, thanks for the even tone. However, you still seem to be affected by the reading skills impairment that often accompanies EDS (enviro derangement syndrome):
- Ben’s quote (in his second paragraph of the summary intro) makes clear that the purpose of using the Greenhouse Calculator is not simply to “find out what age you should die at”, but “so you don’t use more than your fair share of Earth’s resources.” So yes, I would say that it seems pretty clear that this is about SHARING, which does not at all require a reference to “instrinsic value”. Sorry, I’m merely stating the obvious here.
- You “urge [me] to quit apologizing for those in the environmentalist movement who use fallacious arguments to advance their cause”, but of course I haven’t apologized for anyone in the enviro movement here, much less those who clearly use fallacious arguments which are perfectly appropriate to contest. Rather, I have been suggesting that those who would disagree with government policy and stupid arguments by enviros will be better served if they are careful to avoid fallacies, unsupported arguments and emotional ad homs themselves.
Of course I agree with you that “hysterics from the environmental movement aren’t going to win people over”, and I applaud that you resist taking at face value what many enviros say. That said, however, Austrians still ought to understand and appreciate that the extensive Austrian literature that recognizes and explains why there ARE environmental problems, which stem from competing demands and preferences with respect to resources that are not clearly or effective owned (including externalities) or that are subject to socialistic, government control.
A little thinking about Austrian principles should also readily show that while arguments about “instrinsic value” are of course nonsense, they are readily understood as nothing more than the personal preferences of those who express such views that natural environments – which are under pressure in many places due to property rights problems – ought to be preserved.
In short, environmental fights are entirely predictible disputes over resources, preferences and to what extent private property rights or socialized control predominate – and, in the case of socialized rules, who captures the rents.
There are many free market environmentalists who urge that a focus on private rules – and privatization – is generally the most productive path towards resolving socialized mismanagement (although they throw their hands up on climate change), but Austrians seem to prefer to bash enviros while ignoring both the property rights and big-government dynamics that gave birth to enviros and the batches of wealthy elites who prosper under socialized managment.
Sorry if by simplifying I’ve made things too complex.
Tom
Thank you for your reply Ben,
I appreciate your clarification in regards to your portrayal of environmentalism. However, I still think you may be misleading your audience. Your article refers to a fundamental minority within the environmentalism movement, and while they may indeed be the onlytrue environmentalists, the many people who, while not seeking to ‘destroy human values’, consider themselves to be environmentalists, surely represent a sizeable majority, and your use of the extreme minority of environmentalists to characterise the whole is deceptive.
In regard to your opposition of teaching children concern for the environment by ‘engaging the heart’, you seem to contradict yourself. The process of enabling children to learn this way is hardly ‘entirely antithetic to genuine education’, indeed, children too young to necessarily be intellectually engaged may learn to love the environment in much the same way that children are taught other moral behaviours. It is clear that the purpose of such education is to instill moral values such that appropriate behaviour may be developed from a young age. This teaching focuses around moral instruction and is a essential to anybody’s development as a human – your opposition to it is only valid if you think that we are morally exempt from environmental concern, a point you state to be irrelevant.
Joel: By my “clarification” I assume you mean my total drubbing of the argument in your previous post.
Update: The ABC have amended the Planet Slayer website to change the words of the greenhouse calculator. Instead of telling you when you should die, it now says “You’ll use your share of the planet in [X] years.”
No amendments have been made to the rest of the propaganda on the website, which includes (in the Planet Slayer game) the words: “Organise and socialise, comrades. Together we can save the world!” (No prizes for guessing which meaning of “socialise” is intended.)
Update: The link to the Planet Slayer game in my article is now directing to somewhere else on the ABC website. I am not sure if the game has been removed completely, or if it has just been moved to a different web-address. In any case, you can find descriptions of the game, including pictures and video, by searching on the web. Here is a video of the carbon calculator:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ifRhxufyHbw
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