Greenpeace Gives Apple a B- in 'Guide to Greener Electronics'

[star-affinity]

They take an actually worthy cause and make it seem like a scam, turning people against it. We have people categorically voting against anything aimed at protecting the environment because of people like them.

Such as? An example perhaps?

 

[Swift]

Repairability has no business being in a ratings list for "greenness." Unless the glue they're using is arsenic-based. (It isn't.) Nor does "proprietary." The truth is, what Apple is doing for green and so on is number one, so "Greenpeace" is going hunting for another cause, that has nothing to do with the state of the earth and the atmosphere. What if somebody makes a part that is very, very green-- and they make it proprietary so they can profit from it? Is profit not green?
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Such as? An example perhaps?

You just have to go back to its first cause, the poor little baby seals. The cute faces were money faucets. The practice of clubbing the baby seals ended decades ago, but 15-20 years ago, they were still raising money as though it was continuing.

The actual issue, to me, was, are the seals becoming scarce? Was their niche in the ecology diminishing, and hurting other species? Well, the answer was, "No." In fact, after the banning of the seal hunt, the population of grey seals tripled. The ecological and economic problem that was true led to the collapse of the cod fishery in Newfoundland. The seal population's doing just fine, though.

 

[BiggAW]

The iPhone is more environmentally friendly than Android phones for two main reasons:

1. They offer software updates just about forever.

2. They have a place to FIX the phones so that you don't have to go out and buy a new one. Good luck getting an Android phone serviced.

 

[supercoolmanchu]

How many revolutions have you seen succeed by "shutting up and leading by example"?

If you don't like Greenpeace, there are hundreds of other organizations ready and willing to take your money in support of the worthy cause. But let me guess: there's something wrong with all of them? We don't have people categorically voting against the environment because of Greenpeace, we have people in denial and people refusing to act on their better knowledge. In this respect Greenpeace is irrelevant, I have to give you that.

The positive thing about all the comments on this thread is that these people know what they should do even if they fight tooth and nail against actually doing it.

Greenpeace isn't a revolution. Recycling isn't a revolution. Conservation isn't even a revolution.

Worthy causes support a lot of worthy cause bureaucrats in nice worthy cause offices and fancy periodic worthy cause events. Impossible for people to vet the effectiveness of most, but yeah you can write a check, spend no real effort and buy an easy, superficial way to feel good about yourself.

Or you can go personally volunteer somewhere and give up some of your precious forum time used to lecture random people about 'worthy causes'.

 

[2013.1]

For emergencies one would be better off with something like this

 

[supercoolmanchu]

Preachy about important stuff that matter, yes. It's not like there's no substance to what they bring to the table.
Or what is it that they do that's so bad according to you – care to give some examples?

What do they do exactly? Rate the greenness of mobile phones? This is typical of Greenpeace activities, a shallow stunt to raise money for other shallow stunts for media attention.

Nobody stops to check with Greenpeace before buying a phone, they know this, but they also know it makes for a easy headline with simpleton copy editors. That's all this is, Greenpeace brand maintenance. No seagulls were saved today. No rainbows for dolphins. No pumpkin spice lattes for turtles. But some shallow people will pay lip service to 'important stuff', pat themselves on the back, and feel great that they can point fingers at someone else.

You want to know what Greenpeace has helped wrought here in California? A plastic bag ban, illegal for a grocery store to provide people with a complimentary bag for your items. An idiot quest to 'save the environment' by discouraging consumers from using perfectly biodegradable plastic shopping bags.

This was also the same convenient item that homeless people would recycle into their fecal waist receptacles. These worthy cause conservationists were warned about this fallout. Now predictably without these, fecal matter in impoverished communities has created a massive statewide Hepatitis A outbreak among the homeless. Greenpeace should be out picking up the $**t those morons helped turn into a problem, instead of grading cell phones.

Supporting this group is immorally stupid. Learn to identify the emotional weaknesses and triggers these groups use to hijack your brain and prevent logical thought.

