A quick argument for social uplift environmentalism

Protect communities from the most harmful effects, and provide them access to the benefits.  That was the mantra at a recent Center for American Progress panel, where eco-superstars Van Jones and Majora Carter made the case for “social uplift environmentalism.”

 

If you’ve seen An Inconvenient Truth, you may remember that, while richest nations contribute the most to climate change, the poorest (and least industrialized) are faced with the majority of climate change’s nefarious effects.  Even more, the world’s richest countries more effectively defend against negative effects than their poorer counterparts.  For instance, Africa only contributes to 3% of the world’s carbon emissions, yet its people are faced with climate change’s destructive effects.  (We’ve seen this going on in the Sudan, where many observe that the fertile land/drought land divide will spur future conflicts.)  Per person, an average American emits 19 – 20 tons of carbon dioxide a year, as opposed to 10 per Western European or 3 per Chinese. 

 

Let’s change countries for a minute, and fly back to the United States.  (Well, we should train it, since flying is the number one carbon producer in many of our lives: roundtrip from London to New York would emit 2500 tons of carbon dioxide.)  Back in America, the “climate divide” — different communities having disparate impacts on and feeling disparate effects of climate change — was the crux of the argument at the CAP panel, where Jones, Carter, and others made the case that low-income communities in the US, predominantly communities of color, face climate change’s ills with no chance to participate in the emerging green economy – the markets and systems that aim to mitigate climate change’s effects.  To Jones and Carter, access to the green economy and the new green jobs movement is the new civil rights, a type of “social uplift environmentalism.”

 

Climate Change effects

 

Access to Green jobs

 

As Jones said, “I like the polar bears.  But I like our people better.  And climate change will destroy our people.”

 

 More on this later.          

 

d.

“Waterboarding is torture, period.”

Big ups to former Navy interrogator Malcolm Nance, who testified in front of a subcommittee of the House Judiciary Committee, and emphatically declared that waterboarding is indeed torture.

Picture courtesy of http://www.intelligencesummit.org/speakers/MalcolmNance.php

As if we need someone to sit in front of our public servants to tell them that strapping someone to a inclined board, wrapping a cloth around the head, and pouring water over the mouth and nose to induce the beginning stages of drowning is cruel and unusual.

While Attorney General nominee Mukasey dodges questions and invokes the most innocuous euphemisms (a la this Administrations claim that waterboarding is an “enhanced interrogation technique”), a large majority of Americans believe that waterboarding is torture. To no surprise, today’s Judiciary Committee hearing was not call-and-response; the Bush Administration didn’t allow its designated whipping boy to testify on the supposed merits of waterboarding and other forms of their, um, “enhanced” techniques.

Nance’s testimony was frightening, especially his description of the process of waterboarding: “water overpowering your gag reflex, and then feel(ing) your throat open and allow pint after pint of water to involuntarily fill your lungs.”

Oprah’s apology

One of our contributor’s favorite newspapers, The Independent, featured a recent story on abuse and neglect at Oprah’s $40 million South African school.

$40 million on one school gets you a yoga studio, gym, protective? fencing, lavish classroom decor and fancy uniforms…and a whole lot of criticism.

I’ll give to to Oprah for doing something; I’m not hating on her for trying to be active. But, as in earlier discussions about Teach for America, I’m not sure if that kind of doing is actually doing any good.

$40 million sure could buy more (more schools, more books, more uniforms, more teachers). But it was spent on someone’s dream (read: a self-reflexive, Western consumer’s notion of an educational wonderland).