Even
with a Nobel peace prize, there’s a limit to what Al Gore can do, and so a
group of determined eco-worriers are making plans ...
November 2007
A few days after Al Gore was awarded his Nobel peace prize,
we entered the time warp of the Greenwich, an art nouveau Brussels café that has remained unchanged for
the better part of a century, weathering passing fads with casual indifference.
Amid the swirling smoke, music-less air, chess players and punters young and
old, we met up with a group of ecological dissidents on a mission to heal the
planet from the grassroots up.
At the centre of the group is DimitriThienpont, a
self-described eco-dissident who has lost confidence in society’s ability to
avert the coming environmental storm. He is working to bring together dozens of
radical groups in the Benelux
countries – and later the rest of Europe – to
plot an alternative course.
“We can’t turn the ship as it’s already heading
towards the rocks. Instead, we want to construct viable alternatives,” he said.
Al Gore may be on a one-man mission to open the
eyes of the unconverted to an inconvenient truth in his “100-minute
presidential election campaign advertisement”, as Mark Simpson sceptically described it. But many in the environmental
movement see the situation of the planet as more than just inconvenient; they regard
it as near catastrophic.
To his credit, Al Gore has done a lot to put
climate change on the political agenda, particularly in resource-hungry America. The
trouble is that being aware of a problem is not the same as taking action to
tackle it. The polar icecaps are thawing faster than public consciousness in America and, in Europe,
we have the good intentions but are falling shy of our Kyoto commitments. And it is the glacial pace
of political change that is fuelling this discontent among young eco-worriers.
Moreover, climate change may be a hot issue,
but it’s not the only show in town. Carbon footprints have become the Big Foot of mainstream environmentalism. But by
focusing too much on the Yeti of greenhouse gas emissions, I feel we’re losing
sight of the bigger picture – our environmental woes do not end at smokestacks.
We’re gobbling up all the Earth’s resources at a breakneck pace and
biodiversity is rapidly becoming a thing of the past. There are no longer “plenty
more fish in the sea” and we can see the wood (in our homes and offices) but
not the trees.
So, what’s the answer? Dimitri
thinks the way forward is to round up radical ecological dissidents from the
environmental hinterland and create an umbrella movement to amplify their voice
in the political wilderness. This would enable them to better challenge the
received wisdom of economic growth as the panacea to all our ills, and
demonstrate that people can be happy and lead fulsome lives with fewer material
trappings.
“We first want to build bridges between
disparate dissident groups and then address the mainstream,” he explains.
The first step in this bridge-building exercise
is for the “system shifters” to get away from it all for a camp at Mesnil-Église, which used to be a hippy village in the
Belgian Ardennes, where they can share knowledge, cross-fertilise and chart a
course forward for the nascent movement. The movement has received the
provisional name ‘Grounded’ to express the idea of being sensible and down to
earth.
Among the dozens of weird and wonderful groups which have already
expressed an interest are the Radical Fairies, eco-feminists, the Clandestine
Insurgent Rebel Clown Army (CIRCA), Dissent Belgium, Cage and Groen Front (the Green Front).
Although I hold certain radical views, I have
never really been an activist, since I am too sceptical (and perhaps apathetic
or lazy) to give myself entirely to a cause. Attending the inception of a new
radical group like this was a novel experience for me.
I have been interested in the environment since
I was a teenager. But belonging to a part of the world, the Middle
East, with apparently more pressing political issues, I have
focused more, in my writing and my conscience, on other causes. Although I
admire the radical lifestyle changes the ecologically minded have made, I don't
think I can personally go as far. But, essentially, each of us needs to do what’s
in their capacity to ease the strain on this overloaded planet.
For me, it will be interesting to see, in the
long run, the comparative effect of radical groups like this and more
mainstream efforts. Which will ultimately have a greater impact: the campaigns to get us to tweak our lifestyles – such as by
turning down the heating and cycling more – or attempts to construct a
counterculture and later mainstream it?
Many of the radical ideas of environmentalists
in the 1960s and 1970s have now been accepted as received wisdom. So, there is
the chance that this new generation’s notions will one day, too, be embraced by
society. But I can’t help thinking that humanity is stuck on the fast lane and
is unlikely to change its ways fundamentally until it is forced to do so.
October 2007 –
Cities across the world took a small step for pedestrian-kind during car-free
day this weekend. Now it's time to take a giant leap. Read on
EU urged to
back 'clean energy' drive
August 2002 – Greenpeace is urging the EU to go to Johannesburg armed with
stricter targets and to weigh in behind radical proposals to promote ‘clean’
energy. Read on
Fischler ‘surprise’ choice
as greenest commissioner
July 2002 – Agriculture chief Franz
Fischler has emerged with flying colours as the
surprise choice of NGOs as the ‘greenest’ member of the European Commission. Read on
Tropical diseases ignored by companies
July 2002 – The patent-busting battle to get
affordable generic AIDS drugs to millions of HIV-positive people in the
developing world has received wide publicity. The statistics for AIDS in
sub-Saharan Africa are startling: in some
countries, two out of every three adults are HIV-positive. Read on
ã2007 K. Diab. Unless otherwise stated, all the content on this website
is the copyright of Khaled Diab.