 

[Krevnik]

I'm sorry, did you just not say Greenpeace changed their goals when research showed they were wrong? Or should Greenpeace somehow know the results before the scientists?

I expect them to at least not go off half-cocked without at least considering the ramifications of what they are asking of others when trying to make large sea changes. And to actually have a good causal link that demonstrates that change will actually achieve what they are seeking to achieve. It'd be great if they moved based on the scientific consensus, rather than creating real problems in the face of perceived ones.

The problem with the whole push to get McDonalds to ditch cardboard in the first place was that it was based on a causal relationship that didn't exist. They thought: "There's a deforestation problem, and McDonald's uses a lot of cardboard and paper products, which is made from trees. Ergo, McDonalds is helping cause deforestation through paper demand."

The reality is that the source of a lot of paper products in the US, even in the early 80s, didn't have any causal relationship with mass deforestation we've seen around the world. You did have a lot of deforestation happening in areas of the world where agriculture was increasing, this is true. And the trees did wind up in the wood and paper industries, also true. However, it created more supply and pushed down prices. The supply from deforestation wasn't a direct reaction to demand like was being argued at the time. At least not demand for wood products. It was driven by demand for more food in the developing world. Whoops. That's a bit of a miscalculation there.

So their push wasn't just trading one problem for another, it added a problem and did little to solve the existing problem they wanted to solve. It was counter productive, and not driven by any sort of rigorous scientific consensus at any point. It's much like the anti-GMO and anti-Vax pushes today, which are at best based on non-repeatable or disproven studies.

And the problem I have with the PVC push is that we still don't have a good material replacement that is as good and cheap as PVC. If you want to know why Apple's cables go to pot so easily, it's the lack of PVC in the jacket. So we're trading off one waste toxicity problem (PVC leaching) for another (higher heavy metal content winding up in landfills as we throw away more cables that don't last as long). Again. And I'm not entirely convinced it was the right tradeoff in the face of two bad choices.

Here's the thing, I think the goals of organizations like Greenpeace are admirable. But I have to roll my eyes when they walk into costly mistakes (environmentally speaking), and don't seem to learn from it. The right answer to particular environmental problems aren't always intuitive, so you can't behave in a kneejerk way like these organizations tend to do.

 

[fairuz]

How many revolutions have you seen succeed by "shutting up and leading by example"?

If you don't like Greenpeace, there are hundreds of other organizations ready and willing to take your money in support of the worthy cause. But let me guess: there's something wrong with all of them? We don't have people categorically voting against the environment because of Greenpeace, we have people in denial and people refusing to act on their better knowledge. In this respect Greenpeace is irrelevant, I have to give you that.

The positive thing about all the comments on this thread is that these people know what they should do even if they fight tooth and nail against actually doing it.

IDK about the others. The most famous one has a terrible reputation, though. Nobody would really care about the small cost of the climate laws being debated today if they actually believed they were important. Yes, people really think science supporting theories about climate change (for example) is a scam and/or pure politics. No, they aren't in denial.

I got some door flyers from Greenpeace telling me to turn off my phone when it's not in use because that saves power, which is of course stupid because it's the least energy-consuming device I can think of. They must've spent more energy making and distributing those flyers than anyone could've saved that way. And of course they used the most condescending language possible on the flyer. How the heck is that going to get people on their side?

 

[Stiksi]

I expect them to at least not go off half-cocked without at least considering the ramifications of what they are asking of others when trying to make large sea changes. And to actually have a good causal link that demonstrates that change will actually achieve what they are seeking to achieve. It'd be great if they moved based on the scientific consensus, rather than creating real problems in the face of perceived ones.

The problem with the whole push to get McDonalds to ditch cardboard in the first place was that it was based on a causal relationship that didn't exist. They thought: "There's a deforestation problem, and McDonald's uses a lot of cardboard and paper products, which is made from trees. Ergo, McDonalds is helping cause deforestation through paper demand."

