|
Greenwashing:
public relations boosterism
What is greenwash?
Concise Oxford English Dictionary, Tenth Edition
greenwash (n):
"Disinformation disseminated by an organisation so as to present an environmentally responsible public image.
Derivatives greenwashing. Origin from green on the pattern of whitewash."
Ecocentrism:
Eugene not "number one Green City"
"World's Greatest City of
the Arts & Outdoors"
world's most absurd slogan
TREES:
Transportation, Energy,
Environment, Sustainability |
TRANSPORTATION
after Peak Oil
WETLANDS Alternative:
West Eugene Transportation,
Land and Neighborhood
Design Solutions
West Eugene Collaborators:
Bypassing Sustainability:
Planes, Trains, Automobiles
Green Building & Boondoggles
ENVIRONMENT
Protection and Restoration
- ecoforestry:
selective logging to restore tree farms to forests
no clearcuts or biocides,
value added products
- green business, clean industry
myco and bioremediation,
- zero discharge
ban toxics to protect public health
carbohydrate
economy, no petrochemicals
- reduce garbage: waste is a terrible thing to mind
- intelligent (urban) design:
beauty not ugliness
(prevent strip mauls, billboards)
Polluted Air and Water
- Clearcutting the Cascades
& Coast Range
- Aerial Herbicides blanket our forests
- Slash pile burning - a huge waste of trees
- Toxic Eugene:
Plywood glue factories
Railroad pollution
wood preserving
- Grass Seed Capital of the World:
Pollen and Smoke Pollution
- Nano-pollution info at oilempire.us
ENERGY
for the Year 2025
Region 2050 & limits to growth
- build solar panel and wind turbine
factories
- convert grass seed farms to grow
biofuels
- require passive solar design in
building codes
- relocalize production to reduce
consumption
(fewer delivery trucks)
- retrofit buildings: conservation
& renewables
- initiatives for sustainable jobs after Peak Oil
SUSTAINABILITY
is not efficiency, it is zero petroleum
- paradigm shifts: psychological and political
- beyond boom and bust: steady state
economy
- local food security,
more community
gardens,
teach gardening skills at neighborhood levels,
protect farm soils
from "development"
regional inventories of food production and
processing
- economic stability needs democratic
decisions,
Campaign Finance Reform
- public health: single payer health
care
- support local economy:
strengthen
local businesses,
build downtown Farmers Market
not Whole Foods predator,
ban big box megastores & franchises
Human Rights City?
- Chinese Olympics
- June 1, 1997:
pepper spray used on
peaceful protestors
- rapist cops convicted of felonies
- scaring toddlers
- tasers
greenwash groups:
Activist Malpractice
Disasters:
preventative, permaculture perspectives
Disaster Mitigation and Land Use:
-
Eugene needs intelligent (urban) design
Hospitals, Earthquakes, Floods,
and Lahars
Troubled Bridges Over Water:
the I-5 bridge crisis
West Eugene sprawl in floodplains: WEP, Target megastore, Royal Node
subdivision
The Long Emergency:
Peak Oil and
Climate Collapse require paradigm shift
Katrina disaster shows the Federal
government response: we are on our own
Eugene: the bubble
|
Eugene's fragmented cliques fail to reach potentials
by Mark Robinowitz
on this page:
an incomplete list of Eugene area social change groups
My hardest fight as a performer has been with myself, to be as clear
a conduit as possible for what needs to be said. That's the ongoing struggle.
Get my ego and my brain out of the way and let this stuff happen.
-- from "mouth that roared: Bruce Cockburn says he's not
an activist but a concerned voice", Edmonton Sun, 27 March 2002, by Fish
Griwkowsky.
Before he left California to take over the Wilderness Society, photographer
and lifelong environmental activist Ansel Adams, who knew most of the players
well, had warned him: 'You're about to go work with the biggest egos on the
planet. They don't get paid much so the drive is ego, and the righteousness
is self-righteousness,' Adams added, 'the worst kind.' Turnage says Adams foreboding
proved accurate. 'I've never seen so much territoriality and rivalry. Some rivalry
is healthy, but this was counterproductive." There were, however, some
good meetings, 'although the organizations' staffs disliked each other so immensely
it was hard to get them to collaborate on anything we decided to do together.'
