Discussion I had on Treehugger.com:
We all need to make money, that's a given in this modern day and age. The issue greens have with "capitalism" is that it is done almost completely devoid of conscience and consideration for the long term outcomes. ("This asthma medicine may help control your asthma symptoms that have not been brought under control by existing medications.... this medication may increase your risk of death from asthma.")
Capitalism is certainly no panacea. It's just the best of the worst options we have. ![<img src=]( "Smile")
" src="//forums.treehugger.com/images/smilies/icon_smile.gif" /> Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union were certainly not environmental paradises.
My belief is that the most effective means for change is to persuade people that helping the environment is in their best interest in one way or other. Once that happens, that creates a demand for products and services that cater to the people that companies will in turn fill.
In the home I'm building, I'm spending a lot of time dealing with the contractors who produce and install the environmental friendly products -- the solar panels, the LED lights, the close/open cell insulation, the geothermal, the gray water system, the inverters, etc. And every step of the way I'm dealing with people who are to the RIGHT of me politically.
That takes nothing away from people here. It was TreeHugger.com that set me on the path of finding out what I needed to do to make sure my new house was as green as possible. So I'm certainly not arguing that people here aren't having an impact.
The issue is when one group demonizes people who aren't in lock-step. Or worse, creating strawmen of their political opponents and imbuing them with traits that are simply figments of their imagination.
In one conversation on this forum, I was told I was anti-green specifically because I don't buy the CO2 hypothesis on AGW. My deeds meant nothing, only my faith. As a conservative, it is just as easy to build a liberal strawman - the hapless hippie whose idea of helping the environment is bitching on forums and composting twice a year while driving some 30 year old van 50,000 miles a year. But that's just as much of a strawman as the one SgtMaj constructed for conservatives.
We simply do not accept the notion that straight, short term economic gains should be the driving force in making business decisions. Which at this point in time, is exactly the way the majority of "Capitalists" do business.
We do not support companies that continue to throw all other considerations and concerns under the bus in their single-minded pursuit of ever growing profit margins.
The problem I have with this is that it's so subjective as to be meaningless.
IMO, true environmentalism is already winning -- at least in the United States. And it's almost entirely due through increased awareness which has created a demand that business look to fill. Even Walmart is now stocking organic products. That's a big deal.
In just the past decade, there have been tangible results in the realm of energy conservation, reduction of waste (people bringing their own bags to the grocery store), a focus on cleaner water and air, more awareness of taking care of the environment around us.
Compare how people live today versus the 70s. I can still practically smell the lead that used to be in the air and people cutting down all their trees to make room for their grass or dumping fertilizer on their lake front grass.
In another decade or two, windows will start providing solar power to homes, virtually all new cars will be EV, new homes will increasingly have geothermal to lower costs even further, and on and on.
And the reason this will happen is because people will demand this sort of thing in their products and it will increasingly be reflected in basic building standards in local communities.
It won't happen because a bunch of militant greenies bullied their way to getting oppressive federal laws in place. It'll happen in spite of that. Original: http://forums.treehugger.com/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=13782&start=30