The reality is that the source of a lot of paper products in the US, even in the early 80s, didn't have any causal relationship with mass deforestation we've seen around the world. You did have a lot of deforestation happening in areas of the world where agriculture was increasing, this is true. And the trees did wind up in the wood and paper industries, also true. However, it created more supply and pushed down prices. The supply from deforestation wasn't a direct reaction to demand like was being argued at the time. At least not demand for wood products. It was driven by demand for more food in the developing world. Whoops. That's a bit of a miscalculation there.

So their push wasn't just trading one problem for another, it added a problem and did little to solve the existing problem they wanted to solve. It was counter productive, and not driven by any sort of rigorous scientific consensus at any point. It's much like the anti-GMO and anti-Vax pushes today, which are at best based on non-repeatable or disproven studies.

That is all reasonable and well after the fact. The problem with scientific consensus is that someone has to drive it. If it wasn't for Greenpeace's massive campaigns about climate change a couple decades ago, we probably still wouldn't have scientific consensus about that. What Greenpeace did was based on the knowledge at hand at the time. Sometimes that knowledge turns out to be bogus or incomplete and a course correction is needed.

I agree the anti-GMO stance is poorly founded but anti-Vax is a completely different issue and has nothing to do with Greenpeace.

And the problem I have with the PVC push is that we still don't have a good material replacement that is as good and cheap as PVC. If you want to know why Apple's cables go to pot so easily, it's the lack of PVC in the jacket. So we're trading off one waste toxicity problem (PVC leaching) for another (higher heavy metal content winding up in landfills as we throw away more cables that don't last as long). Again. And I'm not entirely convinced it was the right tradeoff in the face of two bad choices.

Here's the thing, I think the goals of organizations like Greenpeace are admirable. But I have to roll my eyes when they walk into costly mistakes (environmentally speaking), and don't seem to learn from it. The right answer to particular environmental problems aren't always intuitive, so you can't behave in a kneejerk way like these organizations tend to do.

You admire the goals but think they should be achieved through proper channels, after waiting decades for scientific consensus. That's not activism, that's politics (or should be). To expect any activist organization to not step into it every once in a while is disingenuous, it is inevitable and comes with the territory. You can't really deny what Greenpeace has achieved.

And none of the cables should end up in landfill, that's what recycling is for. Drive better legislation if it doesn't work where you live.

Greenpeace isn't a revolution. Recycling isn't a revolution. Conservation isn't even a revolution.

Worthy causes support a lot of worthy cause bureaucrats in nice worthy cause offices and fancy periodic worthy cause events. Impossible for people to vet the effectiveness of most, but yeah you can write a check, spend no real effort and buy an easy, superficial way to feel good about yourself.

Or you can go personally volunteer somewhere and give up some of your precious forum time used to lecture random people about 'worthy causes'.

We need a revolution in our thinking for the next century to work. Greenpeace is trying to make that happen. "You can write a check, spend no real effort and buy an easy, superficial way to feel good about yourself." Well said, you should write Greenpeace's ads! Also, let me know where you are currently volunteering. You must be because you feel entitled to hold me up to that standard.

 

[supercoolmanchu]

We need a revolution in our thinking for the next century to work. Greenpeace is trying to make that happen. "You can write a check, spend no real effort and buy an easy, superficial way to feel good about yourself." Well said, you should write Greenpeace's ads! Also, let me know where you are currently volunteering. You must be because you feel entitled to hold me up to that standard.

Do I feel entitled to tell idiotic, moralizing busy-body groups to stop being annoying publicity whores?
Yes, I absolutely do. Majorly entitled, so very incredibly entitled. Entitled x1000.

Further I pledge to continue throwing all my regular garbage in the blue recycling containers, waist electricity for my amusement, cut down trees, take super long showers, drive over the speed limit and use more gas.