-- Mark Dowie, Losing Ground: American Environmentalism at the Close of the
Twentieth Century, p. 69-70
I must confess that over the last few years I have been gravely disappointed
with the white moderate. I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that
the Negro's great stumbling block in the stride toward freedom is not the White
Citizen's Counciler or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate who is more
devoted to "order" than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which
is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice;
who constantly says "I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I can't
agree with your methods of direct action;" who paternalistically feels
he can set the timetable for another man's freedom; who lives by the myth of
time and who constantly advises the Negro to wait until a "more convenient
season." Shallow understanding from people of goodwill is more frustrating
than absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will. Lukewarm acceptance
is much more bewildering than outright rejection.
-- Martin Luther King, Jr., "Letter from the Birmingham Jail", 1963
David Brower, 87, ill with cancer but a rebel to the end, quit the Sierra Club board last week. "I find going to the meetings is, frankly, a total waste of time," said the great environmentalist. "They discuss practically nothing about conservation. You just get layers and layers of bureaucracy."
www.villagevoice.com/news/0021,ridgeway,15086,6.html
encounter group
noun
a group of people who meet to gain psychological benefit through close contact with one another.
from Monty Python's The Life of Brian -
a parable about many things, including ultra-sectarian leftist groups
BRIAN: Are you the Judean People's Front?
REG: Fuck off!
BRIAN: What?
REG: Judean People's Front. We're the People's Front of Judea! Judean People's
Front. Cawk.
FRANCIS: Wankers.
BRIAN: Can I... join your group?
REG: No. Piss off.
BRIAN: I didn't want to sell this stuff. It's only a job. I hate the Romans
as much as anybody.
PEOPLE'S FRONT OF JUDEA: Shhhh. Shhhh. Shhh. Shh. Shhhh.
REG: Stumm.
JUDITH: Are you sure?
BRIAN: Oh, dead sure. I hate the Romans already.
REG: Listen. If you really wanted to join the P.F.J., you'd have to really hate
the Romans.
BRIAN: I do!
REG: Oh, yeah? How much?
BRIAN: A lot!
REG: Right. You're in. Listen. The only people we hate more than the Romans
are the fucking Judean People's Front.
P.F.J.: Yeah...
JUDITH: Splitters.
P.F.J.: Splitters...
FRANCIS: And the Judean Popular People's Front.
P.F.J.: Yeah. Oh, yeah. Splitters. Splitters...
LORETTA: And the People's Front of Judea.
P.F.J.: Yeah. Splitters. Splitters...
REG: What?
LORETTA: The People's Front of Judea. Splitters.
REG: We're the People's Front of Judea!
LORETTA: Oh. I thought we were the Popular Front.
REG: People's Front! C-huh.
FRANCIS: Whatever happened to the Popular Front, Reg?
REG: He's over there.
P.F.J.: Splitter!
....
BRIAN: Brothers! Brothers! We should be struggling together!
FRANCIS: We are! Ohh.
BRIAN: We mustn't fight each other! Surely we should be united against the common
enemy!
EVERYONE: The Judean People's Front?!
BRIAN: No, no! The Romans!
EVERYONE: Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yes. ...
One of the strategies that would be nice to see is consolidation of the various fragmented cliques -- that might pool scattered energies. We don't all have to do the exact same thing - that would be impossible and undesirable - but some unity of purpose even as each of us address different pieces of the puzzle would reinforce our efforts considerably.
The peace movement BY ITSELF is never going to accomplish what it needs to. But in close alliance with religious denominations, environmentalists, labor unions, students, teachers, community organizations, permaculturalists, local business promoters (including local currency programs), and many other social change movements -- it would then have the potential to be far more effective. While no one really knows exactly how that could be done there are many, many clues. It's what Martin Luther King was working on in 1967 and 1968, and why the government killed him (since bringing together civil rights, peace and economic justice was threatening to entrenched elites). A more reasonable social change model (than the "great leader" approach) would be mycelium - a web, a network without a single focal point that was broadly distributed.
