As pointed out by Eric Pooley of Time Magazine, Al Gore's Peace Prize will be a subject of intense debate. One camp will hail it as deserved recognition, at long last, of the severity of climate change and the urgency with which it needs to be tackled. Everyone else will call it either: a.) SlightlyRidiculous (since there were more deserving candidates and/or causes) or b.) Totally and Completely Ridiculous (since the climate change-world peace link is a myth or worse, since climate change itself is a myth).
You probably know by now which camp I belong to.
And therefore can imagine my irritation, annoyance and frustration when I encountered this article on The Telegraph, entitled 'What has Al Gore done for world peace?' by Damian Thompson. What annoyed me more than the article itself (which at least made some attempt at pulling together a series of 'facts') was the string of absurd reactions to it in the Comments section. Two major themes were - Climate change is not real / Climate change is not linked to peace (or lack thereof).
Below is my response. I have deliberately left out the all-important incident-and-example rhetoric, since people tend to twist every piece of evidence to suit their own particular perspective. The thread I have proposed below has already been written about extensively. My summary of it is simply a compressed version:
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A theme that should ring true, and close to home, for all the Yankee cowboys here (suitably simplified to match the level of intelligence I see on this forum). Try, if you can, to wrap your minds around this -
1. An important driver of human conflict is intense competition over scarce (or highly desired resources)
2. Climate change entails a change in the distribution of some highly valuable natural resources - like freshwater.
3. The resulting poverty is likely to drive areas of scarcity (Africa, parts of Asia, etc.,) into further sociopolitical unrest.
4. Therefore, an important driver PREVENTING unrest is the mitigation of climate change, or at least adaptation to it.
5. Education is the first step towards changing policies, since we (and by we, I do not mean the United States) live in a (supposedly) democracy-loving world.
Therefore the link between education and peace.
Therefore the conspicuous lack of peace within America and American 'foreign policy'.
Therefore the Peace Prize for an environmental educator.
Geddit?
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3 comments:
Even though I know I will regret getting in to this argument I do feel the need to comment on this particular issue.
Although I completely see your point and I do follow your train of thought I have my doubts about the implications you make in your argument. Yes, more poverty and scarcer resources will increase socio-political unrest, and therefore less poverty will prevent this from happening. But I am not convinced that this really is the MAIN reason for the sociopolitical situation in these places. And I know you didnt explicitly say this, but by giving the peace prize to someone who educates people about environmental issues (a noble cause, no argument there) implies that this would be the number one driver of world unrest. I think that by educating people in this area an important step is made, but I am not convinced it really warrants the nobel peace prize (which is in the end given for the largest impact on or at least effort towards world peace).
I dont have a better alternative and I dont mean to be negative at all, but I do feel the need to voice my opinion.
Fire away.
wouter.
since when did ''the MAIN reason'' eclipse the differnce between root cause and immediate cause?
root cause is more important, no?
Thanks for writing this.
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