In A Disturbing Trend In America, I described how the relentless "campaign to defend the status quo at all costs and to sustain the unsustainable" (Jim Kunstler's words) has broadened and deepened over the last three years. For environmental issues, this trend means that concern with these has diminished, and the dominance of mainstream politics and policies meant to foster economic growth has grown.
Today I noticed yet another sign that this disturbing trend is trending along. The New York Times Green Blog, which was created in 2010 to cover environmental issues, is being discontinued. On March 1, this post appeared—
The Times is discontinuing the Green blog, which was created to track environmental and energy news and to foster lively discussion of developments in both areas. This change will allow us to direct production resources to other online projects. But we’ll forge ahead with our aggressive reporting on environmental and energy topics, including climate change, land use, threatened ecosystems, government policy, the fossil fuel industries, the growing renewables sector and consumer choices.
Thanks to all of our readers.
On that same day, additional information was released.
We’re moving, but we’ll only be a mouse-click away.
Please watch for environmental policy news on the Caucus blog and energy technology news on the Bits blog.
You can also follow many of us on Twitter: [list of blogger Twitter accounts]
Please note that the Causus blog is a run-of-the-mill political blog where enviromental issues will be lost in the shuffle of the usual partisan bickering, dysfunction and corruption. The Bits blog is a standard business technology blog, and thus we see that energy technology has been lumped together with cell phones, Facebook, iPads, robots, missions to Mars, and other stuff which consumes energy, but does not produce it.
On March 6, there was an addendum.
As we wind down this blog, readers have asked how best to follow The Times’s ongoing coverage of the environment.
Articles we publish on the subject will appear online on our environment page and in our Twitter feed for environment stories, @nytenvironment. Our colleague in Op-Ed, Andrew Revkin, has created a list of the Twitter accounts of former Green blog contributors called “Green Blog Voices.” Mr. Revkin’s own blog, DotEarth, remains a source for perspective on environmental concerns.
Coverage of the environment, energy and climate change will continue across a variety of desks and platforms at The Times, including Science, National and Business Day.
In short, with the exception of Revkin's DotEarth blog—Revkin is in Op-Ed—New York Times coverage of the environment has been scaled back considerably. If you want to be alerted that a story has been published, you need to follow the former Green bloggers on Twitter.
You may say that this was not a big loss, and in the big scheme of things, it is not. However, all these little losses add up. And when you add up all these small losses, by the time you get to 2020—to pick a future date—there will be literally nothing left to lose.
That's why I have stepped up my environmental coverage on DOTE.
And the meaning of it all?
It means the humans are giving up, which was a foreseeable event. The signal is getting clearer and clearer with each passing day — the message we are meant to get says Fuck The Earth, as humans plow full-speed ahead with their growth plans in the years to come.
Do you know why I quit hiking in the Rockies when I lived in Colorado? Well, one reason was that there was no place to park at the trailhead.
I think you are absolutely correct. Given a choice between 'exciting' GDP growth hopium or 'depressing' environmental news, people want the former. I believe even folks that don't have the intellectual understanding that perpetual growth can't go on forever on a finite earth have a queasy sense that something wrong is going on. They may not grasp all of it, but they sense they're screwed and tune out the bad news.
Posted by: John D | 03/20/2013 at 02:03 PM