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(11/28/12 11:54pm)
On Thursday, Nov. 15, Olav Ljosne, senior manager of international operations at Royal Dutch Shell, came to campus to speak on a variety of topics, including the future of energy demand and conflict surrounding oil. Both students and members of the faculty filled the Robert A. Jones ’59 (RAJ) Conference Room to hear the talk, titled “Meeting Future Energy Needs.” Unlike the day before at the University of Vermont, where a group of climate justice activists interrupted Ljosne to the extent that his presentation could not proceed, those in attendance at the College did allow for Ljosne to speak during his allotted time. However, the talk was not without interruptions. Before Ljosne began, two students presented him with a fake diploma while graduation music played, congratulating him for engaging in “multiple human rights violations consistent with the practices of the Middlebury College endowment.” During the question period at the end of the talk, two other students became agitated, accusing Ljosne of being a liar, before falling to the floor in protest. However, a student drew applause from some members of the audience when, in response, he told his peers that they were embarrassing the College and should stop.
The question we ask ourselves in light of these events concerns the status of free speech on this campus. To what extent are students willing to tolerate such behavior as was exhibited by the protesters, some of whom are members of the Dalai Lama Welcoming Committee (DLWC)? Clearly, opinions diverge. Some find the means through which these students expressed themselves to be entirely consistent with the severity of the topic at hand, which dealt in part with accusations against Shell of human rights violations in Nigeria. Others, however, consider such behavior offensive and disrespectful, not only to Ljosne, who made the effort to come to campus, but also to those in attendance who wanted to learn more about Shell’s position and engage in sincere, constructive dialogue.
It seems clear that the protesters at Thursday’s meeting aimed to spark thoughtful discussion around Shell’s practices. Though many on campus may agree with the criticisms raised by this group of students, their actions, ironically enough, appeared to inhibit dialogue to a far greater degree than to facilitate it. As in the aftermath of the false press release sent out by the DLWC, once again the student body is left deciphering the actions of a small group, as opposed to critically analyzing the content of the issue at hand. Substantive discussion regarding Shell’s oil practices in Nigeria is largely absent from the current dialogue on campus, replaced with chatter about the drama that unfolded at Thursday’s talk. Certainly, the dialogue that ensues such protest cannot be entirely controlled by the protesters themselves; it is up to the students to decide whether or not they will focus on the critical issues. However, protesters do have the ability to project an inviting manner, engaging more students and promoting a more productive dialogue.
The current reality shows the paralyzing effects resulting from protest that polarizes a portion of the student body. Activism that engages many groups of people is not necessarily weak activism; in fact, throughout history, the most successful movements demonstrate that there is great strength in numbers. The efforts of a small group, however worthy they may be, will ultimately fail unless they solidify a broader following by appealing to more people and including those with slightly different viewpoints. Activists may also find that educating students on the issues before a controversial speaker arrives will help to facilitate constructive dialogue. While some of the activists at Thursday’s meeting hold forums each Friday to discuss issues with the college community, how inviting are such events to others who feel intimidated by the group’s aggressive tactics? Further, activists should look to diversify how they communicate, expanding beyond the spaces they establish; it shouldn’t matter what platform or forum is used — a productive conversation can happen anywhere, from Proctor tables to Middblog, and should not take place solely on their terms.
Taking a step back, we see that the real issue here is not between Middlebury students and a visiting representative from Shell. Certainly, students owe guest speakers who come to campus a certain degree of respect, even if they disagree vehemently with that speaker’s opinion. For the most part, protesters at Thursday’s meeting did allow Ljosne to speak.
The crux of the issue, then, is the relationship between the protesters and their peers — the rest of the student body. Middlebury students are bright, incredibly passionate people who bring different skills and perspectives to the table. As members of a small college community, we are somewhat surprised to see those with whom we attend class and interact on a daily basis challenge authority in such an overt manner. Protest does not necessarily have to be loud and dramatic to be effective; taping their mouths during Ljosne’s talk, showing solidarity by dressing in one color or picketing outside the RAJ are alternate methods that might have been less polarizing and more effective. The reason we remain focused on the methods and drama of the situation instead of the content of the matter itself reflects the fact we are accustomed to the type of constructive, inclusive discussion in which all can voice their opinions and contribute.
Free speech on campus has many dimensions — it implies an atmosphere that encourages collaboration and open exchange of divergent ideas, as well as tolerance of others. In this case, we must tolerate those who protest a visiting speaker, as well as acknowledge the right of the speaker himself to express his ideas, and the rights of other students to speak their minds. Just because others choose not to show their frustration as dramatically as the protesters does not mean that they do not care deeply about the issues. Some students, for example, asked questions that reflected thought and research. The protesters’ satirical performance overshadowed, and potentially dissuaded, those who wanted to ask pointed questions in a more traditional manner. Further, receiving a reply one does not agree with — a reply that appears veiled in corporate rhetoric — may be incredibly powerful in itself; Middlebury students deserve the opportunity to be critical listeners, and hearing a stock response from a Shell representative may send a stronger signal to the student body than any amount of interruption.
Learning, progress and development of a consensus takes place in a welcoming environment, such as that of a Middlebury classroom in which professors and students alike are respected instead of ridiculed. Though classrooms may be better suited for discussion than action, we must bring these practices of dialogue into the real world. Instead of utilizing divisive tactics not conducive to constructive conversation or the inclusion of others, we as students should identify our common interests and join together to promote the type of change many of us hope for. Undoubtedly, the work we could accomplish together far exceeds that which we achieve as separate entities.
(11/28/12 11:45pm)
A recent op-ed (“Divestment Creates Positive, Systemic Change”) argued that divestment is a valuable tool in the fight against global warming. While I wholeheartedly share in the author’s concern about climate change, I am not convinced that Middlebury College’s divestment from fossil fuel companies would constitute a step towards realizing this goal.
Divesting from a publicly traded company will not lower the company’s share price. Simple economic models tell us that if a stock is sold in sufficient volume to lower its price, non-ideologically motivated buyers will simply take advantage of the lowered price to buy stock until its price returns to the equilibrium point. While the pro-divestment op-ed noted this, the author suggested that if enough investors take action, the financial stability of the company could be jeopardized. Yet this misses the point entirely: it does not matter how many would-be divesters decide to sell — as long as there are non-ideological buyers somewhere, divestment will not impact the company’s valuation.
Far more importantly, the op-ed also fails to note the crucial fact that most of the oil industry is not controlled by publicly traded companies. According to the U.S. Department of Energy, national oil companies — not publicly traded international oil companies — control the majority of current production (55 percent as of 2010) and the vast majority of oil reserves (85 percent). Even ExxonMobil, the largest publicly traded oil company, accounts for only three percent of world petroleum production. Divestment would not have an economic effect on private or state-owned oil companies. Furthermore, because those companies are accountable to governments and not to shareholders, they are also far less likely to care about the moral or symbolic message that divestment could generate.
Even the much-lauded case of divestment from apartheid-era South Africa was not the unmitigated success that activists would have us believe. A London Business School paper titled “The Effect of Socially Activist Investment Policies on the Financial Markets: Evidence from the South African Boycott” found that divestment efforts had “little discernable effect” on either the financial valuation of corporations invested in South Africa or on South African financial markets themselves.
Perhaps one could argue that these criticisms of divestment are misguided, and that divestment is not merely an economic tool, but a social and a moral one. Even if this were the case, we owe it to ourselves to consider not only the benefits of divestment, but also the potential costs. Another study, “The Stock Market Impact of Social Pressure: The South African Divestment Case,” found that there was a negative impact on companies that divested: “Stock prices of firms announcing plans to stay in South Africa fared better relative to stock prices of firms announcing plans to leave [emphasis added].” Could divestment have a similarly negative financial impact on Middlebury?
Campus activists do not seem to consider this important point. In their rush to condemn oil companies, many activists do not appear to grasp the fact that their proposed divestment will have costs as well as benefits. While activist groups have done a remarkable job raising awareness, they have yet to publicly present a plan for how divestment could actually be implemented. Many crucial questions remain unanswered, and indeed, unasked. What are the potential costs of divestment? Who should bear these costs? How much are we willing to sacrifice? What do we want the purpose of our endowment to be? And above all else: is divestment the best way to accomplish our goals?
The best way to fight climate change is not through disruptive agitprop. The small number of students who reject community discussion and mutual respect in favor of radical direct action — who I recognize do not represent the entire divestment movement — should recognize that they are merely alienating potential supporters and weakening the claims of the divestment movement as a whole.
Dissimulation and disruption can only lead to distrust and polarization. Middlebury is better than that. The path to 350 parts per million runs not through the narrow halls of Old Chapel or the crowded seats of Dana Auditorium, but through the classrooms and laboratories of Bicentennial Hall.
So let’s use our skills as Middlebury students not merely to criticize the way things currently are, but to envision a better way forward. Rather than name-calling, protests and accusations, let’s see a concrete model of how the endowment should be managed. With this in mind, here’s an open call to the Socially Responsible Investment Club, Divest for Our Future, the so-called Dalai Lama Welcoming Committee and all students, faculty, staff, administrators, trustees and members of the Middlebury community who are concerned about the future of our endowment: let’s see a cost-benefit analysis of divestment by the end of this academic year.
