What the Green Movement got wrong: will ethical jewellery go the same way?

On Thursday 4^th November 2010 Channel 4 aired a controversial film about what green activists think they may have now got wrong. This was followed by a live debate between those activists from the film and other well respected members of the green society.

Topics which are now considered to be outdated include prejudice against nuclear power, the availability of genetically modified foods and the belief that there was global cooling in action. This later changed to global warming!

The Green Movement started in the 1950’s and 60’s after the cold war when Russia and China were concentrating their efforts on building and using nuclear power. The movement was initially started as protesters came together to stand up against numerous countries' use of nuclear weapons which would have had an unbearable impact on human society as we know it.

Greenpeace started at this time in order to stop nuclear war and nuclear testing and they later developed into the environmental guardians that we know them as today. In the 1970’s Earth Day brought together millions of people who all held the same views. This was a new way of voicing opinion and forcing change.

The show pointed out that belief in climate change is dwindling all the time with figures stating that only 78% of people believe that climate change is an on-going issue which will impact us all now rather than 91% of people 5 years ago.

All participants involved in the show do, however, agree that climate change is happening, will be the most destructive thing the modern world has ever seen and that the speed at which modern society is changing and developing is the biggest factor in this change. It was stated that the planet temperature cannot afford to rise any higher than 1.5 – 2 degrees Celsius and to stop this happening we need to reduce carbon emissions by 80% by 2060.

We all know that as population numbers continue to increase and as human activity consumes more natural resources we need to find new ways to continue living as we do without impacting on the natural world.

There has been a massive uptake in wind and solar power in recent decades but there is no storage for either which still makes them unfit for mass use. There are also problems with where to use these types of energy stations as what works in sunny California will not work in rainy England. This is not to say that these alternative power sources are not viable, just that society needs to choose and use responsibly.

 Wind and solar powered street lamp in Tokyo

GM crops were massively opposed when news of their existence emerged. In all the time since then there has been no evidence of these crops harming the human food chain and yet they have been refused in countries where famine has taken hold. Africa is the only continent where poverty and malnutrition are still on the increase. GM crops could be massively beneficial so we have to ask why were they stopped? Was society too judgemental and why did we not take the human costs of our actions into account?

Yes there were valid reasons at the time as to why society has protested to ban or not use these things; Chernobyl and the Sellafield disasters both impacted massively on societies opinion of how harmful nuclear disasters could be and other factions argued that we shouldn’t be playing god with natural items as is the case of GM foods, but now these reasons are quite patronising, reactionary and outdated.

The Green Movement now needs to be realistic whilst remaining ethical in order to ensure that the world, the environment and humans are all helped equally. And this is also something that individuals need to start taking responsibility for. It is no longer the problem of just those wild activists!

As far as ethical jewellery goes there is no reason why failing beliefs in global environmental issues should affect us. All ethical jewellers know that what they are working towards what is right and just and for this reason alone we should continue working and promoting our products despite the reaction we may get in these bleak times of waning belief.

Ethical jewellery is lucky in the sense that we are not promoting or using or backing any technologies or theories that could be proven incorrect in years to come. Instead we are promoting good, honest, sustainable practices which are attainable and we share goals that can be reached. And this is why here at Opulent Ethics we are still as positive as ever!

To read comments about the show or to view the broadcast click here.

That’s all for now….