So whatever bogus conservation efforts you've personally tried to support, I've already negated. And the best part... you are powerless to stop me.

Any movement that's stupid enough to designate certain vegetables 'organic' over others, deserves nothing but mockery and scorn.

 

[star-affinity]

What do they do exactly? Rate the greenness of mobile phones? This is typical of Greenpeace activities, a shallow stunt to raise money for other shallow stunts for media attention.

Maybe you can checkout their website?
http://www.greenpeace.org/international/Global/international/code/2016/victory-timeline/index.html

Do you really think there's nothing there that's of value?

You want to know what Greenpeace has helped wrought here in California? A plastic bag ban, illegal for a grocery store to provide people with a complimentary bag for your items. An idiot quest to 'save the environment' by discouraging consumers from using perfectly biodegradable plastic shopping bags.

I'm pretty sure Greenpeace wouldn't have any concern about the bags if they were perfectly biodegradable. And plastic bags aren't. Plastic in the environment is a real problem that should be taken seriously.

This was also the same convenient item that homeless people would recycle into their fecal waist receptacles. These worthy cause conservationists were warned about this fallout. Now predictably without these, fecal matter in impoverished communities has created a massive statewide Hepatitis A outbreak among the homeless. Greenpeace should be out picking up the $**t those morons helped turn into a problem, instead of grading cell phones.

Let's say they made a mistake (I'm sure they have done at times), but shouldn't an organization be valued as a whole?

Supporting this group is immorally stupid. Learn to identify the emotional weaknesses and triggers these groups use to hijack your brain and prevent logical thought.

What is illogical about them, as a whole? I don't get it.

I expect them to at least not go off half-cocked without at least considering the ramifications of what they are asking of others when trying to make large sea changes. And to actually have a good causal link that demonstrates that change will actually achieve what they are seeking to achieve. It'd be great if they moved based on the scientific consensus, rather than creating real problems in the face of perceived ones.

The problem with the whole push to get McDonalds to ditch cardboard in the first place was that it was based on a causal relationship that didn't exist. They thought: "There's a deforestation problem, and McDonald's uses a lot of cardboard and paper products, which is made from trees. Ergo, McDonalds is helping cause deforestation through paper demand."

The reality is that the source of a lot of paper products in the US, even in the early 80s, didn't have any causal relationship with mass deforestation we've seen around the world. You did have a lot of deforestation happening in areas of the world where agriculture was increasing, this is true. And the trees did wind up in the wood and paper industries, also true. However, it created more supply and pushed down prices. The supply from deforestation wasn't a direct reaction to demand like was being argued at the time. At least not demand for wood products. It was driven by demand for more food in the developing world. Whoops. That's a bit of a miscalculation there.

So their push wasn't just trading one problem for another, it added a problem and did little to solve the existing problem they wanted to solve. It was counter productive, and not driven by any sort of rigorous scientific consensus at any point. It's much like the anti-GMO and anti-Vax pushes today, which are at best based on non-repeatable or disproven studies.

And the problem I have with the PVC push is that we still don't have a good material replacement that is as good and cheap as PVC. If you want to know why Apple's cables go to pot so easily, it's the lack of PVC in the jacket. So we're trading off one waste toxicity problem (PVC leaching) for another (higher heavy metal content winding up in landfills as we throw away more cables that don't last as long). Again. And I'm not entirely convinced it was the right tradeoff in the face of two bad choices.

Here's the thing, I think the goals of organizations like Greenpeace are admirable. But I have to roll my eyes when they walk into costly mistakes (environmentally speaking), and don't seem to learn from it. The right answer to particular environmental problems aren't always intuitive, so you can't behave in a kneejerk way like these organizations tend to do.

