DarrenBarefoot.com

Andrea: If I follow your thinking correctly, Engber addresses that argument here:

Our other green lifestyle choices can’t even begin to offset the cost of adding a brand-new CO2-emitter to the population. When I ran my own numbers through Al Gore’s carbon calculator, I discovered that a switch to 100 percent wind and solar power would reduce my emissions by just 1.3 tons per year. That’s not even enough to account for one quarter of today’s average American. Meanwhile, I’d have to do quite a bit of driving around in a Hummer H3 to mimic the environmental impact of creating another version of me. Not to mention the fact that my children might eventually decide to have their own children, who would emit even more carbon dioxide down the line.

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Darren, when I calculated my 1-ton challenge thing that Rick Mercer was advocating, my family produced 1/5 the output of the average Canadian. When I calculate it in EarthDay.net, it’s half.

I spend a lot of time educating other people, including parents. I’ve convinced other people to switch to cloth diapers, even for part of the time. I’ve also worked on many other initiatives. One organization I worked for diverted millions of tonnes of food from landfills each year.

My own work often involves growing environmentally friendly companies and organizations. So does that of my husband. Our children will be raised to live pretty green lives, given their North American upbringing.

If all the green people stop having kids, you’ll be leaving the non-green people to vote, consume and manage the planet. This, to me, suggests a more rapid extinction of the planet.

Now, live a typical North American existence and raise your children in a typical way, and you’ll be doing harm. But if you serve as a lobbyist and change agent, I believe it is possible to offset the output of one’s children by far.

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I should add that, when I used the Al Gore calculator, my family produced 1/5 of the output of the average American family. That’s more than one generation that I’ve offset.

Yes, it’s naive to assume your children will adopt all your beliefs. But it’s defeatist to assume they will assume none of them. Even Barbara Frum only produced one David Frum and he apparently has some beliefs that are still in tune with those of his parents and siblings.

Besides, I also have the opportunity to influence my grandchildren. It’s not just one generation with which I’ll be involved.

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Hmmm. Actually, I think the trick is to have many, many more kids. Assuming that the average kid stays at least a little green, and that no more than say, one per thousand accumulates the wealth or develops the genital shrinkage that purchasing a Hummer requires, those of us living in democracies will actually be making change for the better. Because our kids will hopefully vote for the policies that scared, wealthy white folks won’t touch right now.

I haven’t seen idiocracy, but its first premise is the fact that Bush voters tend to outbreed normal humans.

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> I’m not sure that it’s defeatist to
> assume they’ll adopt none of your
> beliefs. What, in particular, is such a
> belief defeating?

Well, as a marketer, do you assume there is no point in marketing?

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