Written be MAX KAGAN '14 of Freeport, ME
(11/27/12 10:26pm)
Middlebury Magazine's Maria Theresa Stadtmueller recently published an interesting article about two Middlebury graduates' local startups:
Not all business start-ups incubate in the family garage. Gardens, kitchens, and J-term classes have inspired two recent Middlebury graduates and one student to explore the business side of improving local eating options and farmers’ bottom lines. Not surprising in this state, they often cross paths. Annie Rowell ’11 is the Farm-to-Institution Program Associate at the two-year-old Vermont Food Venture Center in Hardwick. While helping farmers process their fruits and vegetables, she sometimes teams up with David Dolginow ’09, who manages a new frozen vegetable line by Sunrise Orchards in Cornwall. And Suzanne Calhoun ’14 found Sunrise apples gave the perfect twist to several of her condiments, Suzanne’s Sweet Savories, which she cooks up at the Venture Center.
Annie Rowell ’11 was an internationally focused political science major — she speaks French and studied Arabic — when she realized the pull of her family’s Vermont farming heritage. While taking a closer look at the politics of food in her native Craftsbury, Rowell found a path into the food business. Associate Professor Bert Johnson, a specialist in local and state politics, helped her develop a senior thesis that held the lens of policy and economic change theories to Craftsbury’s proposed adoption of more locally sourced school lunches. “It was a really great experience studying my own community as an observer,” she recalls. A subsequent internship with the Center for an Agricultural Economy in Hardwick synched with the inauguration of its Food Venture Center and led to her current job. She still has a hand in the politics of food, especially through the state’s Farm to Plate strategic; but she also enjoys the physicality of production and “geeks out” over broccoli floret machines and vegetable wash conveyers that add muscle to the VFVC’s rentable commercial kitchens. “Our first year, we processed 1,700 pounds of bulk broccoli in a little under a day and a half; this year, we did 2,200 pounds in one day,” she recalls, scanning the data sheets she keeps in her office down the hall from the kitchen.
The VFVC offers professional equipment, food safety certification, and business know-how to entrepreneurs; Rowell also focuses on connecting farmers to schools, hospitals, and other institutions interested in serving what Vermonters grow. “This has been a huge production and data-gathering year,” she says. “It’s exciting what this means for Vermont’s future. For example, we know broccoli can grow well, and our equipment can process it well, and we have all this data to figure out institutional demand and how we can fill it.” Greater demand for local vegetables can mean more growing options for farmers. Rowell feels fortunate in her work, and not only because of the great aromas that waft into her office (”Yesterday was maple nuts—yum!”). “I can’t imagine having as much ownership elsewhere in what could be seen as an entry level position—doing the projections, managing relationships, and leading productions.”
As a student, David Dolginow ’09 was building environmental policy chops—working with the Sunday Night Group, taking a J-term class that crafted recommendations for Middlebury’s climate neutrality; he even took time off and worked at a Democratic lobby shop in Washington, D.C. The religion and geography major was co-teaching a J-term class on “Food and Justice in Vermont,” touring farms and hosting farmers to discuss their work, when he and one of those farmers, Barney Hodges ’91, started talking about the future of frozen vegetables. Hodges, the second-generation owner of Sunrise Orchards in Cornwall, wanted to diversify his orchard business using their added asset of a refrigerated warehouse in Shoreham. Two years later, thanks to a USDA grant, Sunrise and Dolginow are doing just that. Sitting at the orchard’s farmhouse dining table, Dolginow notes their progress: “Our vegetable operation is still small compared with apples,”—a yearly average of 5.5 million pounds of apples and 50,000 pounds of vegetables—“but that’s double last year’s total.”
The business end is a natural for Dolginow, who grew up around his parents’ jewelry store in Leawood, Kansas. The natural end he learned interning in the College’s organic garden, working at a local organic farm post-graduation, and canning the harvest in the Weybridge House kitchen with friends.
“I remember thinking, ‘people en masse might not get back into home canning, so let’s do it for them, with the farms they want to buy from.’ That’s what we’re trying to do at Sunrise, and it seems to be working.” Dolginow calls Sunrise “a mid-tier supply chain partner” thanks to its two refrigerated box trucks, warehouse, and strong networks. “We buy produce from farms, move it to processors [like the VFVC], pick up the frozen products, and then warehouse and distribute them.” Customers include a network of 25 northeastern food coops and customers such as Middlebury, Fletcher Allen Hospital, and now food service giant Sodexo, which serves 10 million people a day in 7,000 institutions. Working the fine edge between price and volume, Dolginow says, it’s easy to see why the food industry has grown to such a scale. “Our solution is to work only with family farms in the northeast, period.” His job satisfactions? Chefs thrilled with their produce; a role in local food security; and the daily variety: “Produce is always changing—it’s tangible and dynamic, and that seemed a good use of my Middlebury College brain.”
They’re not your typical college-student road trips: driving from Maine loaded with 400 pounds of wild blueberries in your Outback; heading up to Hardwick to cook and can condiments at the Vermont Food Venture Center; making the rounds of farmers’ markets and coops to get people sampling your product. Suzanne Calhoun ’14 admits, “I have a high busy tolerance but I’m definitely pushing it.” What Calhoun is also pushing—tastefully—is reconnection with the fresh, clean flavors of fruits and vegetables in home cooking. Calhoun’s fledgling business, Suzanne’s Sweet Savories, features seven “piquant preserves” to liven up meals with tastes from tomato to carrot and pear to cranberry. Calhoun grew up gardening and canning with her family in Jericho, Vermont. Her desire to share those pleasures with others comes, in part, from her concern with the modern state of food: “We’ve become so disconnected from nature,” she says. “It really concerns me.” In contrast, a 6-year-old could recognize all the ingredients listed on Calhoun’s preserve jars.
Kudos from hungry friends and family started Calhoun thinking about scaling up into a business, but, she says, “I didn’t know what was involved or where to go.” Spending J-term in the MiddCORE leadership immersion course answered many of those questions and helped her establish ongoing relationships with business mentors. After further feasibility homework, she scored a MiddChallenge Grant and the suggestion to check out the VFVC. There, she found more connections through Annie Rowell: High Mowing Seeds just down the road from VFVC had tons of great tomatoes used for their seed testing; Sunrise Orchards had surplus apples perfect for cooking. As Calhoun develops savvy about marketing and sourcing, she remains committed to working with local farmers. Meanwhile, after a busy first summer, company headquarters (her parents’ basement) is well stocked with preserves for distribution so she can concentrate on studying math, computer science, vertebrate biology, and music. Meanwhile, she’s thinking ahead to new products to reconnect people with real food.
(11/07/12 11:58pm)
The splendor of autumn in Vermont is always something to look forward to, especially in a small corner of Addison County where an annual fall visitor comes to roost.
Each fall around mid-October, thousands of strikingly white snow geese flock to Dead Creek, a wildlife management area in Addison County, to rest on their long journey south.
The Dead Creek habitat is characterized by its open stretches of water, cattail marshes and wooded areas. The uplands include farmland, open fields and forests. The state put in a series of dams and actively manages the water levels of flooded impoundments to preserve snow geese habitat.
Although their stay in Vermont is short, it does not go unobserved; hundreds of locals and visitors alike also flock to this area to photograph and observe these birds.
In the warmer months, snow geese rest and breed in northern climates on the Arctic tundra — in Greenland, Alaska, Canada and even the northeastern tip of Siberia. As the season changes, however, the birds take flight, following their familiar migratory path, which takes them southeast to the United States and Mexico.
The birds cover around 5,000 miles round trip. This distance is possible because of the efficient flying “V” formation — while in flight, each bird flies slightly above the bird behind it, creating uplift for its follower and reducing wind resistance. As the head goose, the bird flying at the point of the “V” gets tired, it drops back and rotates out of position, allowing for another bird to take its place.
According to scientists, this process affords geese the chance to travel greater distances than they would be able to alone.
With such a great distance to travel, snow geese can easily become fatigued or hungry and risk being left behind. Sanctuaries, such as the one provided at Dead Creek, give the birds a place to rest and rejuvenate on their journey.
Managed by the Vermont Fish and Wildlife department, Dead Creek Wildlife Management Area (WMA) is a 2,858-acre tract of land that spans Panton, Addison and Bridport. The Dead Creek WMA began as small parcels of land purchased from farmers, and, over time, has grown in size due to purchases financed by a Vermont state tax on firearms and ammunition.
A large portion of the Dead Creek WMA is regulated as a refuge, prohibiting public access. Snow geese rest among the trees and in the water in this area, out of hunters’ range.
Snow geese are not the only wildlife to be seen at the Dead Creek WMA — Canadian geese, other duck species and other waterfowl also inhabit the preserve. Regulated hunting and trapping is allowed, but only in controlled hunting areas. The season for hunting snow geese runs from Oct. 1 to Dec. 29.
The geese reach their peak number in mid to late October. The geese have numbered in excess of 5,000 in previous years and the annual population fluctuates because the population growth trend for snow geese is on rise.
Some observers are worried by the population increase. According to Cameron MacKugler ’09, New Haven resident and avid hunter, this trend could eventually lead to an abrupt decimation of the species, particularly in colder regions to the north of Vermont.
“There are more geese than there are grasses and the geese are grazing beneath the soil and consuming the plants’ roots as well, “ MacKugler said. “This is essentially destroying the tundra’s ability to regenerate ... and is leaving the land barren. State agencies monitoring hunting have expanded the daily limit of snow geese that a hunter may kill. While hunters may take 5 Canada geese, they may shoot 25 snow geese per day.”
Although the national population of snow geese is stable, fewer snow geese are flocking to Dead Creek now than in years past.
Professor of Environmental and Biosphere Studies Stephen Trombulak explained the recent change.
“Over the last few years snow geese have preferentially shifted their migratory route through the Champlain Valley over to the New York side of the lake,” he said.
