The Eco-Jihad

The greenest kids on the block aren’t your Whole-Foods-buying, Prius-driving neighbors with the wind turbines in the backyard. No, the real champions of earth-friendliness are the faithful followers of Islam.

Or so says the Prince of Wales, the royal highness of eco-absurdism.

Speaking at the Sheldonian Theatre on June 9, in a lecture to mark the 25th anniversary of the Oxford Centre for Islamic Studies, Price Charles urged mankind to save the natural world through the means of “sacred traditions.” In the Prince’s ecumenically-patchwork doctrine, our ruthless destruction of the environment stems from an ignorance of these sacred religious and spiritual traditions – most notably Islam.

The Fresh Prince of Fresh Air bemoaned the fact that Islam’s “treasuries of accumulated wisdom and spiritual knowledge” – these “priceless” gifts to the world – are being overshadowed by the “dominant drives towards Western materialism.” You know, the barbaric notion that “to be truly modern you have to ape the West.” If only we could only follow Islam’s “spiritual principles,” said Charles, then our environmental worries will be over!

It’s all very clear now. For the last decade, we right-wing Islamophobes have had it all wrong. We’ve thought that bin Laden and the like were waging their jihad in the name of Allah. But in reality, their global struggles have been about the restoration of a clean, un-Westernized eco Eden.

Ergo, if you’re of the Islamic tradition and you want to save “the environment” and still get a guaranteed spot with the 72 virgins, fly planes into buildings. Blow up the London Tube. Smuggle C4 on a plane via your underwear. Park a car bomb in Times Square. Stage a “massacre” on a flotilla in Israeli waters. Because the worst polluters and CO2-contributors to Allah’s delicate creation are those materialistic Westerners with their abnormal carbon footprints. Felling the Great Satan – surprise-surprise – has nothing to do with a world-wide caliphate after all. Just greener lives for those of us still alive.

This Islamic eco-platitude works just fine if you view the world through multicultural-colored windows. But reality has a way of smashing thinly-paned glass.

Not more than a week after Prince Charles’s hour-long tribute to Islam’s greener side, members of the Muslims Against the Crusades (MAC) group berated British soldiers during their unit’s homecoming parade in a neighborhood of Barking, Essex. Prince Charles was undoubtedly surprised that the MAC’s protest had nothing to do with the soldiers’ Westernized affluence and environmental unfriendliness.

“'This is a protest against parading in a Muslim area. We love death the way you love life,” shouted one MAC member. “Butchers return” and “Murderers” were also common refrains from the MAC contingent.

Muslims cut from this kind of cloth care nothing at all about the state of the “environment.” And about their “sacred traditions” – I wonder if Prince Charles includes female genital mutilation and honor killings among said traditions. Like the rest of the multicultural establishment, Prince Charles probably considers Islam’s “contributions” in areas like architecture and math as evidence of the faith’s noble, culturally-positive legacy.

But as scholar and author Rodney Stark points out, Muslims never “had” it. “The civilization we typically associate with Islam was in fact the civilization of the Christians and Jews they were ruling,” said Stark in a recent interview. “When those Christians and Jews finally disappeared, so too did that advanced ‘Muslim’ civilization.” Oh, well. At least NASA is here to make them feel good about their cultural and religious legacies.

One of the more dangerous revelations from this episode is that environmental doomsayers, like Sir Charles, will bark up any tree they think can help them “save” the “planet.” Climategate and Glaciergate brought the pure, wind-driven science of climate change urgency to a screeching halt, and now it’s time for religion – Islam – to save the day. Allah has gone green. It’s absurd simply writing that. How absurd must it feel to actually believe this nonsense?

I’m not normally a fan of Christopher Hitchens, but he made some pertinent observations about Charles’ speech. In an article in Slate, Hitchens assures us that the Prince’s remarks drew some “wolfish smiles among his Muslim audience.” Hitchens then went on to quote a document published by the Islamic Forum of Europe – “a group dedicated to the restoration of the Islamic Caliphate” and not the saving of the environment – stating that the “primary work” in establishing a global Islamic state “is in Europe, because it is this continent, despite all the furor about its achievements, which has a moral and spiritual vacuum.”

