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Umbra on Wal-Mart

Dear Umbra, Why is Wal-Mart evil? This is really a request for more information. I have often heard that the company has a weak environmental track record, treats its employees poorly, and generally is Satan incarnate. However, when challenged on this position, I have no data. My opponents argue that shopping in bulk reduces packaging. […]

The issue with issues

Freelance writer Christopher Hayes spent the last seven weeks of the campaign talking to undecided voters in Wisconsin. He recounts his experiences in The New Republic (requires registration), and it is simply fascinating. And a little depressing. Most conventional wisdom about undecided voters is wrong, he says.

Sundae Drive

New hybrids are more powerful and sexy, if less efficient The next crop of hybrid vehicles is eagerly anticipated not only by energy-conscious geeks and early-adopter hipsters, but by regular ol’ Americans who like to have their apple pie and eat it too. Auto-industry flacks are predicting buyer excitement over soon-to-debut vehicles like the hybrid […]

The Tree Police, They Live Inside of My Head

Brazil opens environmental police academy in Amazon The environmental movement in Brazil’s Amazon rainforest is arming itself, literally, for the fight against illegal mining, animal and plant piracy, and other crimes against nature. This week, Brazil’s federal government opened Latin America’s largest environmental police academy — 135 square miles of Amazon land devoted to training […]

Nom de Gloom

Do you hate the word “enviros”? At least one Grist reader does. He wrote in this week to reprimand us Gristers for frequent use of the abbreviated moniker: “Don’t you all realize that our avowed adversaries use that term as a pejorative to describe us? It’s their ad hominem dismissal of us as wackos.” As […]

Stick a Pork in It

GOP senators pack anti-environmental pork into huge spending bill Powerful Republicans in Congress fought valiantly against the “do nothing” label yesterday by trying to do an awful lot for their industry cronies. A number of senators endeavored to attach various anti-environmental provisions to a must-pass government-funding bill, including measures that would (take a deep breath) […]

Do you hate the word “enviros”?

Greg Artzner of Takoma Park, Md., does. He wrote in this week to reprimand us Gristers for frequent use of the abbreviated moniker:

Boy, I wish you and all environmentalists would STOP using the term "enviros." Don't you all realize that our avowed adversaries use that term as a pejorative to describe us?  It's their ad hominem dismissal of us as wackos. I have heard it used in personal conversation by Mark Rey, undersecretary for natural resources and environment (known as "Darth Vader" of the forests to those of us working to save the trees). He and many others who stand in direct opposition to what we believe routinely insult us by using that very term. Please stop using it.  

Sincerely,
Greg Artzner, environmentalist

I and my colleagues at various green-focused journalistic enterprises have used the word enviros with frequency over the past decade, with no intent to belittle or demean. Really, I just think it's kinda fun. And it's a damn sight shorter than the overly syllabic environmentalists. As for whether the greenies or the pollutocrats coined the term, I can't say -- anyone care to share their etymological theories? (Oh, wait -- is greenies demeaning too?)

Still, as enviro(nmentalist)s think about (re)framing their message and burnishing their image after this month's election, is it time to give this label a second thought, or even the heave-ho? I'm not yet convinced that it is, but not dead set against it either. A few other perspectives on the matter here.

Cast your vote on whether the word enviro sucks or rocks, in the upper right-hand corner of the Grist homepage, through Monday, Nov. 15.

If loving The Onion is wrong, I don’t wanna be right

Two years ago, a friend challenged me to get through a single day without quoting The
Onion even once. Couldn't do it then; can't do it now.

Here, just in time to celebrate Russia dropping off accession papers on the ratification of Kyoto, comes a sober overview of climate change impacts.

Next Up: Hybrid Zambonis

Canada vows to get tough on vehicle CO2 emissions The greenhouse-gas emissions of cars and trucks in Canada will be cut by 25 percent by 2010, according to a duo of Canadian government ministers. In a joint interview, Natural Resources Minister John Efford and Environment Minister Stephane Dion said that they were committed to the […]