Date: Wed, 3 Dec 1997 16:47:58 +0000
From: James Heartfield <James-AT-heartfield.demon.co.uk>
Subject: M-I: 'a serious problem of hypocrisy'


In message <199712031452.IAA03474-AT-zopyra.com>, "William S. Lear"
<rael-AT-zopyra.com> writes
>How is saving the planet dishonest just because it doesn't involve
>overthrowing existing capitalist relations?  You could make the same
>argument for feeding the poor, or protecting women from battering
>husbands and boyfriends.

Of course there is nothing wrong with 'saving the planet', where it
really is in danger.

But the problem with the general scepticism towards economic development
that is promoted under the rubric of saving the planet is that it suits
the West's defence of its monopoly over new technologies. A political
standpoint that calls for limits to growth all to readily suits those
who want to keep tha advantages of growth to themselves.

Just to take one example, from the British Television programme Against
Nature based on an interview with a Gujerati MD:

"Dr Anil Patel is responsible for the health care of more than 200
villages in Gujarat, in north-west India. The vast majority of medical
problems he encounters have been brought on by environmental causes. But
the environmental problems he is concerned with come not from modern
industry but rather from the lack of modern luxuries such as electricity
and clean water.  'Clean water is completely out of question,' says Dr
Patel. 'The water they get is untreated. Most of the time it is
contaminated with human faeces and cattle faeces, and the ultimate
result is that there are all sorts of water-borne diseases.'  Water-
borne diseases in the Third World have not been caused by modern
industry. On the contrary, the only way to get rid of them is with
modern water-cleaning facilities - the kind we take for granted in the
West.  In the Third World, 250 million people are infected each year by
water-borne diseases, mostly dysentery. Patients suffer severe stomach
cramps, chronic diarrhoea and various other disorders such as skin
disease, and each year 10 million of them die. The World Health
Organisation estimated that in 1996 3.9 million children under the age
of five died from diseases communicated by impure drinking water, mostly
diarrhoea.  

"40 per cent of the world's population still uses either wood or dung
for fuel instead of electricity. But the indoor pollution from this is
deadly, especially for women and children who spend most time in the
home. According to the World Health Organisation, 5 million infants die
every year in the Third World from respiratory diseases caused by
breathing indoor smoke and rural smog. 

"Five years ago Dr Patel welcomed environmentalists' concern about
tribal people and was even persuaded by the Greens to campaign against
the dam.Today, he believes the real concern of environmentalists is to
block progress. He is now a fervent supporter of the dam and accuses the
Greens of seeming to care more about animals than people.  The
idealisation by Greens of life in the Third World is resented by many
people there. 'I see in this a serious problem of hypocrisy, and if not
hypocrisy, a gross insensitivity,' says Dr Patel." 
----------------------

Fraternally


-- 
James Heartfield


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