Sunday, August 30, 2009

Everyday Click

I've placed five regularly updated news aggregation and commentary sites up on the sidebar. This is to help you take up and take on the buzz in Green politics, policies, and self-identified cultures with which we will be grappling together at the beginning of each class meeting. Of course, this week ahead of us we'll be doing personal introductions to the course community and then screening a film, so there won't be time for these opening conversations Week One. But this gives you a preliminary week to get in the habit of skimming these materials for your own issues and interested, becoming conversant with the contours of the discourse generally, and so on. And of course even if we aren't taking these topics on for a week in our sessions outright, it is always fine to discuss them here on the blog itself, whatever else we are up to. Invitations to the blog are forthcoming, and most of you should be in a position to post presently.

3 comments:

  1. On the HuffPo Green Feed, there is an article describing the boycott of Whole Foods caused by the CEO's opposition to Obama's Healthcare Reform. Boycotting just doesn't seem like the proper action to take!

    The background story is that Whole Foods CEO John Mackey released a statement through the Wall Street Journal opposing Obama's Healthcare Reform Plan and instead suggesting that people eat healthy. The righteous bloggers, in their boundless moral superiority that is all in the interests of progressiveness, then responded by proposing a boycott of a publicly owned and traded company because a private individual exercised his First Amendment Rights. The Wall Street Journal asked for his opinion and he delivered exactly that, nothing more and nothing less. What Mr. Mackey suggests is that personal responsibility is more important and is a far more cheaper and healthier alternative then government healthcare. Should good people have to pay for bad lifestyle choices of others?

    What strikes me as interesting in this whole affair is how the online community ,as shown by the polls, is voting to boycott a company with a solid employee healthcare plan that is probably going to be superior to the possible public healthcare. Boycotting Whole Foods will affect its business and its workforce would be laid off as a result, putting more people in the murky area of no health insurance.

    This all ties back into green policy (thankfully) green agri-business exists, and Whole Foods is one of those companies. Boycotting Whole Foods is not exactly the solution to health care woes and will likely increase them for the employees and relatives to the employees of Whole Foods.

    Hope that this didn't get too off topic!

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  2. 1 bag of cheetos costs 99 cents at most places. An equivalent "all-natural" baked cheese organic snack at WholeFoods is probably upwards of 3.99$. While I agree that the decision to boycott whole foods based upon Mackey's political opinions as publicized may not be the best reason to boycott such a "progressive" seemingly benign buisness enterprise; they are not the ultimate buisness model or end-all-be-all because who can access Whole Foods? Only those with the luxury of being wealthy. And those people can afford healthcare.

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  3. I don't think a green-agri business would have giant flavorless apples flown all the way from New Zealand to sell to consumers in Maryland.

    But hey, their logo is green. That means they are Green, right?

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