Unfair Debate and Just Plain Invalid Arguments

So now Bush has doomed the economy with the band aid bailout, I can stop madly posting on every comment section on the web. Not quite sure why I never got around to posting on that. I guess it was such a bad idea, I was not quite sure where to start.

Well, now on to the annoyance du jour. It is bad enough when environmentally sites do PR for automakers and advertise so called green cars. I guess it pays the bills. Might as well get some money from them while they still have any money to give. 

What got to me today was an ad on grist that was not only plain wrong but also used just plain old faulty logic to draw people in. That did it. If there is one thing I can't stand is stuff that couldn't pass a first year philosophy course, which includes the majority of stuff posted on the web these days. Half the world's problems could be solved if people would just take Philosophy 112 or whatever number it was.

Anyway, the offending ad displays a nice beach with a sunset mentions something about drilling for oil and proceeds to proclaim "overpopulation is an environmental problem". Fair enough, their are six billion or so of us. That is a lot, I'll admit. The button said "join the debate". The site was fairdebate.org. Suspecting that the only reason someone would call their site fairdebate would be to try and hide the fact that the debate was anything but fair, I couldn't resist clicking the button. 

Fair, turns out to not describe the quality of the debate but the rather cute acronym for the Federation for American Immigration Reform. Fair enough. What is not fair is the quick bait and switch they pull. Turns out they don't seem to care about global population, just US population. And not just any old US population, merely those who happen to be a little newer newcomers than the rest of us newcomers. The religious conservatives having 17 and counting children don't seem to be on their radar yet in spite of their hit show on TLC.

True, more people in the US will have an impact on the American environment but in a world of global warming, the key word is global. It doesn't really matter if someone is in the good old US of A or in Timbuktu, the impact is the same, isn't it. Well, actually not. The people of the US are just about the hoggest of resource and energy hogs. Sure, when someone comes to the country to live what is rapidly becoming the American nightmare, they are likely to "When in Rome, do as the Romans do". 

And the prize for bucking personal responsibility goes to FAIR. They won it fair and square. A small suggestion. How about cutting down on your own consumption before building the fence. This would have the added benefit of not sending hundreds of billions of dollars overseas for oil to people who don't like you very much. Save the economy and the environment at the same time. Sounds like a good deal. You might what to some some for the kids as well. They might really appreciate that when they grow up.

I suspect though, that it may not be the environment they are really concerned about. It is more about being scared of losing their so call high standard of living which they seem to be doing a fine job of losing on their own. Who would have thought that it would be their own captains of capitalism that would steer the ship into the rocks. They were too busy worrying about more people climbing on board to notice.

Back to population. The key is ensuring women have access to education, economic opportunity and are free to make choices regarding their lives. These are basic rights that have the added benefit of solving the "population crisis". Europe is proof of this. So is my dating life. I tend to be attracted to bright women. Of the dozens I have dated, I only know of two who have had children.

So if you are worried about the impact of population on the environment, you know what to fight for. Women's rights and lower consumption of resources and energy. If you are worried about immigration, stop that. If you are still having trouble, stop listening to Lou Dobbs. If you can't, then at least stop using the environment as an excuse. It is elitist at best to think that you have more rights to resources and to pollute than other people.

Yikes, a google later and it is much worse than I thought, my spidy sense was right:

http://www.adl.org/civil_rights/is_fair_unfair.pdf

http://www.splcenter.org/intel/intelreport/article.jsp?aid=846