And the Prince of Wales is first among the vacuous.

IP for 4.29.10: Celebrate Pantheism

The environmentalist in me likes to stretch out Earth Day celebrations for a whole week. So, in honor of Earth Week, here’s some great articles about the environmental movement, the coming (no, really!) environmental catastrophes, and why hunters are the true conservationists. Thanks for being so enduring, Earth!

This Earth Day, Thank a Hunter by Humberto Fontova

“To date, hunters and fishermen have shelled out over $20 billion ‘on behalf of the environment.’”

Apocalypse Soon by Mark Steyn

“The ‘markets first’ approach was notable by its absence in, say, Eastern Europe, where government regulation of every single aspect of life resulted in environmental devastation beyond the wildest fantasies of the sinister Bush-Cheney-Enron axis of excess.”

Earth Day Turns 40 by Roy Spencer

“In fact, almost all forms of life on Earth feed off of other forms of life. What we consider to be pristine nature is in reality a battleground between different forms of life that are all competing for the same natural resources — if not each others’ heads.”

Earth Day: 40 years of imminent catastrophe by Laura E. Huggins

“Four decades later, the world hasn't come to an end. Most measures of human welfare show the Earth's population is better off today than at any other time in human history. Life expectancy is increasing, per-capita income is rising, and the air we breathe and the water we drink are cleaner.”

Merry Greenmas

Ever wonder what a truly environmentally-conscious Christmas would look like? Wonder no more:

"No tree. No driving to the tree lot, watching them saw the tree down, wrapping it in plastic and then driving back home. No driving to Target, buying a plastic tree and driving home. We make a tree mural out of shopping bags and leave a few Sharpies around to decorate with. It's personal, meaningful and 100 percent recycled."

This from the Alternative Consumer magazine. They have more Christmas "rules," including, "No holiday hams. French toast can replace tired turkey and ham dinners."

Peace and goodwill to you, too, Christmas nazis.

You can read more about the Alternative Consumer's vision of a merry-less Christmas at Ralph Reiland's Pittsburgh Tribune blog. Plenty other goodies in his post about Christmas for those on the "green" side of life. These people make the Grinch look like Santa Claus.

". . . the future belongs to those who show up for it."

Many stories, articles and happenings to post about today, but this one seemed to jump out at me more than the others. This also augments my "Dying to Be Green" post from a few days ago. From SteynOnline (where else?), I give you "Brewing and Breeding". Truly a great, yet harrowing, read.

Teaser:

Britain has a below-replacement fertility rate; its population increase depends entirely on immigrants and their children. If Scots and Ulstermen and the like are despoiling the planet, you can tie their tubes. But their place in the maternity ward will be taken by Pakistanis and Bangladeshis, and even some virtuous Ethiopians: As Europe already knows, no matter how fast you self-extinguish, First World infrastructure does not stay empty. Ethiopia comes to you: Abyssinia in all the old familiar places.

Dying to Be Green

I came across this article a few weeks ago and haven’t had time to comment on it until now.

Titled “Save the Planet: Have Fewer Kids”, the article begins with this statement: “For people who are looking for ways to reduce their ‘carbon footprint,’ here’s one radical idea that could have long-term impact, some scientists say: Have fewer kids.”

“Radical” is one way to put it. Morbid might be another term. Apparently, statisticians at Oregon State University determined that the greenhouse gas impact – or “carbon legacy” – of an extra child is “almost 20 times more important than some of the other environment-friendly practices,” including driving Priuses, recycling, or buying mercury-filled light bulbs.

One member of the study team, Paul Murtaugh, is quoted as saying, “. . . we tend to focus on the carbon emissions of an individual over his or her lifetime. . . . But an added challenge facing us is continuing population growth and the increasing global consumption of resources.”

The article states that in the United States, “each child ultimately adds about 9,441 metric tons of carbon dioxide to the carbon legacy of an average parent – about 5.7 times the lifetime emissions for which, on average, a person is responsible.”

Translation: If you really want to do your part to stop climate change, plan on really small family reunions in the coming years.

Of course, these statisticians aren’t pushing for some kind of child-limit law, but “they simply want to make people aware of the environmental consequences of their reproductive choices.”