Trombulak is not worried by the shifting migratory patterns.
“Plenty of geese still come through the area,” he said.
Observers continue to visit Dead Creek despite the declining number of geese. Often, observers hear the birds before they see them. Rising up from the cornstalks, massive flocks of the white birds will take to the air, drowning out all other sounds. Their bright white plumage accentuated by black-tipped wings contrasts with the fall foliage. Some grey snow geese, called “blue geese,” can be seen flying among their white counterparts at the close of their fleeting stay here in Vermont.
While many observers may miss this spectacle, vestiges of the snow geese are left behind — white feathers, floating atop the water or caught in the grass, offer a promise for next year’s return.
(11/07/12 11:48pm)
Despite the bleak forecast and closures throughout Vermont prior to Sandy, the state experienced only minor flooding and high winds in the aftermath of the storm. Meanwhile, areas along the northeast coast were not so fortunate, and like Vermont after Irene, have a long road ahead to recovery.
With a lot of damage still left to process from Irene, Vermonters were extremely concerned about the potential for another natural disaster coming up the eastern seaboard. Looking back, Governor Peter Shumlin characterized Vermont’s fortune with a sense of relief.
“We are pleased that we have escaped the bullet on Sandy without more damage [and] without loss of life,” said Shumlin in a televised broadcast two days after the storm.
Strictly speaking, Vermont did not entirely avoid damage, but compared to the staggering figures posted for areas like New York City and parts of New Jersey, Vermont’s power outages appear relatively inconsequential.
“We did lose 36,000 power customers during the storm,” said Shumlin. “Right now, we have connected back up all but about 8,000, and we expect to have them connected back in the near future.”
By contrast, the main electricity provider for New York City, Con Edison, estimated that over 800,000 homes were without power immediately after the storm. While above ground circuits may be quickly rebuilt, recovery for the sprawling underground infrastructure will be harder to reconnect. Mayor Michael Bloomberg, however, underlined the greatest loss as a result of Sandy in a press conference on Nov. 2.
“The death toll from Sandy continues to rise,” said Bloomberg somberly. “We now know that at least 41 New Yorkers have perished.”
Since then, a cold front has set in on the city, threatening the many thousands displaced from their homes as a result of Sandy’s devastating storm surges.
In response, Vermont, along with other states in the northeast, has sent state law enforcement officials to aid in the ongoing recovery effort to the south.
“We are obviously extremely sympathetic and empathetic, having survived Irene and other storms, to our neighbors in the south,” said Shumiln, “and we’re going to be offering them all the help that they deserve and need.”
Shumlin went on to report that Vermont will send two helicopters to New Jersey to help distribute food and resources and provide emergency response for those still in need.
In addition, the Vermont State Police (VSP) reported in a press release that they will be sending 11 troopers to New Jersey, joined by 15 troopers from Maine, to form a task force to aid local law enforcement.
“We are honored to be able to support the recovery efforts in the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy,” said Colonel Tom L’Esperance, director of the Vermont State Police. “As part of the greater law enforcement community, it is vital that we help one another during times of crisis.”
The VSP noted the significance of this act, adding that this is only the second time since the VSP’s formation that it has sent officers to support another state; the first time was in 2005 when VSP troopers assisted in Louisiana’s recovery from hurricane Katrina.
Despite the extreme damage to infrastructure along the coast, all nuclear facilities in the trajectory of the hurricane were either successfully shutdown or managed to withstand the severe conditions while running at normal capacity.
“Careful planning and comprehensive preparations days in advance of the storm paid off at all of the facilities, which were prepared to take the steps necessary to maintain safety against high winds, record flooding and disturbances on the regional electric grid,” the Nuclear Energy Institute (NEI) wrote in a recent press release.
While many facilities were forced to shut down in New York and in other states affected by the storm due to disruptions in the electric grid, Vermont’s sole reactor, Vermont Yankee, was asked by the regional electric grid operator only to reduce its output to 90 percent of capacity.
Recovery efforts will continue throughout the northeast in the coming weeks as officials decide how best to rebuild given coastal vulnerabilities to this kind of extreme flooding. Looking ahead, some groups warn that this storm and other natural disasters have been exacerbated by climate change and will continue to grow in frequency and severity in the years to come.
The largest reinsurance company in the world, Munich Re, found in a study released just two weeks prior to Sandy that North America has been the most affected part of the world in recent decades by extreme weather events, which was only bolstered by the onset of hurricane Sandy.
“The study shows a nearly quintupled number of weather-related loss events in North America for the past three decades,” wrote Munich Re.
While many doubt human involvement in these disaster events within the U.S., the report indicated in no uncertain terms that there is a connection between green house gas emissions and extreme weather.
“Climate change particularly affects formation of heat-waves, droughts, intense precipitation events, and in the long run … probably also tropical cyclone intensity,” Munich Re concluded.
(11/07/12 11:24pm)
In the past few days, I have read headline after headline detailing the damaging effects of Hurricane Sandy on the New York metropolitan area. Millions are still without power and dozens have been killed; countless homes and businesses have been destroyed. In scanning through the headlines, however, I can’t help but be concerned about the distorted priorities of coverage. The devastation to New York’s wealthy elite, in the form of closed high-end restaurants or flooded Chelsea art galleries, seems to be the focus of the media. The conversation about who has been disproportionately hurt by Sandy and about the roles that race and class play when hurricanes hit, is altogether absent from the discourse. Once again, the legacy of ignoring marginalized communities in times of national emergency has been affirmed, and what walks and talks like a natural disaster is more likely a man made one.
While wealthy folks from the village were stressing about how they were going to get uptown to charge their phones, as one New York Times article covers, thousands of people were lining up for emergency food and water downtown. The neighborhoods most severely affected by Sandy are, expectedly, the same ones most severely affected by systemic class and racial inequality. While its true that hurricanes don’t discriminate, people and societies certainly do, and this is no exception.
Take the Red Hook Houses in northern Brooklyn, for example, where over 6,500 residents have gone without heat, elevators, food and water for over a week after Sandy. Elderly and disabled residents are being forced to walk up 12 flights of stairs without elevator access, mothers are desperately washing their young children with bottled water and thousands are going to sleep each night without heat, in temperatures dropping into the 20’s. Red Hook has received virtually no aid from FEMA or the city, and its residents are literally surviving because of the generosity of neighbors’ donations. Lower Manhattan, on the other hand, has had almost all of its power restored. Trees in my parents’ upper-class towns in the suburbs are already being replanted. Random? You decide.
Red Hook, similar to many other forgotten communities, like the Jacob Riis Houses in Lower Manhattan, has a long history of marginalization. These are predominately communities of color whose residents live below or near the poverty line, who could not simply leave town when Sandy struck, as many New York City residents did. As one Reuters article states, “Those with a car could flee. Those with wealth could move into a hotel. Those with steady jobs could decline to come into work.” Without public evacuations, people must rely on individual resources, which, in New York City, are distributed far from equally. According to census data, last year the wealthiest 20 percent of Manhattan residents made close to $400,000 on average, while the poorest 20 percent made around $10,000. As Reuters points out, only a handful of developing nations, like Sierra Leone and Namibia, have income inequality rates that rival those of New York.
So, although the media is overlooking the disproportionate attention given to certain neighborhoods, really it should come as no surprise that the hardest hit are overwhelmingly home to the working poor. The housing projects are, in fact, just the tip of the iceberg as one New York journalist notes: “Waterfront communities like Far Rockaway and Coney Island are utterly devastated, parts of Queens have suffered horrific damage from fires, and […] we’ve heard nothing about what city officials are doing to assist residents of Staten Island who are virtually stranded.” Unfortunately, all of this is really nothing new.
It only takes one look out my window to be reminded of what happens when communities are forgotten by the nation in times of disaster. I am in the Lower Ninth Ward of New Orleans, and the street I am living on is lined with houses that have been boarded up and empty since Katrina hit, over seven years ago. If I were to show you a picture of the house across the street, with its roof collapsed in, you might think it was from 2006, right after the hurricane. On the other hand, if I were to take a drive uptown to the wealthy, predominately white neighborhoods back in 2006, they would be almost completely restored. But hurricanes don’t discriminate, right?
The class and racial dynamics of Hurricane Katrina’s effects are far too complex to go into detail here (although I encourage you to read about them elsewhere), but the obvious comparisons to Sandy must be made. The Lower Ninth Ward is a predominately black and working-class neighborhood, which was hit the hardest by Katrina and the hardest by national indifference. Just like the residents of Red Hook, the Lower Ninth was disproportionately neglected immediately after the storm, and has continued to be neglected seven years later. There are no services or jobs in the neighborhood, the unemployment rate is something like 75 percent, the incarceration rate is the highest in the country and thousands of residents are still unable to return home. To top it all off, the levees that famously broke are being rebuilt just down the street, and are allegedly weaker than the old ones.
Despite the media’s negligence of covering systemic racism and classism in relief efforts, they are realities that must be brought into the discourse if the full story is to be told. As climate change continues to make natural disasters the norm, it is pretty clear that Sandy is not going to be the last hurricane of the decade. However, if there is a positive (if not bleak) side to storms like Sandy and Katrina, it is that they expose pre-existing inequalities and push us to address them; to make our communities more resilient; and to work towards a more just and equitable future.
Written by JENNY MARKS '14.5 of Bedford, N.Y.