I think you have good points, but it seems to me you too take some missteps that Greenpeace might have done (I haven't researched your claims about McDonald's, so I don't know) and apply that to the whole organisation. Is that really fair? Are the things in the link below not more of value than not?

http://www.greenpeace.org/international/Global/international/code/2016/victory-timeline/index.html

Do I feel entitled to tell idiotic, moralizing busy-body groups to stop being annoying publicity whores?
Yes, I absolutely do. Majorly entitled, so very incredibly entitled. Entitled x1000.

Further I pledge to continue throwing all my regular garbage in the blue recycling containers, waist electricity for my amusement, cut down trees, take super long showers, drive over the speed limit and use more gas.

So whatever bogus conservation efforts you've personally tried to support, I've already negated. And the best part... you are powerless to stop me.

How can you be so certain that you have the ”correct” view on things when it comes to this? What do you base your conclusions on?

Any movement that's stupid enough to designate certain vegetables 'organic' over others, deserves nothing but mockery and scorn.

Anyone who don't know the difference between an organically grown vegetable and one that has been conventionally produced deserves nothing but mockery and scorn. 😉 No, but seriously – of course there's a difference. There are also a difference between what the different ”organic” labels mean in different countries.

 

[Krevnik]

That is all reasonable and well after the fact. The problem with scientific consensus is that someone has to drive it. If it wasn't for Greenpeace's massive campaigns about climate change a couple decades ago, we probably still wouldn't have scientific consensus about that. What Greenpeace did was based on the knowledge at hand at the time. Sometimes that knowledge turns out to be bogus or incomplete and a course correction is needed.

Wait, so are you claiming that scientists wouldn’t be going “that’s odd” without Greenpeace around when talking the climate climate? Climate change is an area of research that has roots dating back to before WWII. Suspicions about the greenhouse effect became stronger based on more data after WWII. Consensus was getting pretty strong in the 70s, 40 years ago. The CFC and aerosol issues just came to a head and pushed the climate change discussion into the background at that point in time, but the ozone hole, “global dimming” and global warming were all being worked on at the same time. Consensus is not a new thing on this topic, despite what the mainstream visibility of the research is.

Greenpeace is helping get it in the minds of mainstream, with their activity rising as we get better data saying what the ill effects will be. But if anything, they should have been helping to raise the alarm bells sooner.

The problem is that Greenpeace doesn’t do their own investigations or work with others to do so, when they really should. They operate by getting informed by reporting or research like anyone else, but like anyone else, they really need good independent verification or consensus if they want to launch a massive campaign.

I agree the anti-GMO stance is poorly founded but anti-Vax is a completely different issue and has nothing to do with Greenpeace.

The relevant thread there is that we have pushes based on shoddy or fraudulent research, because we either don’t have replication, or because the reviews of that research pointing out the problems are ignored. Or perhaps the answer agrees too much with our worldview to let it go, even when the researcher admits to their mistakes. Greenpeace has historically swallowed the bait and thrown their weight behind both good and bad environmental research. Anti-Vax is a simile if you will, for the particular biases at play and the end results.

I think you have good points, but it seems to me you too take some missteps that Greenpeace might have done (I haven't researched your claims about McDonald's, so I don't know) and apply that to the whole organisation. Is that really fair? Are the things in the link below not more of value than not?

http://www.greenpeace.org/international/Global/international/code/2016/victory-timeline/index.html

How much of that is directly attributable to Greenpeace I wonder? How much of it is a victory specifically from their particular worldview, versus the right set of trade offs for the moment?

The thing is, I’ll admit that it is possible for Greenpeace to have mellowed out, but I’ve been around long enough to remember their gung ho attitude towards things. Hell, I’ll support their efforts when it makes sense, but I tend to be skeptical that a particular thing must be done (or done away with) based on their word. Because of that history of leaping before they look.

And the whole fact that years ago, they rated companies higher than Apple for two reasons:
1) That company promised to make changes, but hadn’t made them yet.
2) Apple had made most of those changes already, but hadn’t slathered their brand in self praise for it yet.

