Following on from my series about supermarkets in schools, here is something that has been irritating me for a while: British Gas are part of a huge energy company known as Centrica, which operates in energy markets across the world. For many years now BG have been losing out to other energy companies in the domestic market due to the deregulation of the energy industry; they have managed to diversify into electricity, but are nothing like the force they were before the 1990s in the UK.

So what have they decided to do? Get into the business of education, subtly but incidiously. Here is the advert for their Generation Green campaign…

Like the supermarket campaigns, schools can get rewards for collecting vouchers, or “leaves” (love the green tinge already!). I have no idea how many leaves are required for a solar panel, so it would be foolish for me to suggest that it would be an extraordinary amount, but it might be – that’s all I’m saying.

More importantly for British Gas, there is a huge amount of subtle marketing going on:

– To get 200 leaves, a school can download a lesson plan which contains lots of information about saving energy, but also has a British Gas logo on every page. The lesson plans are particularly interesting in that when they discuss the causes of climate change they highlight how bad coal is, but completely neglect to mention natural gas as also being a source of both carbon dioxide and methane. Interesting.

– To get 150 leaves, a parent can complete a British Gas “Energy Saver’s Report“. I started to fill one out, honestly, and at Step 6 was asked what my main heating fuel was – it is wood, but this is not an option. I carried on, using gas as my source, and when I got to this page things got even stranger – I could not say that I only heat my home in the evening, and I could not say that my thermostat was set to 15C. The minimum allowed was 19 degrees centigrade – very hot for us. I completed the plan, and was offered some nice services and goods that could be supplied by British Gas, and that I had only earned 100 leaves!

This entire operation has light green platitudes stamped all over it, just like the supermarket greenwashing I wrote about last week. The changes suggested are not bad, but they are insufficient and completely within the comfort zone of a commercial organisation.

It also, like the supermarket vouchers, allows a large commercial entity to worm its way into a so-called place of education, via the teachers and students using the lesson plans, and the parents of the students filling out surveys in order to earn the schools more leaves.

Now watch the advert again and see how good you feel about British Gas.

(although I love the idea of shutting down the lights at the supermarket – go on kids, you know it makes sense!)

In the previous part of this series I wrote about two prime examples of greenwash being used to maximise the success of School Supermarket Voucher Schemes. In this final part I will explain who the real winners and losers are, and what you can do to change things…

By now it’s pretty clear that supermarkets are not giving anything away with their voucher schemes, and may be gaining an awful lot — but it’s also possible that schools get something out of these schemes too, as exemplified by the quotes in Part Two. If it is indeed the case that schools benefit from these schemes, then how do you explain the Tesco advert below:

There’s no shortage of urgency to get everyone you could possibly influence to go down to their local Tesco and get hold of vouchers; but maybe Tesco, or Sainsburys, or Morrisons, or Asda are being genuinely altruistic and the extra sales are just a useful by-product of providing a valuable social service. To help you decide, I have carried out a short analysis of the four schemes mentioned (note that these are the four largest supermarket chains in the UK, and they all ran or are running schemes in 2008, so I’m not picking on any one company) to find out who gains most financially from them. You can access the relevant catalogue by clicking on the supermarket name. I have only used items that represent the overall range (low, mid and high value), and for which I can reasonably accurately provide a sales price.

Tesco Computers For Schools

Tesco CD-R Pack
Voucher = 360
Sale Price = £3
Voucher Price = £3600
Store/School Benefit Ratio = 120:1 (i.e. store gains £120 for every £1 school gains)

Samsung S630 Digital Camera
Vouchers = 3300
Sale Price = £70
Voucher Price = £33,000
Store/School Benefit Ratio = 471:1

Apple 20″ iMac
Vouchers = 26,500
Sale Price = £900
Voucher Price = £260,500
Store/School Benefit Ratio = 290:1

Asda Go Green For Schools

Eco-Ed Poster Set
Vouchers = 300
Sale Price = £6
Voucher Price = £3000 (based on one carrier bag containing £10 worth of goods)
Store/School Benefit Ratio = 500:1

Pocket Microscope Set
Vouchers = 800
Sale Price = £30
Voucher Price = £8000
Store/School Benefit Ratio = 266:1

Bird View Remote Camera System
Vouchers = 3000
Sale Price = £170
Voucher Price = £30,000
Store/School Benefit Ratio = 176:1