Beyond War
Beyond War is a national effort that seeks "to explore, model, and promote the means for humanity to live without war." However, Beyond War's literature does not focus on the Peak Oil motivation for the invasion of Iraq, which is important for understanding what would be needed to shift away from resource wars.
www.heliosnetwork.org/displayorg.cfm?orgid=879
is a page that links to the local chapter
CALC: Community Alliance of Lane County - Progressive Responses
CALC is an organization that has been in Eugene for about four decades. It was originally a chapter of Clergy and Laity Concerned, a peace group opposed to the War on Vietnam. Now, it is a more local, more diverse effort. "Progressive Responses" is a project established after 9/11 that seeks to promote peace -- although the name reflects a misunderstanding of the event that triggered the war (since it tacitly assumes that 9/11 was really a surprise attack and the peace movement is merely urging a "progressive" response, not war)
Code Pink
Code Pink is a national peace organization that promotes a feminist view for peace. The name is a spoof on the color coded terror alerts from the Department of Homeland Security (Code Pink = women want peace). The local chapter, like others around the country, does a variety of actions including street theater. There is a considerable overlap between Code Pink and WAND.
www.heliosnetwork.org/displayorg.cfm?orgid=981
is a description of the local chapter
Department of Peace campaign
Eugene Middle East Peace Group (EMEPG)
www.mideastpeace.net
Israelis, Palestinians, Christians, Muslims, Jews and others working for understanding toward Middle East peace
Eugene Peace Works
www.efn.org/~eugpeace/
Justice Not War Coalition
www.justicenotwarcoalition.org
This website does not seem to have been updated in a while, the home page states "The next Justice Not War Coalition meeting (held twice a month) is scheduled for:
March 12, 2004" and the address and phone number listed for the organization are incorrect. It is difficult to understand why this "coalition" is somehow separate from the other "peace groups" of Eugene.
Peace booth at the Oregon Country Fair
a visibile outreach effort for peace at the "real downtown" of Eugene (second weekend in July). A couple of the "peace booth" leaders were embarrassed and jealous in 2003 and 2004 when tens of thousands of "Deception Dollars" were passed out in the vicinity of the peace book and were eagerly picked up by fairgoers (these gimmicks were much more popular than the relatively boring peace propaganda of the established groups in the peace booth). The peace booth has not been welcoming to efforts to discuss the Peak Oil reasons for the attack on Iraq (literature about this has not been generated by the peace booth groups). Some in the peace booth wanted this "deeper" approach to peace to be included in as part of their community, but it was blocked by the "gatekeepers" and is not welcome. Real peace is unlikely to be achieved by being more concerned about "turf" and political correctness than understanding why the war they're supposedly seeking to stop is happening.
Veterans for Peace
the local Eugene chapter is one of the more vibrant peace efforts in Eugene - the website is www.squadron13.com
WAND: Women's Action for New Directions
WAND is a national effort originally founded as Women's Action for Nuclear Disarmament (at the height of the Cold War). WAND was an example of redundancy in the peace movement - in addition to this group, there was also the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom and Women Strike for Peace. All three groups had offices in Washington, DC near the US Capitol, and it struck at least some members of the peace movement as odd that these groups could not collaborate more (or unite together) to present a feminist view on the need for peace. If there were any major differences between their policy agendas, they were minimal at best. There is considerable overlap in Eugene between WAND and Code Pink.
WAND's national website also has a truncated approach to understanding the reasons for the so-called War on Terror -- and tacitly endorses it by promoting a Council on Foreign Relations sponsored movie on nuclear terrorism called "Last Best Chance" (with Fred Thompson playing the role of the US President). The WAND website praises the 9/11 Commission Chairs (which would be hard to do if you don't accept the Bush regime view of 9/11) and quotes Senator Lugar of Indiana claiming that this film contributes toward the understanding needed for winning the war on terror. The failure of the national peace groups to address the fact that 9/11 was deliberately allowed to happen (and given technical assistance) by the Bush regime is the primary reason why the peace movements were completely unable to stop the invasion and occupation of Iraq.
| racist group pretending to be peace group |
Pacifica Forum
a group that once was a peace organization, but has degenerated into a forum for racism. On November 2, 2007, "Pacifica" (which means peaceful) is sponsoring a rant by one of the loudest supporters of Holocaust denial -- Mark Weber of the Institute for Historical Review. Background information is at www.greenwasheugene.com/pacificaforum.html
Climate Crisis Working Group
Climate Leadership Initiative
http://climlead.uoregon.edu
a think tank that is part of the University of Oregon's Institute for a Sustainable Environment
Mayor's Climate Challenge
http://climlead.uoregon.edu/checklist/checklist.html
an initiative that urges personal reduction of fossil fuel combustion through efficiency and behavior changes, but is silent about City promotion of transportation plans for another three quarter billion dollars of new roads in the metropolitan area. It would be nice to see the "Mayor's Challenge" result in changes to City policies and not merely requests that individuals behave differently.
