greenwashing is yet another space in which you have to read and look critically. it's not that all claims are entirely false; it's certainly not that all claims are entirely true. it's like corporate social responsibility audits and other such things more broadly--they're interesting, the raise important considerations and prompt the gathering of potentially important data, but there's little in the way of information that can tell you, sitting in a chair reading any such documentation, about what if any relation there is between them and what's happening on the ground. there just isn't.
it's obvious that many firms want to appear to be environmentally and socially responsible--but until this kind of information is integrated into information about cashflows, it's all to the side and so is as much or more p.r. as anything else.
but does that mean that therefore the gathering of csr-related information is worthless?
no.
green tourism is kinda funny--it's the logical extension of the spectator relation to everything, which seems to me a very american relation to information generally. so you can go look at green projects and get there in your relatively low-impact rental car and think nice thoughts about carbon offsets.
that one can be cynical about all of this is obvious: does the fact that one can be cynical mean that therefore the actions are worthless? i don't think so, and i don't think making that move goes at all past spectatorship--it's the same relation, except you stand the information you passively take in on it's head, using indices like price of a vacation to anchor it.
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a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle
spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear
it make you sick.
-kamau brathwaite
Last edited by roachboy; 04-23-2008 at 04:37 AM..
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