(11/07/12 11:14pm)
Divestment is a tool that is best used as part of a broader movement towards a real-world goal. My goal is to keep the global temperature from rising two degrees Celsius above the pre-industrial temperature, an increment that was about the only thing global leaders could agree upon at the Copenhagen Summit. In the 1980s, activists had the goal of ending Apartheid in South Africa, and used divestment as a tool to do so.
Next it is important to consider how businesses are related to the given goal. Will divestment be an appropriate tool towards that goal? In the 1980’s, U.S. companies were doing business in South Africa, supporting and profiting from the Apartheid regime. In facing climate change, fossil fuel companies have a vested interest not only in extracting and selling five times the amount of carbon as will raise the global temperature two degrees, but also in funding climate-change-denying science and lobbying against climate change legislation.
When investors do remove their money from the culpable companies, or divest, it must be a widespread action. Admittedly, one shareholder’s divestment will not significantly impact the company — the shares will simply be sold to another investor. But if a large cohort of investors across the country, or even across the globe, mobilizes to divest, than the value of the company’s shares could drop and the company could begin to lose its financial stability. Perhaps more important are the social and political impacts of broad scale divestment. When divestment is used in concert with boycotts, lobbying, political pressure, civil disobedience and widespread media coverage, the companies can be stigmatized so that they change their business practices, they lose their political power or the public consumes less of their product.
In the case of South Africa, the divestment movement included more than 55 colleges and universities, 26 U.S. states, 22 counties, 90 cities and many religious organizations and pension funds. The divestment movement caused 200 U.S. companies that had been supporting the Apartheid regime to cut their ties with South Africa. But change in those businesses was not the ultimate goal — rather it was an important tool used in conjunction with a broader social movement towards ending Apartheid. Governments issued sanctions against the regime, human rights organizations lobbied and activists in South Africa and around the world rallied against the regime. When Apartheid officially ended in 1994 with the election of Nelson Mandela, he specifically cited divestment and the withdrawal of U.S. companies as key factors in the end of Apartheid.
The movement against climate change is on a similar track. Students at more than 40 campuses are already pressuring their administrations to divest from fossil fuel industries. Climate change is the target of countless environmental and human rights groups, international agreements and coalitions of reputable scientists. Businesses in renewable energy, efficient technology and green buildings work to reduce fossil fuel consumption. Thousands of activists through organizations like 350.org mobilize to raise awareness of the urgency of climate change. In other words, there is a broad and multidimensional social movement against climate change. But through lobbying and campaign contributions, fossil fuel companies are effectively preventing more rapid and systemic change. Additionally, it is not just the industry’s spending practices that are the problem. Rather it is their inherent business model. The fossil fuel industry is so big and so profitable that even a widespread divestment movement will probably not keep it from selling 80 per cent of the reserves it has discovered. But divestment could easily be the catalyzing force in separating our politicians from fossil fuel interests, in demanding climate change policy, in ending fossil fuel subsidies and in exciting the public to a new degree of urgency in reducing its carbon consumption. Divestment from fossil fuels, coupled with social pressure against the industry, will work within the broader social movement to keep climate change from passing two degrees.
Written by JEANNIE BARTLETT '15 of Leyden, Mass., Co-President of the Socially Responsible Investment Club (SRI)
(11/07/12 11:10pm)
It’s hard to believe that it’s been three weeks since His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama graced us with his presence and dropped enlightenment bombs like it was his job for two glorious days. With that said, this column may seem a bit dated, but hey, I needed to get that election column out the other week so you all could be good and educated before hitting the polls, and chances are that most of you haven’t completely forgotten about Tibet’s spiritual leader’s visit quite yet. Let’s take some time to revisit some of His Holiness’ more illuminating points, reflect on Buddhist teachings and talk about why “Educating the Heart” and “Cultivating Hope, Wisdom and Compassion” can play crucial roles in building our communities and preserving our planet.
For anyone unfamiliar, Buddhism is a rich and intricate religious tradition centered as much on philosophical inquiry and research as it is on teachings and practice. As His Holiness alluded to in his talk, much of Buddhist thought has been focused on closing the gap between our illusory perceptions and reality. As a result, Buddhism has provided insight in the areas of philosophy of the mind, psychology and the study of consciousness hundreds of years before modern mind science arrived at the same conclusions. And while His Holiness spared the audience from a longwinded discussion on Buddhism’s contributions to mind science, one product of Buddhist inquiry mentioned — and possibly one of the most important points made by the Dalai Lama in Nelson Arena — could hold particular importance in attempting to formulate an ethical case for environmentalism: the notion that there is no self, and that individuation is an illusion which must be overcome.
Now, that concept may have been a bit hard to swallow for most people in our society, and is enough to induce existential crises in those more philosophically inclined. It’s no mystery why our culture holds notions of the self and individual so near and dear; as Americans, we’re told not only that the highest end we can aspire to is personal success, but that even as a collective unit we’re inherently superior to every other group of people out there. American exceptionalism has proved exceptionally pervasive in our collective consciousness, and while I’m not trying to belittle all of the great things about the land of the free and home of the brave, it’s this precise kind of mentality that has facilitated the extent to which we view the way we treat the planet and other people as acceptable.
One of the effects of remedying this attachment to the thought of ourselves as separate from others is that the well-being of others gains a lot more value in the grand scheme of things. If we can reconcile the discrepancy in the way we value others in relation to ourselves, being concerned about community welfare — and goods and services shared by the community — becomes a whole lot easier. When greater equity is placed in the way others are affected by our actions, it gets somewhat harder to be alright with the costs of pollution and other kinds of environmental degradation to people who aren’t us — what economics calls externalities. And as His Holiness asserted during his talk, there’s even incentive to make this the case. We shouldn’t only be concerned for others’ well being as much as our own because it’s ethically appropriate; research has shown that the way our brains work, we even get satisfaction when helping others. So not only is there a case for not being mean to one another, there’s even a neurobiological case for being nice to one another. And in case anyone was wondering, the Dalai Lama has researched the biological sciences and psychology extensively.
So if there is anything to take from His Holiness’s visit to Midd, it’s that we need to be more trusting and open with everything outside of us — whether it’s our own self, our culture or our species. The world in which we live is shared, and we ought to start treating it as such. In the words of the His Holiness: “We are the generation that will shape the world to come.” Lets do so as a community.
As an aside, to all the people I heard after the talk claiming His Holiness does not “believe in climate change,” you’re wrong. During the student and faculty talk on Oct. 12, he acknowledged that the way nature’s cycles work is partially affected by our way of life. And when he attended the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s (MIT) forum on climate change on Oct. 15, he claimed that “all of humanity’s children will be affected by climate change,” and that a solution “will only come through compassion.”
(11/07/12 10:54pm)
Richard Cizik, president of the New Evangelical Partnership for the Common Good, spoke last Friday, Nov. 2 in the Robert A. Jones ’59 Conference Room about a unique conversion experience, one he is hoping to bring to his fellow evangelicals.
“I was converted in 2002 at the Oxford Conference on climate change,” said Cizik. “Six years later I gave an interview on NPR’s Fresh Air and I gave too much ‘fresh air’ to my evangelicals and all of them rose up on the conservative religious right side and said ‘fire the guy.’”
Cizik, for 28 years of his career, worked for the National Association of Evangelicals and for 10 of those years was the vice-president for governmental affairs. Cizik resigned in 2008 after supporting civil unions, President of the United States Barack Obama and action on climate change in an interview with NPR’s Fresh Air, which led to criticism from his fellow evangelicals.
“I said a few other things, like I had voted for Barack Obama. I said I can support civil unions, like other evangelical youngsters,” said Cizik. “And I said I believe in climate change and the science and we’re going to have to change the way we live, and that was too much.”
In his lecture, “For God’s Sake, Let’s Focus on the Earth!” Cizik said evangelicals are facing a theological crisis.
“I am going to be a consultant for you to [evangelicalism] because that movement, you see, has said no to all that we, I hope, in this room believe about what is happening to the planet,” said Cizik. “What I want to talk about is the theological challenge of the 21st century: climate change and the environment and the future of the planet,” said Cizik. “We are going to have to see and think more clearly about this...I happen to think we are going to have to see what the scriptures say about this.”
Cizik said there are 1,000 verses in the “green Bible,” or verses that refer to a responsibility for humankind to care for and protect the environment. He believes evangelicals must “shift from thinking this way – that our purpose in life is to live in order to die in order to live in a disembodied spiritual existence with God forever in heaven – from that vision, which is theological heresy, to a vision that we were born, not to live and die with Him in a disembodied existence, but to be with Him, co-partners, in the renewal and redemption of all of creation.”
Cizik said the world needs a conversion experience to change our vision to where everyone, of all creeds, can see what is happening to the planet. Calling it the shift from ethnocentric to cosmocentric thinking, Cizik said the Bible gives Christians a mechanism to see the spiritual importance of taking steps to halt climate change.
“We have to employ a strategy unlike we have ever employed in the past,” said Cizik, “We need to be inspired to action.”
Cizik believes colleges have a role to play.
“The strategy is to care more deeply, and the ethics professors on every campus, including this one, have to ask themselves and their students, what makes people care?” Cizik said, “The younger generation isn’t more environmentally ‘green’ just because they are more educated.”
According to Cizik, motivating people does not require more information, but communicating why people ought to care, and to do so, diverse communities have to work together.
“The strategy has to be bringing people together, particularly the scientific community, the religious community, to do this.”
As a result of Hurricane Sandy, Cizik said climate change and the environment “will be back on the screen, but nothing will change if we don’t internalize it with the eyes of our hearts, this shift to a new way of living that is deeply ingrained in how we think and how we feel.”
