Enviro-faith?
In today’s Chronicle (1/14/10), Stephen Asma, a professor of philosophy at Columbia College Chicago, offers an extended parallel between contemporary environmentalism and religion. He posits that environmentalists give a green rationale to their internalized aggression, guilt, and feelings of unworthiness, while religious folk give a godly shape to those psychological struggles.
Asma grounds this comparison in some assertions made by Nietzsche, who wrote that we live in a “post-Christian world” in which the underlying values, the ones that quietly, pretty much invisibly prefigure the beliefs about which we are aware, are “resentment and guilt,” and that these lead to an “internalized self-loathing.”
Great. That’s bound to be bunches of fun.
Except, not. Which is perhaps a shame, but is also (as Nietzsche and Asma both note) the psychological condition which allows humans to live together more or less civilly. Within this framework, Asma identifies a set of parallels between environmentalism and religion that strike me as well-considered:
Instead of religious sins plaguing our conscience, we now have the transgressions of leaving the water running, leaving the lights on, failing to recycle, and using plastic grocery bags instead of paper. In addition, the righteous pleasures of being more orthodox than your neighbor (in this case being more green) can still be had—the new heresies include failure to compost, or refusal to go organic. Vitriol that used to be reserved for Satan can now be discharged against evil corporate chief executives and drivers of gas-guzzling vehicles. Apocalyptic fear-mongering previously took the shape of repent or burn in hell, but now it is recycle or burn in the ozone hole. In fact, it is interesting the way environmentalism takes on the apocalyptic aspects of the traditional religious narrative. The idea that the end is nigh is quite central to traditional Christianity—it is a jolting wake-up call to get on the righteous path. And we find many environmentalists in a similarly earnest panic about climate change and global warming. There are also high priests of the new religion, with Al Gore (“the Goracle”) playing an especially prophetic role.
We even find parallels in environmentalism of the most extreme, self-flagellating forms of religious guilt. Nietzsche claims that religion has fostered guilt to such neurotic levels that some people feel culpable and apologetic about their very existence. Compare this with extreme conservationists who want to sacrifice themselves for trees and whales. And teachers, like myself, will attest to significant numbers of their students who feel that their cats or whatever are equal to human beings. And not only are members of the next generation egalitarian about all life, but they often feel positively awful about the way that their species has corrupted and defiled the whole beautiful symphony of nature. The planet, they feel, would be better off without us. We are not worthy. In this extreme form, one does not seek to reduce one’s carbon footprint so much as eliminate one’s very being.
To be sure, he doesn’t suggest that this parallel is a reason not to recycle. Rather, he seems simply to be suggesting a little self-awareness about the whole thing: “Even if it’s neurotic, it’s still doing some good. But environmentalism, like every other ism, has the potential for dogmatic zeal and obsession…Let us save the planet, by all means. But let’s also admit to ourselves that we have a natural tendency toward guilt and indignation, and let that fact temper our fervor to more reasonable levels.”
Reading Asma’s list of environmental orthodoxies, I felt awkwardly indignant twinges of self-recognition. But it’s the last phrase, more reasonable levels, that caught me. I wanted to say “wait a minute! What’s a ‘more reasonable level’ when the planet is at stake?” At which point I imagined Asma smiling knowingly, for I didn’t sound like a neutral interlocutor; even in my own head, I sounded panicky and really earnest.
Which is my pre-critique admission of the tiniest bit of bias because, as much as I feel that Asma has outlined a host of significant parallels between the two ways of giving form to some of our deepest psychological tensions, he has also (at least in this essay) skipped one of the biggest differences: the place of the planet in each belief system, and the implications of that placement.
For Christians, and for many religious folks, earth is a very temporary home, the interlude spot where humans dwell prior to attaining their true home. One can rustle up scriptural passages that suggest we need to nurture it or have dominion over it, thereby nuancing quite different arguments about what we owe, or do not owe, the planet. But in the end, the accounts would similarly emphasize that this life on earth is a pale precedent to the heavenly lives the saved will enjoy in the hereafter.
In contrast, environmentalists point out that “earth is our only home.” Future visions are thus limited to wondering about what kind of planet we will leave to our progeny. There’s no promise that being good (green) will directly benefit the individual, no seat in heaven for the best composter. At most, being green will benefit one’s grandchildren, a kind of gene pool redemption, perhaps, but hardly eternal bliss.
This difference as to whether earth is our only home or simply our current home is thus tied to another key difference. Environmentalism lacks one of the most compelling attributes of many religions—the potential for personal salvation. I suppose one could argue that lack makes environmentalism an even better fit than traditional religions for folks who’ve got high levels of internalized self-loathing. But I tend to see this willingness to work hard without the likelihood of personal benefit in terms of a trait we share with other animal species—empathy. Even more basic than the conflicts and tensions that living in civil groups generates are the urges and emotions to which we, as animals, are subject. And yes, aggression is such an impulse—but so is empathy. And over the last few years, researchers have identified not only instances of intraspecies empathy (easy to find!) but also inter-species empathy, which some scientists, like Dr. Frans de Waal, suggest could be the evolutionary precursors to a moral nature.
I absolutely agree with Asma that it’d be a poor sort of environmentalism that’s fueled only by “guilt and indignation.” Fortunately, I think our current version is often leavened with empathy as well.
In: Text · Tagged with: empathy, environmentalism, Frans de Waal, religion, Stephen Asma
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on February 22, 2010 at 10:20 pm
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Well done.
On a smaller scale, perhaps growing your own perfect carrot could be a personal salivatory experience?