Greenpeace – Corporate Controlled Opposition

One of the most common criticisms leveled at Greenpeace is that it is too mainstream but that is the least of their worries. Paul Watson, who was kicked out of Greenpeace in the 1970s went on to set up Sea Shepherd. By then Greenpeace had summarily shut down its community-building operations, terminating more than 300 employees in the US alone. But that was only the start of a litany of events which has drawn critics from all sides of the political spectrum. In the 1990’s Icelandic filmmaker Magnús Guðmundsson, director of the documentary Survival in the High North and a prominent critic of Greenpeace spoke out against them. Gudmundsson’s criticism focused largely on the social impact of anti-whaling and anti-sealing campaigns, which according to him and many others have had disastrous affects on the native people of Iceland, Greenland and Canada, who depend on these activities for subsistence. After lobbying efforts by Greenpeace, Guðmundsson’s documentary was judged to be libellous by a Norwegian court in 1992, and he was ordered to pay damages to Greenpeace. Greenpeace also supports the Stockholm Convention on Persistent Organic Pollutants, a legally binding international agreement which aims to phase out substances such as DDT. However, both the Stockholm Convention and Greenpeace allow DDT to be used for malaria control. Libertarian critic Paul Driessen claims the permit process has been so elaborate that up to 85% of USAID toward Malaria control is spent on environmental consultants needed to comply with the convention. According to Roger Bate, a libertarian critic of Greenpeace, the organizations campaign to shut down the last major DDT factory in the world located in Cochin, India, would make the eradication of malaria more difficult for poorer countries. In 1994, an anti-nuclear newspaper advert by Greenpeace UK was banned by the Advertising Standards Authority because of false and unsubstantiated information. This included a claim that nuclear facilities Sellafield would kill 2000 people in the next 10 years, and an image of a hydrocephalus-affected child purported to be a victim of nuclear weapons testing in Kazakhstan. Greenpeace did not admit fault. Greenpeace have also recently been involved in another controversy when they attacked Facebook. At issue is the Web site’s planned new data center in Prineville, Oregon. The utility company that serves Prineville uses coal to get most of its power, and Greenpeace hates dirty burning coal. So it has stated a group on Facebook, oddly enough, to protest. It is not asking for Facebook to move the center but said in a statement: Facebook should change the terms of its power purchase agreement with (power company) PacifiCorp so that it is powered with renewables before the Oregon data center goes online. That they support a fraud such as man made global warming is hardly surprising. They have well and truly hopped on this bandwagon and it has become one of their most important sources of funding. Yet they still refuse to acknowledge the mounting evidence that it is a hoax often with embarrassing results. So for Greenpeace it is business as usual because ‘you don’t look a gift horse in the mouth’ when there is so much money at stake. You have to wonder about a charity which is heavily funded (see financials) to the tune of many millions of dollars from the Turner Foundation, The Rockefeller Brothers Trust and other so-called ‘philanthropist’ organizations who use environmental groups such as Greenpeace not only as tax write offs nor because they are in touch with the earth. Historically the Rockefellers have always financed both sides in wars and this is no different to them. It is clear that this degree of funding has allowed Greenpeace to be hijacked by corporate interests and turned into controlled opposition. So next time you are accosted on the street by some ‘well meaning idiot’ don’t feel guilty for snubbing them. If you are feeling game you could always educate them on the fact that the funds given by gullible people but often honest people never go to where it is supposed to but they are funded by the likes of the Turners and the Rockefellers whom many claim are really the ones who pull the levers of power in the world.