Yellow journalism

The politics of colour showed through in John Lalor’s piece in this months Magill magazine. Headed ‘Green for Danger’ the author attempted to show that the Greens are for the birds. The piece mocks the environmental movement, and suggests that environmentalism creates the mirage of ‘community’. Although the writer states that the statements from the likes of Dave Foreman have no official connection with the Irish Green Party, the strawman is carefully positioned for maximum effect. Joschka Fischer’s behaviour is also ridiculed, but Lalor heads back almost forty years for that particular piece of mud-raking, and ends up by suggesting that under the camouflage of Green policies red hearts are beating strongly.

Not in Vanity Fair I suspect. Editor Graydon Carter suggests that ‘Green is the New Black’. In the Green Issue George Clooney, Julia Roberts, Robert F Kennedy Jr. and Al Gore contribute, and call for a new environmental revolution. I particularly liked Al Gore’s article where he quotes General Omar Bradley who said at the end of World War II: ‘It is time we steered by the stars and not by the lights of each passing ship’. It is also important to stress as Al Gore does that a more environmentally sound future can be a good news story. If we want to, it can include better planned neighbourhoods, more Brownfield rather than Greenfield sites; homes that are better insulated and cheaper to heat, more time with your kids. It does involve government support and intervention though, and a laissez-faire approach just won’t deliver the goods.