In November 2007, the citizens of Eugene voted down 63 to 37 the Mayor's proposal to spend tens of millions to subsidize out-of-town real estate speculators who sought to destroy downtown locally owned businesses in exchange for speculative development of national chain stores to supposedly fix the problems of downtown Eugene largely caused by construction of suburban shopping mauls full of national chain franchises.
Cascadia Ecosystem Advocates
www.wildernessdefenders.net/cea.html
organizing the "Clearcutting the Climate" conference this winter about the climate impact of deforestation - the conference will seek to bring together the forest protection and climate crisis movements
Cascadia Wildlands Project
www.cascwild.org
Native Forest Council
www.forestcouncil.org
Oregon Wild
(formerly Oregon Natural Resources Council)
www.oregonwild.org
Sustainable Forestry Project
sponsor of a perennial ballot initiative to ban clearcutting and herbicide spraying on corporate timberlands. Their "Measure 64" initiative in 1998 was defeated by a statewide vote of five to one, thus ensuring that few politicians would be willing to support a subsequent effort. No initiative has qualified for the ballot since 1998, and it is unlikely that Oregon's environmental movement would rally to support a future effort with the amount of organizational effort and money it would take to enact any restrictions on corporate deforestation. Until honest elections are implemented with transparent vote counting and campaign finance reform, even the best ballot measures are unlikely to be successful if they challenge entrenched financial elites such as the timber industry.
Civil Liberties Defense Center
www.cldc.org
Environmental Law Alliance Worldwide
www.elaw.org
Western Environmental Law Center
www.westernlaw.org
Cascadia Commonwealth Institute (no website on line yet)
a project of Dharmalaya yoga center (webpage no longer on-line)
"Post Carbon Eugene" states that this institute is a "pioneering project to envision a relocalized economy for this area. Once the conceptual framework of this developmental plan is in place, it will become the foundation of a participatory process for creating a powerful and coherent approach to establishing relocalized, sustainable policy and practice in the South Willamette Valley."
Nice rhetoric, but perhaps more effort needs to be made on outreach and less on making perfect theoretical frameworks -- so that implementation can be achieved while there is still some cheap oil to use for the transition.
Eugene Permaculture Guild
www.eugenepermacultureguild.org
primary group promoting permaculture practices in the metro area, sponsors an annual gathering in late summer for networking and discussion among about 100 Eugene area permaculturalists. Holds periodic seed swaps and workshops about gardening and other skills. Best "free / cheap" materials email list in the area.
EPG sponsored Peak Oil awareness author Richard Heinberg's second presentation in Eugene in January 2006 that attracted nearly 1,000 people. Unfortunately, this successful event did not lead to changes in the way the community is structured. Worse, Mayor Kitty Piercy, who introduced Heinberg, went on to promote another public funded parking garage and corporate welfare for transnational chain stores shortly after this event.
Food Not Lawns
www.foodnotlawns.com/
an organization promoting urban agriculture
Lane County Energy Roundup
www.oregonenergymodel.org
an organization created in 2007 to promote awareness of renewable energy, energy efficiency, Peak Oil and climate change. Unsure what their primary focus is or what their specific accomplishments are.
Permatopia (group)
The word "permatopia" (permaculture utopia) was coined at the Earth Activist Training permaculture course in Sonoma County, California in May 2004.
There was a short-lived effort to create an organization called "Permatopia" in Eugene between December 2004 and June 2005, bringing together permaculturalists concerned about the implications of Peak Oil to discuss community responses. There were lots of meetings, but the primary outreach activity was the rhetorical sponsorship of a lecture by Michael Ruppert (author of Crossing the Rubicon: the Decline of the American Empire at the End of the Age of Oil) in May 2005. This event attracted over 400 people, but was not a financial success -- and a couple participants moved to exclude the organizer of the event afterwards (partly out of fear of the topic of the lecture, and probably partly a desire to be "in charge" of something). A member who tried to redesign the event (without discussing the proposal with the organizer or the speaker) went on to suggest the group would be raising $10,000 for an "energy farm" for Eugene -- even though that is the price tag for an "energy farm" for a house, not a small metropolitan area.
The website permatopia.com is part of the GreenwashEugene.com effort, focused more on global permaculture concepts, not Eugene centric efforts.