Hmm. Makes you wonder if these same statisticians will now push for abstinence-only sex education in public schools. Somehow I doubt it. Having sex should have no relation (pun intended) on procreating.

This article reminded me of another green/population growth article that appeared in the Times Online back in March. From the other side of the pond:

Jonathon Porritt, one of Gordon Brown’s leading green advisers, is to warn that Britain must drastically reduce its population if it is to build a sustainable society.

Porritt’s call will come at this week’s annual conference of the Optimum Population Trust (OPT), of which he is patron.

The trust will release research suggesting UK population must be cut to 30m if the
country wants to feed itself sustainably.

Take a guess at what Britain’s total population was in 2008. Go ahead. If you said slightly more than double (61,270,000) the 30 million Porritt wants to annihilate then you get a smiley face sticker. Porritt’s proposed reduction would bring the population back to Victorian-era numbers.

But should all countries send half of their populations to the death camps?

Many experts believe that, since Europeans and Americans have such a lopsided impact on the environment, the world would benefit more from reducing their populations than by making cuts in developing countries.

How…noble of us?

You might be asking the question, “How do they propose cutting entire population’s in half?” Answer: Britain's Tory leader, David Cameron, suggested that the UK needs a “coherent strategy” on population growth.

Oh, I know: How about we limit the number of babies a couple can have! It’s working for China, right? The good of the planet is at stake.

The irony is that most of Europe has already subconsciously enacted a birth-limit policy. By 2002, all of the member states of the European Union had a birth rate below the sustainability level (2.1 children born per woman). Spain’s birth rate in 2000 was 1.07 per woman, and rests precipitously today at 1.31; Italy’s birthrate is also at 1.31; Portugal’s is 1.48; Poland’s is a disastrous 1.28. Demographers believe that it is virtually impossible for a nation to recover once its birth rate dips to 1.3. In the United States, the latest numbers put our birth rate hovering somewhere around the sustainability level.

There’s more to this story than just declining birthrates. In 2000, 15% of Europe’s population was 65 or older. By 2060, there will only be two workers for every person 65 years or older. A Business Week article from October of 2007 noted that European Union residents 65 years or older outnumbered those 14 and under. Yikes.

(By the way, the European Muslim birth rate is three times higher than Europe’s non-Muslim population. The Muslim population in Europe will double by 2015, while the rest will shrink by 3.5%. Do you think Allah cares about carbon legacies?)

So what do you get when you cross a self-sterilizing culture with a rapidly-aging population? The Oregon State statisticians would probably say a positive, earth-friendly carbon legacy. So would Jonathon Porritt and other British greenmongers. My answer would be the end of democracy and Liberalism in Western Civilization.

Here’s the larger point, though. God’s command in Genesis 1 to “Be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth, and subdue it,” doesn’t exactly line up with the worldview/climate-change-combating measures of the Jonathon Porritts of the world. Nor do the Scriptures that praise children as a blessing from the Lord. It's one thing to be a steward of God's earth. But that stewardship needs to be anthropocentric. Calling for a nation's population to be slashed in half to save us from global warming is the furthest thing from a Biblical mandate on how to care for God's world.

Obviously, Europe’s declining birth rate can’t all be chalked up to a desire to live greenly. The anesthesia of socialism that has lulled Europe from its personal responsibility is largely to blame for the lack of kids that aren’t there now.

But it would be a mistake not to believe that a sizeable portion of the European population is making family decisions with an earth-first mindset – demographics and the survival of their culture be damned.

A 2007 story from the UK DailyMail tells how three individuals in Britain have had abortions and have been sterilized – all because they thought they were saving the planet. A certain Mark Hudson proclaimed, “That’s why I had a vasectomy. It would be morally wrong for me to add to climate change and the destruction of Earth.” His fiancé, Sarah Irving, quipped, “When I see a mother with a large family, I don’t resent her, but I do hope she’s thought through the implications.”

This kind of green fanaticism is setting the standard for what it means to live a truly environmentally-friendly, climate-change-combatting life.

Sure, you can drive a Prius, use public transportation or buy locally-grown food. But if you really want to save the world, don’t procreate. That’s as green as green can be.