Cizik, delivering his lecture mere days after Hurricane Sandy struck the east coast, said the event should send a message to evangelical Christians.
“All of those conservatives who believe science is evil and trust in a God and believe He will take care of them no matter what and resort to a fear-based politics had something happen this week that should shatter their ignorance.”
Nevertheless, Cizik said the responsibility is up to us.
“We have to present the information to them in ways they will accept and understand.”
Jordan Collins ’15 was impressed by Cizik’s message and strategy for making change happen.
“I thought that Cizik presented a very important perspective on the shift Evangelical Christians need to make, to a more ‘cosmocentric’ appreciation and care of the earth,” she said in an email. “It was a pretty radical position considering Christianity's ingrained traditions, but his points on using personal stories and bold action to inspire people and chip away at ignorance were definitely reasonable. It's reassuring to have such a provocative change agent to whom those of faith can relate, with a message Christians are more likely to take to heart.”
(11/07/12 10:11pm)
On Monday Nov. 5 the Community Council met to finalize the creation of the Residential Life Committee and speak with representatives of the Honor Code Review regarding its plans for this year.
The constitution of the Honor Code mandates that a committee be created every four years with the purpose of reviewing the language and effectiveness of the Honor Code, making appropriate alterations when necessary.
This year the committee is comprised of Karen Guttentag, associate dean of judicial affairs and student life, Holly Allen, assistant professor of American studies, Steve Abbott, professor of mathematics, and students Amy Schlueter ’13, Jackie Yordan ’13 and Matt Ball ’14.
The 2012-2013 Honor Code Review Committee is considering four honor code related issues: turnitin.com, orienting new students to the honor code policy, faculty support and communication of expectations.
Turnitin.com is a service that checks written work for plagiarism — a service that could make the process of checking student work much less time consuming for faculty members.
“One of the issues that is really challenging for faculty members when checking student work for plagiarism is that it is a very onerous process. We are exploring if [turnitin.com] is a reasonable resource to invest in,” explained Guttentag.
“I’ve come across some fairly egregious cases of academic dishonesty and I know faculty members who won’t take the time to track down plagiarism because it is overwhelming,” said Allen.
“But having these practices and knowing there is consistency among the faculty that shows we are all on the same page may help create a climate of academic honesty,”
Some student members of Community Council were less supportive of the online tool, explaining that they felt as though such tools undermine the trust between students and faculty, so central to the Middlebury experience.
“The reason in my mind that we have an honor code is trust. Professors trust students to do their own work and students feel and recognize that,” said Barrett Smith ’13, student co-chair of community council.
“Turnitin.com and tools like it undermine that trust. This is a system that is built entirely on respect that is built between faculty and students.”
Aside from Turnitin.com, the Honor Code Review Committee is looking at ways to successfully orient first year students with the honor code. The committee has suggested creating an honor code video comprised of student interviews in which current students describe what the honor code means to them.
The group would also like to create an online tutorial for citations — one of the most common sources of academic honor code violations for students.
Lastly, the committee would like to review and expand on the language of the code.
“We are looking to create broad enough definitions so that they encompass the many forms of academic dishonesty,” explained Allen.
“I have been charged with the task of looking at how different schools define academic dishonestly. And many schools do have more comprehensive definitions.”
The introduction to Middlebury’s honor code outlines three prohibited activities: plagiarism, cheating and duplicate production of work. Yet Guttentag believes that other forms of academic dishonesty may be worthy of consideration.
“There is also the fabrication of data, having someone sign you into to a lecture that you did not attend, or lying about when you turned a paper in,” she explained.
The Honor Code Review Committee will continue to examine the code through the year and Community Council will review any proposed changes.
“If we are giving the students the tools they need and it is being expanded on in classes, especially first-year seminars, I think it would make a huge difference” concluded Shirley Collado, dean of the college.
(10/31/12 7:17pm)
I am a proud Republican. But last week, I filled out my absentee ballot and voted for Gary Johnson, the Libertarian presidential candidate.
When I first announced that I planned to vote for a third-party candidate, many of my friends were a little angry. “This may be the most important election of our lives. How can you throw away your vote on a third-party candidate?”
Nearly a quarter of Americans feel that in this election, they support “the candidate they disagree with less,” and bipartisan polarization has long been blamed for this “lesser of two evils” outlook. Indeed, our bipartisan system has divided most political issues to the point where the two party’s views stand in fundamental opposition to each other, leaving no room for compromise. And yet, many of these platforms stand against their party’s smothered philosophy, having been arbitrarily adopted to capture votes by providing an alternative to the other party’s stances. In 1981, Ronald Reagan asserted that the “government’s first duty is to protect the people, not run their lives,” and this principle applies to many Republican party platforms. Yet, while advocating decreased private-sector control and huge government spending cuts, Republicans champion social platforms aiming to control peoples’ decisions. The Democratic Party, meanwhile, compromises the integral American social and political value of freedom to establish politically manufactured equality through tax hikes for the wealthy, affirmative action and nationalized services.
The government shouldn’t pick winners and losers in our economy, and it shouldn’t judge marriage eligibility. Yet both the Democratic and Republican parties impinge on Americans’ freedoms and seek expanded control, whether fiscally or socially. Whether Obama or Romney wins this election, Congress will work to thwart the president’s attempts at political or social progress, military spending will increase, foreign entanglements in the Middle East will continue, climate change will remain unsolved, taxes will probably be raised on some sector of Americans and government power over the American citizenry will expand. We clearly need a pragmatic alternative.
While “our two-party political system is destroying America,” remains a popular declaration, Americans will largely ignore the half-dozen third-party presidential candidates come Election Day. It’s mostly psychological — we want to vote for the winning candidate; we don’t want our vote to be wasted — but the media and misinformation are also at fault. Last week, an obese dachshund named Obie received more national press than Green Party presidential candidate Jill Stein. Seven in 10 Americans believe our government was designed as a two-party system, while political parties didn’t exist until the 1790s, and third parties have historically played major roles in influencing American politics.
While third parties may not elect candidates or rally widespread support, they can shape the political system by illuminating unrepresented political beliefs and prompting platform readjustments in the vote-thirsty, dominant parties.
Gary Johnson, a former Republican governor of New Mexico, advocates socially tolerant, fiscally conservative leadership stressing economic, diplomatic and foreign non-interventionism. Governor Johnson wants to abolish the corporate tax to encourage business, immediately end our costly military occupation of Afghanistan, repeal Obamacare, cut government spending, remove tax loopholes instead of raising taxes, end government subsidies, expand states’ control, legalize and tax marijuana, ensure government neutrality on social issues and encourage legal immigration rather than attack illegal immigration. These lofty goals aren’t pipe dreams — they rest on tried and true principles of non-interventionism and personal liberty advocated by our Founding Fathers. And in New Mexico, Gary Johnson’s libertarian leadership and budget slashing created one of the only state budget surpluses in the last four decades.
I know that Gary Johnson will not be elected, but my hope is that if he gains a substantial portion of the popular vote, libertarian views could reign in the fiscal liberalism of the left and convince the Republican Party that its social policies are isolating young people.
Voting for a third party is not wasting my vote when compromising my beliefs for a Republican or Democrat who leads based on polarized party stances rather than moral and economic pragmatism is the alternative. A vote for Gary Johnson challenges current political gridlock, voices frustration in the failed policies of both Democrats and Republicans and helps politicians recognize that their parties have lost touch with the values held by the majority of our socially tolerant, fiscally conservative nation. We can’t afford four more years of Obama, but Romney’s policies are not the alternatives we need. You don’t have to pick the lesser of two evils — vote libertarian with me and demand a change in our divided, stagnated political system.
(10/31/12 4:01pm)
Standing in front of a crowd of some 50 faculty, students and community members during lunch last Thursday, Oct. 25, Executive Director of Équiterre and Ashoka Fellow Sidney Ribaux explained how his organization, Équiterre, built the greenest building in Canada with no money, land or building experience.
The process began some 10 years after Équiterre’s inauguration. The organization was founded in 1993 by a young group of idealists infused with energy from the 1992 United Nations Conference on Environment and Development in Rio de Janeiro.
For the first 10 years of their existence, as they began to grow and establish themselves in Québec as one of the leading advocates for climate and energy solutions, environmental education, food system reform and policy change, the non-profit was based out of a decrepit building that leaked in heavy rains. They were focused on using their limited budget for their projects, as any office space would do.
But in 2002, Équiterre’s Board of Directors decided it was time for an upgrade.
“The board told me ‘You can’t go on working in these conditions,’” said Ribeaux. They gave me that mandate to move the organization to a new building. And then they added: ‘And you’re going to make this an educational project, and you’re going to make sure that your move is exemplary.’”
“We didn’t own land,” Ribeaux continued. “[We were] not a large non-profit, [nor] a large land-owner. I had no money. Our annual budget was a million dollars, but we weren’t accumulating anything. We had no loose money to invest, and had no idea how to go about building anything concrete really, apart from an educational campaign. The only thing we did have that helped was community. All we had, as a non-profit organization, was the ability to mobilize people and organizations — governments, non-profits and businesses.”
Ribaux spent the next 30 minutes explaining how Équiterre and its partner organizations went about building the greenest building in Canada, la Maison du Développement Durable — a building constructed to LEED Platinum standards — which opened its doors on Oct. 6, 2011.
Ribaux was invited to the College as a guest lecturer in the Howard E. Woodin Colloquium Series, a speaker series sponsored by the environmental studies program.
