I clicked "Translate Tweet". It gave me:
"We hope that by planting a few trees we can greenwash our ecocidal business model and trip people into believing we're a force for good."
Incidentally, what in God's name are @Natures_Voice and @WoodlandTrust doing in partnership with this planetary death machine?
It's a classic example of how conservation groups, dazzled by corporate power and money, lose their moral compass.
Good spot by @andyheald
Which part of "greenwash" do these organisations not understand? And why should we continue to support them when they become a PR vehicle for fossil fuel companies?
I see this moral drift, cowardice and corruption of purpose throughout the conservation sector. Seaspiracy exposed it among marine organisations (and there's a lot more of that story to tell). But I'm sorry to say that the terrestrial ones are just as compromised.
Look, it's really simple.
You don't take money from fossil companies
You don't launch projects funded by fossil fuel companies
You don't allow fossil fuel companies to use your name
You don't help them greenwash their image
... if you want to retain a shred of credibility.
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1. I’m often asked by the industries I criticise to “work with us and find solutions”. It sounds reasonable. But is it?
In some cases (fossil fuel companies for example), I don’t think any environmentalist should work with them. We should combine to shut them down.
Thread/
2. In other cases, it’s probably a good thing that some environmentalists are working with industries to improve their performance – if indeed that’s what they’re really doing.
But at least some of us – I would say most – should stand apart and apply external pressure.
Why?
3. a. Because the industries tend to be richer and more powerful than we are. They spend more on advocacy and persuasion. Former critics soon adopt their worldview. I have seen so many groups and individual campaigners swallowed whole by them, never to be seen again.
How I became a human plague – and stumbled into one of the most astonishing scientific stories I’ve ever encountered.
My column.
Plus thread. theguardian.com/commentisfree/…
1. There’s an aspect of this story that I didn’t have space for in the column. This is about how the scientific and media establishment closed ranks around bad science, defending it from legitimate questioning and criticism.
2. In 2011, the Lancet’s editor, @richardhorton1, a man I otherwise admire, was challenged about major anomalies and irregularities in the PACE Trial paper he published. He dismissed the critics as “a small but highly vocal minority”. They turned out to be right.
We have a thriving intellectual culture in this country. But what distinguishes us from the rest of Europe - and is in fact highly unusual - is that it's scarcely represented in the media.
As a result, the *public* intellectual is an endangered species in the UK. We have a prevailing media culture of extreme anti-intellectualism. Intellectuals are derided as a pointy-headed elite. Elsewhere in Europe, they are cherished.
It's one of the reasons why so many of the heated debates here are vacuous and irrelevant. Huge, crucial issues go undebated, while we beat out each other's brains over trivia.
Why should wealth translate into greater legal and political rights over the fabric of the planet? It's a question I explore here:
The notion that we are "equal before the law" is a complete joke, when so much of the law concerns property rights. Those with property have far greater legal rights than those without. These rights include, in many cases, the right to trash what other people see as precious.
We need a whole new relationship with our blue planet. This means abandoning micro-consumerist bollocks and confronting the powerful interests trashing it.
My column: theguardian.com/commentisfree/…
It’s not just malpractice Seaspiracy exposes, but an entire worldview.
A worldview that describes any fish population not caught to the max as "underfished" or "underexploited".
We need to learn respect and wonder for the ecosystems we currently treat as nothing but seafood.
I've just discovered, via @Unpop_Science, that I made a mistake in this column: #Seaspiracy's figure for illegally caught fish is in fact supported in the scientific literature: sciencedirect.com/science/articl…
I confused this paper for another, that has been retracted.
Of course some of the people exposed by #Seaspiracy are going ballistic about it. What else can they do but shoot the messenger? The years of collusion, cowardice and failure have come home to roost.
As for the film's other critics: yes, there are details we could quibble over, as with all films. But, you know what? I didn't hear a word from them about the massive falsehoods and misdirections in Blue Planet 2 and Blue Planet Live. Why is it only the radical films they attack?
I don't think I've ever seen a series of such pathetic attempts to knock something down as the criticisms aimed at #Seaspiracy. They're either wrong, or so trivial/irrelevant that they just look like sour grapes. Finally, this issue is properly on the map. We should be cheering.