Tuesday, April 22, 2008

Corporate America, Earth Day, the public good and private interests

So, it's Earth Day, happy Earth Day everyone, and hypocrisy is out in full force. I am hardly innocent in this matter, as Bob Willis, my boss, pointed out to me this morning. He said, "You are a hypocrite. You rode your bike on Earth Day but left the lights on in your office when you left for staff meeting."

Which brings me to, does anyone really believe that all these Multi National Corporations really care about being GREEN? This morning I got an email from Levis that said "Celebrate Earth Day with 10 percent off all ECO green line jeans." Bottom line, from Exxon-Mobil to Fox to NBC to GAP to Starbucks to Nike to your Aunt Susan's pretzel business, corporations do NOT have a social conscience. Sure, some are better than others but they are built for one thing: Profit. Therefore, when it comes to commitment to conservation, respect for nature and concern over climate change, businesses (esp MEGA businesses) are suddenly interested because BY APPEARING RESPONSIBLE AND CONSCIENTIOUS, THEY CAN MAKE MORE MONEY. Some MNCs are worse than others but mostly they range from uninformed and ignorant to blatantly evil when it comes to issues of justice. That's why the public must care about issues and not fall for some easy marketing opportunities once a year. The public good must be championed by...you guessed it, the public.

The best way to be green on Earth Day of course, would be to not watch tv, not eat at Chipotle and most of all, not waste precious energy resources on something as trivial as blogging.

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