Sainsburys Active Kids

PVC Rounders Bat
Vouchers = 94
Sale Price = £6
Voucher Price = £940
Store/School Benefit Ratio = 156:1

V12 Panther Cricket Bat
Vouchers = 280
Sale Price = £14
Voucher Price = £2800
Store/School Benefit Ratio = 200:1

Butterfly Compact Outdoor Table Tennis Table
Vouchers = 7969
Sale Price = £240
Voucher Price = £79,690
Store/School Benefit Ratio = 332:1

Morrisons Let’s Grow

All Purpose Plant Food
Vouchers = 68
Sale Price = £7
Voucher Price = £680
Store/School Benefit Ratio = 97:1

Graduate Spade
Vouchers = 340
Sale Price = £20
Voucher Price = £3400
Store/School Benefit Ratio = 170:1

4′ x 6′ Greenhouse Twin Wall
Vouchers = 4979
Sale Price = £260
Voucher Price = £49,790
Store/School Benefit Ratio = 192:1

What is very clear from the above analysis, is that with nothing else taken into account, the financial benefit to the supermarket is between 100 and 500 times the benefit gained by the school. Bear in mind that although vouchers would be given with shopping regardless of whether the shopper bought more than they normally do, the schemes are (as the advert at the beginning of this article showed) are designed to take custom from other stores, so there is a net benefit to the store that gains the most publicity: hence the posters and banners provided to schools. Also, the sale price of an item is likely to be much lower to the store, equivalent to the wholesale price of the goods purchased by the shopper — so, the ratio provided is a good reflection of how much the store benefits financially from the schemes.

There are, of course some benefits to the schools — here they are:

1) Equipment
2) Information packs

That said, here’s a list of the benefits, in addition to increased sales, to the supermarkets:

1) Free in-school advertising
2) Customer loyalty and children as future customers
3) Socially responsible image
4) Ability to influence curriculum

The outcome is very clear: the supermarkets are the outright winners of these schemes, in almost every way imaginable. The losers are the shoppers who will buy far more than normal to obtain vouchers but, most of all the children who are being subjected to continual corporate brainwashing, right under the noses of the very people who have been entrusted with their education and well-being.

The supermarkets aren’t the only businesses responsible for this, either: brands like Flora, Cadburys, Walkers and Nestle are all competing for a piece of the education system, and the attention of children not just in the UK, but right across the world, and it’s getting more intense all the time.

What You Can Do

If this makes you feel angry and determined to do something, there are many things you can do.

1) Join a campaign group: in the USA, the main group is Commercial Alert; in Ireland, the group is Commercial Free Education. Incredibly, no such group exists in the UK, unless you can tell me otherwise. If you are keen to set up such a group then The Unsuitablog will be happy to support you.

2) Tell teachers, friends and children about the harm caused by commercial advertising in schools, and the huge benefits the supermarkets and other businesses gain from such schemes (or rather, commercial promotions). Refer to this study if you need evidence, or show people the catalogues and posters for examples. Write letters to newspapers, blog about the subject and repost the links to this series of articles:

Schools Supermarket Vouchers Special: Part 1
Schools Supermarket Vouchers Special: Part 2
Schools Supermarket Vouchers Special: Part 3

3) Refuse vouchers when offered them, explaining your reasons and, if you can, don’t go to supermarkets at all. Write to the offending companies saying that you will not be a customer unless they stop running such promotions.

4) Demand that your school (or your childrens school) removes advertising from within in grounds, or on its boundaries. This is a breach of ethics and trust. First speak to the head teacher and if this doesn’t help, write to the board of governors. If this is unsuccessful then you may have to take direct action.

5) Subvertise and/or remove offending advertising in and around schools. A pair of wire cutters is very useful for removing banner adverts on school boundaries, and if you come across posters in and around the school then simply remove them — if challenged then ask why the posters are there in the first place.

In the first part of this series I explained how supermarkets have infiltrated schools with their clever voucher schemes, and the various tricks that the business use to ensure they are as successful as possible. In this part I will highlight two attempts at greenwashing that have been accepted as fact by school leaders, teachers, parents and children…

Greenwashing stinks! That you already know. What isn’t always clear, though, is when greenwashing is actually taking place: you can use this guide to help with its identification, but when you have something as insidious as a school voucher scheme being accepted wholeheartedly by everyone attached to thousands of schools, then the whole greenwashing concept starts to seem a little hazy.

