Green talk but no green walk? 05 March 07

Hands up anyone who isn't a hypocrite. Come on, own up. Who out there actually lives by every one of the principles they profess to uphold? And why has it suddenly gone so quiet? When it comes to ourselves, it seems, we are quick to realise that life is full of grey areas and being pure and virtuous is never as easy - nor even as desirable - as it might appear. That does not stop us sitting in judgment of others, however, particularly those whose message we are unwilling to hear, and who, deep down, we would dearly love to see exposed as two-faced and, well, hypocritical.

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This article was first published in the Guardian. The original piece is here.

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Hence Al Gore’s “exposure” yesterday. “As the spokesman of choice for the global warming movement, Al Gore has to be willing to walk the walk, not just talk the talk, when it comes to home energy use,” complained Drew Johnson of the Tennessee Center for Policy Research, highlighting that Gore’s mansion in Nashville uses 20 times as much energy as the average American household. Yes, the TCPR is a right-wing anti-environmental lobby group. But even so, its barbs hit home.

The reason is simple: it is hard to trust someone who says one thing and does another. When I first saw Gore’s movie An Inconvenient Truth, several people in the audience were muttering darkly about the irony of him taking so many flights to promote a message that would require people to, er, reduce their flights. As someone who writes books and gives talks on climate change myself (both of which occasionally require me to fly), I have noticed how people often delight in pointing to the contradictions inherent in my own lifestyle. “Still jetting around the world to save us from climate change?” asked an acquaintance snidely last week.

So why this obsession with hypocrisy? The motives of the rightwing campaign against Gore are obvious: if the accusers can smear the man, then they can also undermine his message. Similar campaigns have been run against London’s mayor, Ken Livingstone – arguing that he uses too many taxis, for example – in order to undermine his effectiveness as one of the only political leaders in the world to show real vision and leadership on climate change. Likewise, the charges levelled against Prince Charles for flying to the US with a large entourage to pick up an environmental award, as well as knocking McDonald’s while selling high-fat Duchy Originals pasties, foster the impression that the Prince – and his green obsessions – are all a bit ridiculous.

At a deeper level, the effects of this blame game can be even more damaging. There is perhaps a “chilling effect” to the hypocrisy witch-hunt, where prominent people who might support green causes keep their mouths shut for fear of having their energy bills fished out of their bins at night by some snooping tabloid hack. Each time a potential “green hero” is shot down in flames, we all feel that little bit more cynical about politicians, leaders and society in general. Cynicism breeds selfishness and a de facto acceptance of the status quo – no cynic ever led a movement for positive change. In this sense, charging someone with hypocrisy serves to reinforce denial: “You’re a hypocrite, so why should I do what you tell me?” Or the more disempowering: “If even you can’t do it, how can I?” The practical outcome is that lightbulbs go unchanged, lofts uninsulated and bicycles unridden. And greenhouse gas emissions continue to soar.

This denial response is also why, on the other hand, no one likes a greenie who is not a hypocrite. Climate activists I know who do walk the walk (eschewing all flights, for example) look prim and obsessive, as if they are out of touch with the concerns and pressures faced by ordinary people. It is fine for BBC Newsnight’s “ethical man” to be a tongue-in-cheek reporter, but if it is the head of Greenpeace who is totally pure and virtuous, then that is seen as just annoying.

The charge of hypocrisy against environmentalists may also be illegitimate as well as irrelevant. In my view, Gore was right to rack up thousands of air miles in his campaign to raise awareness of climate change: the political shift he has helped to engineer, particularly in America, has been truly profound, and is one of the few real causes for optimism on climate change today. If he had stayed at home in Tennessee with the lights and heating off, wearing organic woolly jumpers and feeling generally good about himself, we would have a lot further to travel in terms of awareness-raising than we do now. Being a purist may be comforting, but it is unlikely to change the world.