Nobody should be getting favor for words, only actions. Giving folks a cookie for something they may, possibly, just might do in the future undermines the whole effort, IMO. And underlines my argument that they need to do more independent investigation. But no, they took credit for Apple feeling the need to respond to the accusations and took credit for Apple’s environmental stance that already existed. Calling it a victory.

 

[supercoolmanchu]

What is illogical about them, as a whole? I don't get it.

The imminent peril and fear they stoke. It's a cult for naturalist superstitions.
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How can you be so certain that you have the ”correct” view on things when it comes to this? What do you base your conclusions on?

'Sky is falling' philosophies are the domain of cults. Because when people talk like Nostradamus, and think like Nostradamus, and even smell like Nostradamus... it's proof positive that they as wrong as Nostradamus. Science sounding superstition, no matter how popular with certain cliques, is still a cult.
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Anyone who don't know the difference between an organically grown vegetable and one that has been conventionally produced deserves nothing but mockery and scorn. 😉 No, but seriously – of course there's a difference. There are also a difference between what the different ”organic” labels mean in different countries.

🙄 All vegetables are 'organically' grown. I challenge you to find any inorganic plant.

Changing the definition of 'organic' and trying to turn it into some brand or selling point, doesn't make it any less stupid.

 

[M2M]

but normal people repairing the screen will lead lead the to throwing away the screen into the landfill
apple will recycle the materials
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screen was just an example. the point is that apple can recycle and reuse the materials better you or the third party repair services can. so the net waste in landfill is less if you let apple take care of the broken parts
[doublepost=1508258201][/doublepost]
same can be said about the repair shop. what do they do with the broken parts? not all repair shops would do the responsible thing and make sure the broken parts are recycled

Resource utilization is still lower with parts replacement compared to getting a new full device. The argument about parts not getting properly recycled is valid however

 

[LordVic]

More like BS! Apple is basically number one, only topped by a socialist organization known as Fairphone (who has heard of them? how many phones do they sell?) and they only get a B-?!?

That's like saying Apple just cured cancer, they get a B- for innovation.

Being number #1 doesn't automatically make you an A++ student.

I was once #1 in a class on a test. I scored 70%, should it have been automatically recorded as 100%? no, that's not how it works.

The B- score reflects that they still have things they can do to be better.
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LOL where are the As? Greenpeace should not exist.

It's not a bell curve. It's entirely possible that not a single company met their requirements for an A.

 

[star-affinity]

The imminent peril and fear they stoke. It's a cult for naturalist superstitions.

Imminent peril and fear? To me it seems more like they bring up some problematic things and try do do something about them.

'Sky is falling' philosophies are the domain of cults. Because when people talk like Nostradamus, and think like Nostradamus, and even smell like Nostradamus... it's proof positive that they as wrong as Nostradamus. Science sounding superstition, no matter how popular with certain cliques, is still a cult.

Is Greenpeace saying that the sky is falling? Again, I don't see that. In general it seems to me they bring up problems and try to deal with them. Problems that are real and affect people and the environment.

🙄 All vegetables are 'organically' grown. I challenge you to find any inorganic plant.

Changing the definition of 'organic' and trying to turn it into some brand or selling point, doesn't make it any less stupid.

Yes, of course all plants are organic. But as the definition of ”organically produced” means certain things such as no use of (certain) pesticides etc. there sure is a difference between vegetables that are labeled as organically produced and those that are conventionally produced. I don't think anyone is arguing that the vegetables themselves aren't organic if not organically produced.

And it sure is a selling point to many. For example, here in southern Sweden where I currently live they have found traces of pesticides in the groundwater: https://translate.google.com/translate?sl=sv&tl=en&js=y&prev=_t&hl=sv&ie=UTF-8&u=https://www.sydsvenskan.se/2017-08-03/bekampningsmedel-i-skanskt-grundvatten&edit-text=

And this is in a country where there is (to my knowledge) a rather high level of controls and rules when it comes to pesticides. Is that nothing to worry about you think?