It’s not. There is nothing hazy about the following acts of greenwashing except the minds of the people who have allowed it to be part of the “educational” process…

Morrisons’ Let’s Grow

If you read my entries on The Sietch and The Earth Blog, you will know that I am a huge supporter of many types of self-sufficiency, which includes — to a very large extent — growing your own food. So, anything that gets children interested in the potential of home growing as a source of food is obviously a good thing: it removes the carbon footprint of “food miles”; it encourages children to take an interest in where their food comes from; it can cause a dramatic shift in diet from processed, high-energy foods to natural, healthy ones; most importantly it can help reconnect children to the very landbase which we depend upon for our survival.

So why are Morrisons, the fourth largest supermarket chain in the UK, trying to bring self-sufficiency to schools around the country — have they discovered a moral bone within their, well-publicised, history of environmental stonewalling?

Let’s Grow aims to help schools capture the imagination of the nation’s kids to show them that food doesn’t just come from supermarkets. By collecting Let’s Grow vouchers you’ll be enabling kids to get their hands dirty for good reason by giving them the opportunity to grow their own food in the school grounds.

All very worthy, and on message. Food doesn’t just come from supermarkets: very true, and seemingly in opposition to the raison d’etre of a supermarket. But take a closer look at the “Fact Sheet For Teachers” and things start to become clearer.

The key points are easy to identify:

1) There is, of course, the required grocery spend for vouchers — £10 for one, in this case — so it is clear from the off that this isn’t a social enterprise on behalf of the business.

2) On registration, the school are supplied with “free” teaching resources. The guides are pretty good: they cover all the basics about preparation, composting, growing, harvesting and many other things. Most of the guides are branded with the Morrisons logo.

3) Schools are provided with posters and banners, which they can display all round the school and, very importantly, on the school boundaries, so that passers-by can see what the school, and Morrisons, are doing.

As you will see in Part Three, the voucher purchase alone makes this “green” scheme very good for business, as does the branding: but its the nature of the business itself, a huge business with a turnover of £8bn in the last financial year, that makes this so droll. Morrisons, like all large supermarkets, import the vast majority of their produce from overseas and, unlike some other chains, push their “budget” produce very heavily, at the expense of local and organic goods, which are routinely sidelined. This is the profit motive writ large. The benefits of the scheme to the supermarket are primarily at the checkout, but by wrapping the scheme in something so obviously counter to the supermarket culture, they are able to appear “outside the system”.

Morrisons know, full well, that the vast majority of children and adults who get involved in the scheme will become slightly more loyal to the Morrisons brand as a result of the socially beneficial appearance of the scheme; a small minority may well decide they don’t need supermarkets and will strive to grow their own food and buy local produce, but they are the exception. Morrisons have done a great job greenwashing their brand.

Asda Go Green For Schools

As the second largest supermarket chain in the UK, and part of the largest corporation on Earth, Asda (or rather, AsdaWalmart) are well placed to move into schools. Starting as a regional store group, they opened up their market by pushing their “mumsy” appeal, exemplified by the widely recognised Asda “bottom pat” (the bottoms in question being those of mothers who had spare change in their back pockets). Once they had captured the family market, Walmart took over (literally) and turned a medioum sized chain into a corporate behemoth.

It is this corporate behemoth that is now urging schools to “Go Green”. Bear in mind that Asda’s carbon emissions for 2007 were…oh dear! I don’t seem to be able to find them anywhere on the internet. In fact I spent over 20 minutes on the phone talking to the press office, the customer service office (in South Africa, bizarrely) and head office, and no one could tell me how much carbon Asda release. This is the single most important measure of environmental performance and it’s missing.

Here’s the entire set of phone calls for you to enjoy >>> Asda Can’t Tell Me Their Carbon Emissions

Looking at the Go Green For Schools website, it’s immediately clear that there is very little on offer. The scheme ran during the first half of 2008, and during that time teachers could download worksheets about various aspects of the environment (I can’t find any on the site) and also — and here’s the clincher — collect vouchers to save up for “eco-equipment”. The environmental scope of the scheme is limited to Reduce-Reuse-Recycle (which seems to skip the most important “reduce” bit entirely), plastic bags and packaging. The “eco-equipment” is pretty limited, and includes a set of 6 “Go Green For Schools” branded posters for “only” 300 vouchers.