The series is named in honor of Professor Howard Woodin, one of the four founders of the College’s environmental studies program. The Colloquium’s purpose is to bring in people who are working on advanced or innovative projects in the environmental field and foster discussion and conversation around environmental problems and solutions.
“In some ways it’s the centerpiece of environmental studies and environmental affairs in the sense that every week its a gathering place for students, staff, faculty and community members to learn from each other,” said Director of Environmental Studies, Faculty Director of the Middlebury Center for Social Entrepreneurship and Professor of Economics Jon Isham.
“We have people from far away, people from the region, faculty and students themselves present; it’s a chance to talk about challenges and opportunities in the area of environmental studies and sustainability. We’re insanely proud of it. Everyone on this campus should know about this opportunity. Grab a lunch, come to Hillcrest from 12:30 to 1:30 on Thursday, and you’ll learn something.”
Virginia Wiltshire-Gordon ’16 has only missed one of the Woodin lectures this year and spoke enthusiastically of the series.
“I love going to the Hillcrest talks,” she said. “They’ve covered a broad range of environmental topics — a discussion about collaboration, the presentation of a river management study, conversations about public environmental education — the range really reflects the scope of the environmental studies program.”
Wiltshire-Gordon also noted that, in addition to the many interesting speakers, the series can help students connect with professors.
“It’s also a great time to get to know my professors outside of class,” she said. “I’ve seen both my biology and economics professors there and have been able to talk with them about what we heard. It’s great to see that they are so engaged in the community, [and it is] great to have the opportunity to learn alongside of them.”
Community engagement is an integral piece of the Woodin Colloquium, and it was a sentiment echoed by Ribaux as he wrapped up his presentation:
“We [built la Maison du Développement Durable] because of the partnerships that we created, because of the community that we mobilized.
We ended up with the building, but more importantly, we’ve ended up with a much stronger community, that’s now supporting everything we’re doing and helping us move forward.”
(10/24/12 11:13pm)
Since roughly January, unless you’ve been trapped at the bottom of the sea in a mid-ocean ridge somewhere, spent no less than all of your time out in the backcountry or have failed to leave Bicentennial Hall (entirely possible), you’ve hopefully figured out that the number by which we refer to this year is divisible by four. But more importantly there’s one of those election things coming up — the general election. And you know what that means: time for roadside signs to start multiplying like invasive species. On a more serious note, we vote for local, state and Congressional offices, along with that other one, the office of the president. Granted that the first two digits of 2012 are 2 and 0, respectively, and not, say, 1 and 4, or 0 and 8, or even 1 and 9, the environment should be a hot issue. But for some reason, even though we’re in the midst of a 21st century election, it isn’t.
During this election, oddly enough, the most surprising thing about either candidate’s position on the environment is that we haven’t really heard much about it. Four years ago, President of the United States Barack Obama told us he’d heal the planet. Governor Mitt Romney made a joke or two about those comments at the Republican National Convention, and mentions now and then that as soon as he steps into office, he’ll do away with the Environmental Protection Agency. Though there were some allusions made by the President during his speech at the Democratic National Committee to the seriousness of climate change and a plan to reduce carbon pollution, there’s been little talk of either since. The fact of the matter is that neither candidate has outlined a concrete plan for how he will tackle the issues facing our country.
Unfortunately, the environment right now is a non-issue. Yet things like energy independence, natural gas and drilling for oil are. Some people (myself included) would argue that these topics are, to the contrary, some of the most important issues in the environmental dialogue today, though they haven’t been perceived that way by the public. Both candidates, if elected, will probably approve construction of the Keystone XL pipeline from Canada, and most people couldn’t care less about where our oil comes from or how much of it is left in the ground, so long as it’s cheap. Actually arguing publicly that oil prices now are far below market value and that maybe we should be using less petroleum after all would be nothing short of political suicide. So why aren’t presidential debates flooded with questions about managing the national parks and wilderness areas, creating a sustainable energy future or cap and trade programs for carbon emissions? A look at why the country hasn’t made any significant environmental developments in the last 20 years may shed some light on the topic and requires going beyond presidential politics.
Annual studies conducted by the League of Conservation Voters for the last 30 years have tracked voting records in the House and Senate on environmental issues and illustrate just how deep into gridlock we are. Over almost four decades, statistics have shown that both parties have become even more polarized in either direction, with bipartisan support on environmental issues becoming less and less common. The environmental legislation passed in the latter half of the previous century was largely the product of bipartisan cooperation. So, where did it go? Other studies have shown that the overwhelming majority of Americans like the environment and would be reasonably bitter if something awful happened to it. The sad truth is that these attitudes often fail to materialize as points of action and usually play second fiddle to hotter topics like job creation, tax policy and national security.
I’m not trying to downplay any of those aforementioned issues, but that environmental topics have gotten so little significant attention from either candidate is downright silly. Further, the New York Times has fact-checked Romney’s claim of cutting back the environmental regulatory structure in place and concluded that doing so is a pipe-dream at best. If there’s one thing that should ignite political interest in voters about the environment, it is that nature is a shared commodity. I’d hate to think that the only way for it to become salient as an issue is some kind of catastrophe, but the trends displayed don’t prove promising. To say that I’m less than enthused about the candidates’ showing on the issue would be an understatement. But, if there’s any way of making our own opinions heard, it’s out at the polls on Election Day.
(10/24/12 11:10pm)
There has been quite a bit of talk about divestment at Middlebury College in the past few weeks. For many students, this is their first exposure to the reality of our college’s endowment, which is invested with very limited, if any, screening for environmental and social criteria.
Others have heard about the endowment from the Socially Responsible Investment group for years, and some have grown tired of the word endowment, the petitions and the sometimes heated pre-Proctor lunch conversations.
Talking about the endowment is challenging. It is not particularly exciting or easy to understand.
However, it is important.
And it is our responsibility to think of this endowment as ours, as proud Middlebury students, as beneficiaries of the over $800 million.
It is our responsibility to make sure that when Middlebury goes carbon neutral, we aren’t building our solar panels with money from fracking in Appalachia, or from corporations who fund lobbying against climate change legislation.
A growing number of students at Middlebury have joined the national movement, now underway on more than 40 college and university campuses, in demanding that our schools divest from coal and fossil fuels. We recognize that in not acting, we are not neutral. We are supporting continued dependence on unsustainable practices that Middlebury’s commitment to environmental stewardship contradicts. As Schumann Distinguished Scholar Bill McKibben of 350.org says, our college degrees won’t be much good if we don’t have a livable planet on which to make use of them.
In 2004, the College’s Board of Trustees endorsed the Commitment to Carbon Reduction, which stated, “We join with the College’s administration, students, faculty, staff and alumni in the dedication of intellectual and fiscal capital to responsibly engage in this paradigm shift away from our fossil fuel dependency.” We are not trying to convince Middlebury that this community shouldn’t support coal and fossil fuel investment. Middlebury has already made this commitment. We are simply asking them to take the natural next step in fulfilling it.
Middlebury College Board of Trustees, we ask you to commit to dedicating our fiscal capital in the paradigm shift away from coal and fossil fuel dependency.
And Middlebury community, we ask that you not be neutral on this issue. We ask you to join with us in demanding Middlebury do better. Let’s ensure this place is one we can continue to be proud of.
Join us at 8:30 p.m. tonight in Axinn 219 for an introduction to divestment and the campaign co-sponsored by the Socially Responsible Investment group and the Divestment team.
Also, please join us for a Town Hall meeting tomorrow at 4 p.m. to bring together voices from across campus and from different coalitions to discuss divestment.
Check the calendar and public message boards for further information.
Written by GRETA NEUBAUER ’14.5 of Racine, Wisc.
(10/10/12 11:58pm)
For the past 15 years, the College’s Environmental Council (EC) has worked to further the College’s efforts on sustainability and to spread environmental awareness in the community. The EC recommends changes on the College’s sustainability policy and acts as an adviser to its President.
Avery McNiff ’12, the current sustainability communications and outreach coordinator, spoke to the high level of commitment behind the group.
“The call for applicants helped to recruit individuals who feel connected to our initiatives,” said McNiff. “[They] are excited about making significant progress and improvements this year.”
The EC acts to advise policy in four specific working groups: carbon neutrality, food and dining, grants, and “greening athletics.”
The phrase “greening athletics” is appropriately vague, as the EC has already tackled many small issues in the athletic department through sustainability initiatives such as replacing light fixtures in the athletic center and creating team environmental liaisons.
Now, the Council has plans to move on to more challenging topics.
Andrew Gardner, head coach of the Nordic ski team, has coordinated the athletic department’s sustainability program since 2005 and has been generally inspired by athletes’ environmental prerogative.
“The most impressive thing I’ve noticed in my time here is that most of the sustainability initiatives are self-driven from athletes,” said Gardner. “Not much has been mandated, meaning that every positive step we’ve taken has been done because people have been invested in it.”
These athlete-led initiatives cover a wide range of projects, including the lacrosse team “offsetting its season” by purchasing carbon allowances, to the ski team’s van running on vegetable oil for the past three years.
One of the central undertakings of the Council will involve changing the athletic culture’s ideology to reflect more of the institution’s overall sustainability mission.
In many ways, this concept is groundbreaking in the athletic community, an arena in which success is defined by reaching material wealth through stellar play. The world’s top athletes have new product lines and video games every season, which only encourage more consumption. This ideal is what Gardner seeks to upend.
“In competition, athletics is about efficiency and doing things cleanly,” said Gardner. “Athletes must extend this efficiency into their ways of life. For a skiing coach, climate change has a direct relationship with not achieving environmental sustainability, making sustainability something athletes should strive for.”
