1970s environmentalism was simple: don’t pollute; today we’ve made a devil of the very element that is the building block of life: carbon
My parents weren’t quite old enough to be real hippies of the 1960s. Born in the 1950s, they came of age in the ’70s, carrying with them a love of meditation, nature, and “back to the land” living. The environmentalism of my childhood was simple and direct: it was about pollution. Don’t dump toxins in rivers. Don’t litter. Don’t poison the ground you depend on.
Somewhere along the way, we lost that focus. Today’s environmentalism has drifted far from the basics of clean air, clean water and healthy soil. Instead, it has become almost entirely about carbon. We’ve made a devil out of the very element that is the building block of life. Plants, animals and humans are all made of carbon. How did we convince ourselves that the essence of our bodies and our soil is the enemy?
I can’t help but suspect that money plays a role. After all, how much profit can be made by telling people not to litter, not to dump chemicals in their fields, or not to poison the water supply? Not much. But if you convince the public that every single act they do — eating, driving, even breathing — is a threat to the planet, there’s an endless array of products, technologies and offsets you can sell them to soothe their guilt.
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