From the course: 34 Things to Know about Carbon and Climate

Carbon footprint was invented by the oil industry

From the course: 34 Things to Know about Carbon and Climate

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Carbon footprint was invented by the oil industry

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- The term carbon footprint was invented by advertising agency, Ogilvy and Mather for British petroleum. The goal was to make us feel like hypocrites and not take coordinated action. - This one makes people really uncomfortable, but you can look it up. We have been seduced, indoctrinated, brainwashed, into worrying about our carbon footprint. If I can just switch from a car that gets 50 miles a gallon to 80 miles per gallon, I've done my part. If I just compost, or I just recycle, I've done my part, and if I haven't done my part, I better not say anything, 'cause I don't want to be a hypocrite. But here's the thing to understand, if you're an oil company with trillions of dollars of reserve under the ground, if you're a company that burns coal, if you're a company that is churning out plastic bags by the trillion, and yes, we produce a trillion plastic bags a year on this planet now, one person cutting back a little bit so they're a little bit less of a hypocrite, it's not going to make any difference whatsoever. That the big problems we have, the giant holes in the boat, the things that must be addressed are not about you, and whether or not you threw a gum wrapper on the street. Please don't throw a gum wrapper on the street, please switch to an electric car, please don't buy stuff in plastic bags. Okay, I said it, not the issue. The issue is that you have far more power than you realize, and your organization has far more power. That lobbying governments, speaking up as a voter, organizing people can make a spectacular difference on the problems that are really high leverage. That what we have to do is yes, take care of the mess in our own backyard, but way more important, far higher up the priority list is we need to change the systems, and it doesn't take very many of us to speak up and change systems, it might be a little inconvenient, it might be a little less profitable in the short run, but what we're talking about here is an existential crisis that needs a systemic solution to systemic problems.

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