|
April 23, 2008: Archives
Greenspeak.
Spinning Makes Me Green?
The Meaning of “Green”.
By Bruce Rozenhart
Man-o-man. Talk about your pile-on communications. There are so many biggies and wanna-be’s wanting to get on the green conscience communications train that it’s hard to focus on the realities of the greening of western society. Picture a green train with too many people on the engine, and all types hanging off the boxcars, tankcars and caboose… Crazy.
I’m sure that the Russians and Chinese are killing themselves laughing at us while they continue to hustle with their thousand-mile-an-hour economic-business-resource development. Cap your smokestacks, they say, it means more business for us.
As I sit here on the west coast of British Columbia, having just gone through yet another unseasonal snowfall, in one of the coldest spring times we’ve had for some time, I find it hard to talk about global warming. Hey – we’ve got global cooling here!
It’s about perspective -- this communications stuff about the world and climate change. We now have substance tracking the communications of the green world. Western leaders are trying to figure out how to lead with policy – following the public interest in environmental protection. Governor Arnold has it down. So does Premier Campbell. But President Bush? Prime Minister Harper? Who knows?
Contrary to what many believe, Al Gore did not discover the environmental domino game we’re dealing with. But he packaged it into the PowerPoint presentation now called “An Inconvenient Truth”. He did not invent the environmental messaging – he just re-packaged it – a veritable Marshall McLuhan of environmental communications.
Dr. David Suzuki should get the credit for kicking us in the shins – constantly – for years – about our changing environment. Don’t get me wrong – I sure don’t agree with everything Suzuki’s been saying. His predictions have been a little too dire on occasion. I remember him saying some years ago that B.C.’s forests would be gone by now. I think maybe he fires for effect sometimes. And he is a very effective environmental communicator.
Unfortunately, we are over-run by so-called experts that the media freely and often feature as experts on environmental matters. It’s complicated by politicians and other actors who present themselves as the protectors of the environment, but more frequently just use “the environment” to hammer their own political ideologies at the expense of truth and the reality of our environment.
So I want a greener world too. I want environmental truth. I want the media to take the responsibility for making the truth more obvious and less confusing. And they do that to some extent – particularly around Earth Day this month.
Here’s my personal green shopping list of environmental questions that I want honest answers about:
- Volatile organic compounds (VOC) in new cars and what that “new car smell” is doing to my lungs.
- What the real environmental cost is of buying “organic” produce that is grown in China and other countries – and the comfort of knowing that this is “organic” according to North American standards.
- How much greenhouse gases are being made with the energy I burn in my household – does my electricity come from Alberta coal generation, or US coal-burning generators?
- Why people who really need trucks (in rural areas) need to pay as much as urban SUV-ers who really don’t need SUVs.
- Why should my garbage be shipped to the State of Washington? Imagine what Canadians would say if we were looking after US garbage. What is wrong with this picture?
- If we don’t want big power generation here, what is the alternative? Small power generation. So why aren’t we getting on with it?
It’s time to sort through the crap. Tell your politicians where you want your garbage to go – not just into a garbage truck. Tell them where you want your energy to come from. Tell them you don’t want to breathe VOC’s in cars.
Seek the truth. Tell our politicians and media to cut the crap and get to the real stuff.
Comments? E-mail Bruce Rozenhart
Archives
April 23, 2008: Archives
The Meaning of “Green”.
Spinning Makes Me Green?
Greenspeak.
By Joanna Piros
Kermit had no idea how right he was, back in the 80s when he observed, “it’s not easy being green”. The all-encompassing battle to save the earth through green initiatives has not only changed business practices, politics and politicians; it has given us a whole new language.
For example, we call it Greenspeak, the framing of familiar concepts in new, environmentally sustainable ways.
- Sink was something your mom washed your hair in when you didn’t have time for a shower.
- Carbon was something left over after the fire was put out.
- A carbon sink didn’t make sense.
- Global warming sounded like it might be kind of pleasant, especially on the prairies.
- Extortion only came in one colour – blackmail – now greenmail is also popular.
- Similarly, the greenwash has come to rival a whitewash.
- Ozone was something that you found in lighters and hair spray cans.
- Al Gore was a boring, unsuccessful politician.
- PowerPoint was a boring and unsuccessful slide program (see above re: Gore).
- Green was a colour, not a value or a platform.
- Recycling was about going back over the same path on your bike, ideally with a banana seat and raised handle bars.
- Impact involved summer driving, windshields and insects.
- Stewardship was where you learned to recognize a good wine from a cheap one.
- Sustainability was a big word you never heard mentioned.
- Climate change referred to that trip to the Oregon coast your parents kept promising you.
Comments? E-mail Joanna Piros
Archives
April 23, 2008: Archives
The Meaning of “Green”.
Greenspeak.
Spinning Makes Me Green?
By Bob Ransford
Green spin doesn’t make “greenwashing” any more palatable.
There are some out there who believe there is a way to master “environmental communications”, perhaps using certain messages that have been tested in focus groups and with opinion polls. These messages attempt to push certain hot buttons among consumers or appeal to a certain sense of public guilt. They resonate with varying degrees of intensity. Perhaps their relative effectiveness can be portrayed with various hues of green on some fancy graphs in a PowerPoint presentation.
The fact is that by colour evaluating your message and cloaking reality with a veil tinted the ideal hue of green, all you are doing is trying to make mere lip service look like real action.
The old adage that “actions speak louder than words” was never more applicable. Instead of searching for the right words and the messages that best resonate with a skeptical and discriminating populace, you are better off searching for ways to deliver real outcomes that speak to reducing your global footprint and protecting sensitive eco-systems.
Authenticity is the key to being seen as environmentally ethical. People are searching for authentic outcomes. Show me the results. Prove to me you can and will deliver what you are promising. Show me it works.
Manipulative messaging – spin—and the hyperactive application of hollow buzz words like the dreaded “S” word – sustainability—have entrenched cynicism among the masses. Changing the words so that they have the right polish or tuning the hollow message is just more spin and it breeds just more cynicism. Authentic outcomes can trump the most cynical charges.
It’s pretty difficult to deliver authentic outcomes, however, if you haven’t started by setting “green” objectives, strategies and targets right at the beginning of a project and designed your project to meet those objectives.
“Just find the right words to make my project look and feel green to all of those who are looking for green because it needs to be green.”
When a client presents that challenge, I immediately know there are no words. I can’t help them. They are starting after the fact. Not a single thought has been given to how their project might meet targets that measure environmental impacts. Their target is a marketing target, not a positioning target.
If you want to position yourself or your initiative as eco-sensitive or environmentally non-threatening then you must ensure that you can deliver genuine results. Delivering the right messages just won’t cut it.
Comments? E-mail Bob Ransford
Archives
|