In other words, no snow means no skiing.
While most do not have their own product lines, athletes at Middlebury can play their part.Since 2005, Gardner has made a specific point of tracking how many cars enter and leave Kenyon parking lot each day for practice. What he found was that on an average day nearly 60 cars come and go between four and seven.
“In the time that I’ve been here, driving has increased substantially,” said Gardner. “It would be great to see fewer cars arriving every day, and some teams have certainly taken this on.”
Gardner spoke to the “missionary” aspect of the “greening,” in hopes that those who are dedicated to environmental issues already will spread the program’s message among athletes, coaches, fans and the community at large.
As the Environmental Council continues its work this year, look for more open parking spaces.
(10/10/12 10:28pm)
As a small liberal arts college, Middlebury proves that bigger is not necessarily better —at least when it comes to environmental responsibility. In recent years, the College has paved the way for some of the most advanced and environmentally friendly energy systems among colleges and universities in the country.
In 2004, the College set the goal of achieving carbon neutrality by 2016. In 2009, the biomass plant, located beside McCullough Social Space, became operational in order to aid the efforts in achieving this goal. Although the plant cost the College $12 million, it has cut fuel oil use in half, reducing consumption from two million gallons per year to one million gallons. Additionally, the biomass plant has helped to reduce the College’s carbon footprint by 40 percent. The current footprint is measured at 18,000 metric tons of carbon.
The steam production process requires 20,000 tons of woodchips annually. These woodchips come from mill residue and bole tree chips, and all are sourced within a 75-mile radius of the College.
Since its early years as a research operation, the biomass project has grown to become even more efficient than the manufacturer first believed possible. Presently, other schools, including University of South Carolina and Eastern Illinois University, are looking to the the College’s system as a model for their campus energy systems. Director of Sustainability Integration Jack Byrne believes the success of biomass at the College can be attributed to the community’s dedication to the project over the years.
“[The College is] doing a good job of figuring out how to make it work really well,” said Byrne. “I think as a result, we have had a lot of people who are considering systems come to us to find out how we do it. We’re a valuable resource for advocating this system.”
The biomass plant creates energy for the entire college by converting woodchips into steam and energy. Twenty thousand tons of woodchips are used annually to heat dorms and create 20 percent of electricity on campus. The steam then condenses back into water and is transported back to the plant to be turned into steam again. An underground piping system facilitates the transport of steam throughout campus.
While other schools like Colgate University and Bennington College utilize heat energy from the wood burning process, the College’s system uses a gasification process where chips are converted into gas, leaving only mineral ash, which produces more efficient and cleaner energy.
The biomass plant started as an idea discussed by the Environmental Council in accordance with a 2004 winter term class focusing on carbon reduction. Ultimately, the Council and other supplementary groups set a goal to reduce the 1990-level emissions by 10 percent by 2012. After putting together a report including potential results, costs and savings, they recommended the biomass plant as a way to achieve this goal.
Before the construction of the biomass plant, the College used two million gallons of fuel oil (propane number six) per year to produce the required amount of energy. Known as a “dirty” fuel, number six comes from the bottom of the barrel, and produces and releaes more carbon dioxide emissions than most other fuel sources.
Despite these efforts, the amount of woodchips that the biomass plant requires is larger than one may think. Each student uses 39 pounds of woodchips and one gallon of number six fuel oil per day, much more than one might expect.
To reduce the number down to zero before the 2016 deadline, the College is looks to an unlikely source: manure.
Recently, the College signed a contract with a developer who is planning to build a manure digester on a dairy farm. Manure is considered to be carbon neutral because it originated from grass.
This developer would deliver biomethane for 10 years in order to supplement the gas provided by the biomass plant. If enacted, the use of biomethane would reduce carbon emissions by 13,000 metric tons, leaving just five tons remaining.
The College is also considering other options, including renewable diesel oil and better management of the large amounts of agriculture land.
College-related travel and waste still remain obstacles to achieving carbon neutrality. Administrators remain unsure of how to account for the use of college-owned vehicles and transportation to sponsored conferences, which are not currently factored into the overall carbon footprint. Additionally, while 65 percent of our waste is recycled, the rest goes to a landfill in the northeastern part of Vermont.
To reduce the amount of waste and energy produced, the Environmental Council is developing an energy literacy campaign to educate students on how much each activity affects our environment. Supplemental to the campaign is an energy pledge which will be unveiled at the end of October. Council members hope other planned events like campus sustainability day on Oct. 24 will encourage environmental awareness by providing all local foods in the dining hall, among other initiatives.
“Through our efforts we are teaching and reminding the student body how to effectibely reduce their carbon emissions,” said council member Piper Rosales Underbrink ’15.
Avery McNiff ’12 currently works alongside Director of Sustainability Integration Jack Byrne as the student sustainability, communications and outreach coordinator. Her job entails communicating Middlebury’s sustainability efforts to students. McNiff believes that educating the community to become involved is an integral part in making carbon neutrality a possibility by 2016.
“The best part of this job is working with students who really care about reaching our goal of carbon neutrality and who are passionate about working on issues regarding the environment on and off campus,” said McNiff. “Students have amazing ideas and visions and have been a huge force behind the carbon neutrality goal and sustainability efforts in general.”
Byrne also understands the importance of student involvement and hopes that by increasing student awareness, cutting the carbon footprint will become an easier task.
“We’re putting the emphasis this year on getting more student involvement around energy use,” said Byrne. “What we are hoping is that we will have a majority of students really understanding how to use energy in their dorm rooms, cars and using best practices.”
While carbon neutrality by 2016 is a lofty goal, Byrne believes the goal shows the College’s dedication to environmental responsibility and that our community can set an example to others.
“This all emanates from our concern [which emerged] years and years ago that climate change was a serious issue,” he said. “We have one of the most ambitious plans of any college or university in the country. Carbon neutrality by 2016 is pretty bold. The resolutions [the trustees] passed demonstrate that we want to do it in a real, substantive way on our own.”
Olivia Noble ’13, an environmental studies major with a focus on policy, said that the plant is a positive addition to the campus’ eco-frendly infrastructure, but that more still needs to be done in order to achieve carbon neutrality.
“Since the building of that plant, few major projects have made their way through the woodwork that would notably reduce the carbon footprint of this campus,” said Noble. “Partially this is because a lot of that support from the students faded away, partially because of the recession. Now that the deadline is creeping up on us, the College is piquing its interest again, so maybe we’ll see more action on this front, but I am pessimistic in thinking that we will make the deadline in a meaningful way.”
(10/10/12 10:17pm)
I was having lunch with friends from my environmental class the other day at Ross. We were all starving after the long lecture, and the long line in Ross made us even more hungry. One of them took half a plate of turkey and two slices of cheese pizza.
We had great conversation about the issue of food waste on campus, and everyone agreed that something needs to be done to reduce food waste.
After lunch when we were taking our plates to the dish rack, I snuck a glance of my friend’s plate. I doubted that he ate any of the turkey.
I asked him why he didn’t finish the food, and he said he was so hungry that he took more than his stomach could handle.
Things like wasting food while talking about food waste happen a lot among students.
How can we throw away paper that is only printed on one-side while criticizing the logging industry in Brazil? How can we leave refrigerators, laptops and other devices in our dorms plugged in 24 hours a day while encouraging others to save energy? How can we drive to the gym to work out while fretting about climate change? How can we act one way, while advocating something completely different?
My parents never complain about the logging industry or climate change with me, but they also never waste food. Sometimes when we’re very hungry, we cook too much as well. But we always save it for another meal. Or we just finish it and get really full.
Next time when we are hungry again, we can remind ourselves of the consequences of preparing too much food and learn to cook the right portions.
For my grandparents’ generation, they never wasted food because food was so valuable at that time in China.
For my parents’ generation, they don’t waste food because their parents taught them not to.
I remember my grandparents convincing me at age four to finish the last bit of my rice because “if you don’t do so, your boyfriend in the future will have as many pocks as the number of rice that got left in your bowl.”
Since I really didn’t want my boyfriend to look like that, I always finished all my rice.
When I grew older, my parents told me that we should be grateful for the food we eat because there is always someone else in this world starving and suffering. I accepted their reasons to not waste food not because those reasons are moving and touching, but because I know they treasure every single bit of food themselves.
On weekend mornings when my family enjoys breakfast together, we always have a competition to compare whose bowl is the cleanest. After eating our porridge, we always lick the bowl, careful to not let the last drop of porridge be wasted.
It is not convincing if I encourage my friend to finish the vegetables on her plate with my plate full of leftovers.
It is not convincing at all for us to talk about environmental awareness without meeting the standards ourselves.
(10/10/12 9:17pm)
In the environmental studies department, students and professors strive to research innovative solutions to environmental issues.
Projects and interests range from building sustainable housing to studying the composition of minerals.
The program is in its 46th year, and is still going strong.
Professor of Geology Peter Ryan works in mineralogy and geochemistry.
Ryan is on academic leave this year, and will travel to for Spain this January to further his research.
“My research is more or less split into two topics: the geochemical and mineralogical analysis of bedrock-derived arsenic and uranium in Vermont ground water, and the mineralogy and geochemistry of soils developed on terraces along the tectonically active Pacific coast of Costa Rica,” said Ryan.
His work with Vermont ground water (in collaboration with his students, as well as Jon Kim of the Vermont Geological Survey) contributed to passage of a new groundwater testing law in Vermont.
In addition, his work in Costa Rica could also have the same impact.
