The environmental movement is on life support. Some would
say it is already dead. Even though climate change and Al Gore are fast
becoming the conversation du jour around the American dinner table, it also
happens to be the rallying cry for do-gooder conservationists and corporations
alike.
Call it the eco-economy. Virtually all major corporations
now claim they are going �green.� Toyota dealerships cannot keep the hybrid
Prius in stock. Apple, after heavy lobbying from Greenpeace and others,
declares they are going to make their computers environmentally friendly.
Genetically modified corn, which produces ethanol fuel, is being hawked by
Monsanto as an alternative to petroleum based gasoline. Ethanol advocates are
calling their program �Fuels for Profit,� while they sip McDonald�s organic
coffee. The environmental movement has been corporatized.
Big green groups are not helping the situation. Their hands
are tied by both the large foundations that pay their rent and the Democratic
Party to which they are attached at the hip. They long ago gave up on
challenging the system. Most groups today are little more than direct mailing
outfits who have embraced a sordid neoliberal approach to saving the natural
world. The true causes of planetary destruction are never mentioned. Industrial
capitalism is not the problem, individuals are. Not the government�s inability
to enforce its weak regulations. Not big oil companies, or coal fired plants.
These neoliberal groups argue ordinary people are to blame for the impending
environmental catastrophe, not those who profit from the Earth�s destruction.
Meanwhile, on the ground, grassroots environmentalists
engaging in arson as a response to unfettered sprawl and our car-addicted
culture are dubbed terrorists by the federal government. Despite their extreme
and counter-productive methods, the cases are quite informative. In our
post-9/11 world, young eco-radicals are viewed by the FBI and corporations as
if they are as dangerous as bin Laden. All activists, no matter their cause,
should take heed. It is the first step in cracking down on radical activism.
Torching SUVs in the middle of the night, unfortunately,
will not bring about any massive radical change, except, perhaps, in our
�anti-terrorism� legislation. There are militant direct actions that are
prevailing, however, from Paul Watson�s crusade to protect the wild creatures
of the sea, to the environmentalists who stake out in trees for weeks at a
time, to the grandmothers who chain themselves to logging trucks, despite the
dangers.
Such actions, coupled with the organization of the working
class, could help steer the environmental movement in the right direction. The
philosophy of the great wilderness advocate Bob Marshall may prove to be quite
prescient in the age of foundation driven conservationism. Marshall believed
wilderness was for the regular folks. He believed wilderness was a �minority
right� and argued that elitism inside the movement would be inherently corrupt.
He�s right. The burdens of a corporatized society are great, not only for our
forests and rivers, but to the workers who are consistently exploited and
poisoned for profit.
Marshall believed the radical trade unions and socialized
forestry was one answer to countering the destruction of the wild places he
loved so much. Now is the time to once again embrace such an environmental
ethic. Wilderness is for all to enjoy. It is not ours to exploit. The salmon
and grizzly bears deserve better.
Jeffrey St. Clair is the author of �Been Brown So Long It
Looked Like Green to Me: the Politics of Nature� and Grand �Theft Pentagon.�
His newest book is �End Times: the Death of the Fourth Estate,� co-written with
Alexander Cockburn.
Joshua
Frank is co-editor of Dissident Voice and author of �Left Out! How Liberals
Helped Reelect George W. Bush� (Common Courage Press, 2005), and along with
Jeffrey St. Clair, the editor of the forthcoming �Red State Rebels,� to be
published by AK Press in March 2008.