Post Carbon Eugene
an "outpost" of the Post Carbon Institute of Sebastopol, California, a group trying to encourage community responses to the end of cheap oil
Some Post Carbon "outposts" are substantial community groups with coherent organizational efforts to start the process of making cities and regions more "localized" in their consumption and production of food, energy and money. Some are merely good ideas that have yet to be realized. None have come anywhere close to the level of effort that will be needed to be fully effective on the "downslope" of Peak Oil. Perhaps the most famous "Outpost" is the relocalizaton effort in Willits, California, which is doing great work on these issues but is also facing the challenge of a $200 million freeway bypass around the town through the heart of the nearby agricultural lands.
Post Carbon Eugene was created by the would-be fundraiser for the proposed "Eugene energy farm" after the Permatopia group fell apart in the summer of 2005.
Post Carbon Eugene was a sponsor (along with the Eugene Permaculture Guild) of the "Lane County Relocalization" conference in April 2007.
The "Relocalization" event had several months of weekly planning meetings, but attracted virtually the same number of people as the "Connect the Dots" presentation two weeks previous which focused on many of the same topics, co-sponsored by OilEmpire.US (a related website to GreenwashEugene.com). The "relocalization" plenary session was largely an introduction to Peak Oil and community responses for an audience that had mostly already been exposed to this information at numerous previous events.
Perhaps one day Eugene social change groups will focus more on training the "choir" to become outreach organizers and work to consolidate the excessive redundancy that impedes effectiveness.
School Garden Project
Forestland Dwellers
Northwest Coalition for Alternatives to Pesticides (NCAP)
www.pesticide.org
Oregon Toxics Alliance
www.oregontoxics.org
| statewide environmental groups |
1000 Friends of Portland
a group that has done some great work in the past but is also compromised by funding from developers. Most famous for their work to stop the proposed Portland "Western Bypass" via the Land Use - Transportation - Air Quality (LUTRAQ) alternative, which showed that a combination of land use shifts and transit oriented development outperformed the proposed bypass.
In 2002, 1000 Friends promoted a worse version of the West Eugene Parkway than the design from the Oregon Department of Transportation -- this version was designed by their former Board Chair (architect George Crandall) in collaboration with 1000 Friends staffperson Rob Zako and independent activist Mary O'Brien. It would have had worse impacts to wetlands, forests, farms and homes than ODOT's version, and would have nullified the proposed federal legal challenges to the project. Details are at
www.permatopia.com/wetlands/crandall.html
The Nature Conservancy (of Oregon)
Stayed silent about the proposed West Eugene Parkway despite the threat to endangered habitats similar to the ecosystem fragment protected by their southwest Eugene "Willow Creek" preserve. Could their silence and acquiescence be related to the presence of Randy Pape on their Oregon board of directors? Randy Pape is also on the Oregon Transportation Commission and has direct financial interest in more road construction through his construction company, among other ties.
TNC provided a half million dollars to the yeson49.com campaign - how many authentic environmental groups that oppose ecocide have this sort of spare cash to influence elections?
Nature Conservancy's President Abruptly Announces Resignation
By Joe Stephens
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, October 2, 2007; A04
...
The series described how the Conservancy had logged forests and drilled for oil under the last native breeding ground of an endangered bird species. It reported that the charity's governing and advisory boards had grown to include executives from corporations that had paid millions of dollars in environment-related fines. It showed how the Conservancy had engaged in deals with executives on its boards.
The stories detailed how the Conservancy gave low-interest loans to its executives and sold scenic properties to its employees and trustees, who built homes on the sites and reaped large tax breaks.
After the Post series, the Conservancy restructured its board and banned some practices, including lending money to insiders, selling land to trustees and drilling on preserves.
Oregon Environmental Council
takes money from Nike, Weyerhauser and other polluters
Oregon League of Conservation Voters
promoted Kulongoski's re-election even though the State has abandoned enforcement of the Oregon Forest Practices Act (which supposedly regulates corporate clearcutting on private timberlands). The Governor is also pushing massive upgrades to I-5, the Sunrise Freeway and other highways, plus the Coos Bay Liquid Natural Gas terminal and associated massive gas pipeline through 200 miles of southern Oregon's forests.
Oregon Sierra Club
| land use & transportation |
Citizens for Public Accountability (CPA)
www.lanecpa.org/cpa
Citizens Coalition (West Eugene Parkway campaign)
Friends of Eugene
www.friendsofeugene.org
Goal One Coalition
www.goal1.org
LandWatch Lane County
primary group working to defend rural Lane County
www.landwatch.net
1000 Friends of Oregon
|