“[It] has implications for understanding the rates and pathways by which young, nutrient-rich soils evolve into the classic nutrient poor oxisols of the tropics,” he said.
Students are also hard at work with their own projects.
Assi Askala ’15 is organizing a conference, scheduled for mid-March, tentatively called “Youth in the New Economy.” She explained the objective of her creation.
“We have the local foods movement,” she said. “We have the Socially Responsible Investment Club. We have the Sunday Night Group, which is very climate oriented. But there’s not a lot of connection between these different groups, there isn’t awareness that they’re all tackling the same problem [and] trying to change the same system.
But they are all part of what our society and economy is going through right now.
So what I want to get out of [this conference] is a link between those groups. [I want to] raise awareness that there is an alternative working economic model out there.”
Both Ryan and Askala embody the all-encompassing environmental ethic that pervades this campus.
From their own unique angles, they are trying to tackle the intertwined economic and environmental challenges faced by this generation.
This isn’t a new phenomenon here at the College.
The environmental studies (ES) program web page boasts of the oldest undergraduate ES program in the country, “with over 900 graduates in 46 years.”
The program declares that “environmental solutions cannot come from one type of knowledge or way of thinking, not just from politics or chemistry or economics or history.
They will come instead from leaders, thinkers and innovators who can draw skills and knowledge from multiple fields of knowledge and work with teams of thinkers from every corner of the campus and the globe.”
Phoebe Howe ’15 is an architecture and environmental studies joint major currently taking core environmental studies courses in addition to the standard courses for her major.
“We aren’t spoon-fed how architecture and the environment overlap,” said Howe.
“It’s about taking classes from two different fields, and then you have to apply the two concepts on your own,” she added. “Even when I’m not focusing specifically on sustainable architecture in an architecture studio, I still end up applying concepts from my environmental studies class.”
Howe noted that this kind of education was essential for both a broad knowledge of both topics, as well as synthesis.
“It’s the epitome of liberal arts education,” she said. “You’re given two disparate topics, and you have to take the initiative to unify your overall education. And it works. It’s effective.”
But the environmental ethic extends beyond the classroom and beyond the environmental studies program.
The level to which the ethic has permeated the campus speaks to the College’s commitment to the environment on a broader scale.
Middlebury’s Solar Decathlon team embodies this commitment.
It’s a team that competes in a challenge set forth by the U.S. Department of Energy: “to design, build, and operate solar-powered houses that are cost-effective, energy-efficient, and attractive.”
Howe was also on the Solar Decathlon design team last spring, and she spoke about her personal experience.
“To accomplish something, it involves carving time out of your schedule and making time in your day and in your life to be more conscious and intentional about what you’re doing,” she said.
Middlebury College will be returning October of 2013 to the Orange County Great Park in Irving, California where the next Solar Decathalon will be held.
According to Middlebury’s page on the official Solar Decathalon website, the Middlebury team had this to say; “We see a house as just one piece of larger human and natural ecosystems.
We strive to design a house that embodies the principles of a centralized community that reduces demands on transportation while facilitating greater personal interactions.
By realizing the potential of underutilized spaces, we aim to integrate a house into an existing walkable community—to suggest a model of living that is applicable on any scale. With history and nature as our guides, we hope to design a home that reflects a community and a lifestyle for a sustainable society, economy, and environment. “
(10/10/12 9:14pm)
In the atrium of the Johnson Memorial Building, sculptures featuring welded steel rods, paper, fabric, wood and many other materials have taken their final place in a new exhibit.
This exhibit, “Line in Space: Just a Corner of Your Memory Palace,” features work from the studio art class Sculpture I, and it officially opened to the public on Wednesday.
While passersby will appreciate the uniqueness and visual appeal of the exhibit, they might not look at each piece in terms of its component parts.
Artists, however, do think in these terms, and an important question today, in light of climate change and pollution in general, is the impact that certain art materials might have on the environment.
Professor of Studio Art Jim Butler notes that art has largely phased out harmful chemicals over time.
“When I was a student, turpentine was used as a solvent,” he said.
“Today we use mineral spirits instead, which are much better for the environment.”
Butler also mentioned that in printmaking, “water-based ink has replaced oil-based ink” and that toluene, a solvent used to dissolve paints, “is not used in the field anymore.”
“ Also,” said Butler, “at the College we reuse work rags they are collected and washed by the school. You don’t use old ragged T-shirts and then throw them out like in the past.”
Echoing Butler’s sentiment, Visiting Assistant Professor of Studio Art Sanford Mirling, who is teaching Sculpture I this fall, added that the safer solvents are also disposed of in accordance with the College’s policy on handling hazardous materials.
“We make sure those materials are taken care of properly,” he said.
As is the case with many college art programs, a culture of reusing and recycling pervades the studio art program here.
“First of all,” said Associate Professor of Art Hedya Klein, “if it still has life to it, we store items for later art making. Recycling services picks up wood shavings, paint, paper and metal. We sort these out for them, and I know they have different piles for everything.”
Mirling makes a point to get the most use out of materials, citing the current “Line in Space” exhibit as an example.
“Evio’s piece incorporates a blue curtain, which we’ll use again,” Mirling said, pointing out the installation by Evio Isaac ’13, which consists of a large blue curtain hung by wire and resembles a leaning tepee from one angle.
“The Plexiglass in his piece has been reused three times,” he said.
In fact, one goal of Isaac’s instilation was to only purchase materials that could all be used more than once.
Katie Rominger ’14, also a student in Sculpture I, reused materials for her instillation, a towering curtain that incorporates steel, cloth and surgical masks, amongst other items.
“They [the art department] provide us with a lot of reused fabric,” she said. “I feel like there is a decent amount of reused material.”
Although he agrees that people in the studio art department reuse material, Misha Gershcel ’13 feels that some waste is inevitable.“Some things you just end up throwing out,” he said. “Although spray paint can’t be great for the environment, it’s convenient and sometimes I use it on projects.”
Gerschel also added that in comparison to the bigger picture, “the carbon footprint that art leaves is a drop in the bucket. Art also has intrinsic value; you can ‘upcyle’ by reusing old materials to make something new and better,” he added.
Professor of Studio Art Jim Butler emphasizes the department’s awareness of the issue and their efforts to minimize the impact of art waste on campus.
“Talking to my colleagues — it’s a big concern. You know, this country has so many materials you don’t have to buy new ones.”
(10/03/12 10:34pm)
So, anybody interested in talking about climate change? No? How about global warming? Wait, that isn’t politically correct anymore. How about rising sea levels, significantly more expensive living, increased health problems and the prospect that our children (assuming procreating is something some of us plan on doing someday) could inherit a world almost entirely different from the one we inherited from our parents? Oh, now I’ve got your attention? Wonderful.
It seems like every time someone brings up the giant invisible pink elephant in the tiny glass room, three kinds of people reveal themselves. The first are those who, upon catching wind of anything remotely related to climate science, will tell you that you need to stop driving anywhere starting at that exact moment in time, lest you feel somewhat content with bearing the burden of thousands of dead polar bears on your shoulders. The second are those who, in fact, are totally okay with that responsibility, and may even tell you those big fuzzy white things have had it too good for too long and that ice caps are overrated anyway. And then there’s probably the largest group of the three: those who don’t lean towards either extreme, may not feel all that strongly about the matter and can’t figure out for the life of them why the first two groups can’t seem to get along.
Just in case any of you new students had any doubts, Midd Kids do in fact come in all three flavors. I’ve come in contact with each, I swear. And that’s alright, because everybody in our “Mr. Rogers” generation has told us that we’re all special and entitled to our own opinions.
But then there are pesky things that hold on to their truth-value regardless of whether or not you believe them. Like the scientific research that shows that people living downstream or downwind from factories are more likely to contract nasty things like asthma and cancer. Or that carbon dioxide and certain other gases exhibit insulating properties, especially when they’re pumped into the atmosphere. And we can’t possibly forget the seemingly constant stream of abnormal weather patterns we’ve seen develop over the course of the last few decades.
All these things are here, for better or worse, no matter how hard we try to convince ourselves that they’re not. There’s just a very strong correlation between pumping exponentially larger amounts of carbon into the atmosphere and experiencing exponentially more awful things on this Earth. Now wait, hold on, I know what you’re thinking, “Didn’t this guy say he was a pragmatist in that last article?” I implore you, believe me when I say that even though I haven’t taken stats yet, I like to think I’ve got enough common sense to know that correlation and causation aren’t the same thing. But what if I said that correlation could, and maybe even should, be reason enough to make a change or two in our high-energy consumer lifestyles?
Let’s talk again about a couple more of those facts I brought up earlier. First, as much as some of the politicians in this country would like to think, the fossil fuel stores on this planet are not infinite. With that in mind, maintaining an economy that relies on cheap, combustible energy seems an awful lot like subscribing to a lifestyle of planned obsolescence without any inkling or care as to where we’re going to find the next one. For the short-term, building an America fueled by a cleaner kind of energy coursing through its veins may seem like a daunting task compared to coasting along complacently and continuing to support our dinosaur-derived-hydrocarbon addiction. And it is, but the cost of inaction will probably be even more terrifying.
Don’t take this as fear-mongering; look at it instead as a challenge to rethink whether or not we are willing to take the gamble that we don’t have as much power over the way this planet works as science has shown. Because passing up the opportunity to tackle the coming crisis head on and find a way to reinvent our existence is essentially betting against ourselves. Some of us may be able to afford that wager, but the overwhelming majority of the people on this world can’t.
That seems pragmatic enough to me.
