[Re] Green, but not so peaceful

 I attended the Greenpeace protest that Brandon Ng held during lunch yesterday and overall, I felt like we brought awareness to the issue of finding clean and sustainable energy to our school, even if it was in a small way.  Rarely do you ever see prudent students, especially from our school, who are willing to stand up for a noble cause and take responsibility for our environment.  Perhaps, this is within correlation to Sutherland's question of when students would be aggravated enough to voice their own opinions publicly (especially the Wall Street Protests).  However, the night before, I was a bit skeptical of how the protest would turn out after reading Adam's post concerning the message Greenpeace is trying to promote and its tendencies to use civil disobedience to defend the environment.

Adam says: "GreenPeace is somewhat known to be a bit radical and act in extreme ways, some of you may have seen or heard of the show Whale Wars. To get a result you have to put in a effort of just as much value. The fact that they were attacked after poking around a nuclear testing site shows that GreenPeace will not shy away from any problem that is potentially disastrous towards our home, Earth... I'm finding it hard to find the legality of the radical measures taken by certain members of GreenPeace."

Almost immediately, I was turned off by the mere mention of Whale Wars. As I recall, the television series has received its own criticism and scrutiny for utilizing direct action sabotage against Japanese whalers.  Despite the great reviews the show received for the first season,  the Sea Shepherds on "Whale Wars" have done very little to protect whales where they need protection.  The WWF estimates that 90% of non-natural whale deaths are due to collisions with ships, followed by "by-catch," whales becoming caught in nets, and then lastly, by fishing.  Unlike the aggressive interference Sea Shepherds, changes in shipping lanes around the world and the development of new technologies are making a real difference in reducing the number of whales who die needlessly.  Critics claim that the show is a cheap exploitation in praise of what is nothing less than eco-terrorism and glorification of vigilantism on the high seas.  The show's controversy was even spoofed by South Park in an episode called "Whale Whores" which condemned both the whalers themselves and the activists that fought against them.

Greenpeace was originally formed to protest nuclear power testing and development and  gained attention by creating “mind bombs” or strong, visual messages displaying their position on complex environmental issues.  However, their methods and how much the organization has managed to accomplish over the past years has come into question. The organization has approximately lost 2 million members in the past ten years. One of its most prominent critics is Patrick Moore, one of the founders of the group, who now criticizes the organization for being anti-science after his leave.  Greenpeace has also notably received negative feedback on its main site for taking credit in the endeavor to end Japanese whaling which they allegedly took no part of.

 Like Adam, I too would be hesitant in taking radical measures that would certainly be difficult to justify.  I would prefer taking more peaceful alternatives to send a message rather than use drastic measures.  Although I may have a distaste for Greenpeace, I'm still glad I was able to participate in a protest with peers that shared equal concerns for our environment's future.