Now here’s the clever bit: Asda don’t ask you to spend money for vouchers, they give you one every time you don’t ask for a carrier bag and use one of your own instead. This is another bit of classic greenwash: as I reported a while ago, plastic bags are just a bit of eco fluff that distract from the real environmental problems companies cause. But because people think they are being environmentally friendly, then they associate the scheme with genuine social concern — that all important feel-good factor that encourages loyalty. And you can only get a voucher if you have a bag’s worth of goods; to get three vouchers you have to buy three bag’s worth of goods.

It seems that schools have fallen for this scheme lock, stock and barrel:

“Many many thanks, what a wonderful supermarket you are! What a fantastic surprise we had, when we received all the lovely goodies from you.”
Dawn Sparrows
Pound Park Nursery & Early Years Centre, Charlton, London

“I am writing with a huge THANK YOU! We received your kind donation this morning of numerous items and we are absolutely delighted. The children are excited and enthused and eager to set up the mini green houses and can crushers…..! We really do appreciate the contribution to our school and the Eco Club. You have got our club off the ground! Thank you once again.”
Lucy Garside
Woodley Primary School, Stockport

“Thank you so much for the environmental prizes. We really work hard here to help our children find out more about the environment and how to look after it. The kits you sent will really help us do this.”
Lynne Cannon – Head Teacher
Saxon Wood, Hants

So are Asda greenwashing? Well, considering they do not publish any useful environmental information publically, they are (even more than Morrisons) a massive importer and retailer of consumer goods and exotic produce, and they are part of the largest global corporation in history: yes, that’s Asda Greenwashing at its best.

Next time I will explain who the real winners and losers are in the supermarket voucher schemes. even after what I have said, you might well be pretty shocked at the results.

There is no fine line between commercial activity at schools and proper education, assuming you understand that education doesn’t mean preparing a child to be a valuable consumer. On the other hand, if you consider schools to simply be conduits into the spending habits of children and their parents then the efforts of supermarkets in the UK and Ireland (and, undoubtedly many other countries) make perfect sense.

This week, The Unsuitablog is concentrating on a particular phenomenon which is growing ever more insidious: the School Supermarket Voucher Scheme. Even if you haven’t directly encountered one, you will probably know how they work: shopper buys goods from supermarket; shopper is given some vouchers in return for their custom; children of shoppers take vouchers into school; school collects vouchers and exchanges them for items that are of use to the school.

Simple. So what would explain the different attitudes being exhibited by the following three quotes:

Tesco announced today that it is creating a brand new voucher collection scheme that will offer schools and clubs a huge range of exciting products to collect for.

By merging its two highly successful voucher schemes into one bumper catalogue, the supermarket will offer schools and clubs much greater choice as well as the freedom to decide where their priorities are.

Lucy Neville-Rolfe, Corporate and Legal Affairs Director said:

“Over the last 17 years millions of children up and down the country have collected Tesco vouchers for their schools. We wanted to build on this success by extending our support into others areas of the curriculum, such as health and art. Our enhanced voucher collection scheme will make it easier for schools and clubs to benefit from our programme, and we expect it will prove to be our most popular yet.”

(from http://www.tescoplc.com/plc/corporate_responsibility/news/press_releases/pr2008/2008-06-13/)

During the summer term, parents and friends of the school sent in their ‘Tesco Computers for Schools’ vouchers and parent helpers in the library spent many a happy hour counting them – thank you.

This year we collected 17,053 vouchers, which were added to the 15,104 ‘banked’ last year. This gave us a total of 32,157 vouchers to spend.

We recently took delivery of a brand new Apple iMac costing 26,500 vouchers – leaving 5,657 banked for next year.

Many thanks to all who sent these vouchers into the school. As you can see, they have been converted into a really useful piece of computer equipment, which will benefit all of the students here.

(from http://www.colytongrammar.devon.sch.uk/news/index.htm)

A Sligo school is among the first in the country to formally oppose what it calls ‘covert and exploitative’ activities by major companies seeking to advertise their products to young children.

The Sligo School Project has outlawed activities such as high profile token collection schemes operated by big supermarkets, as well as commercial presentations and the use of sponsored curriculum material, as part of a formal policy on commercial free education.

The school’s co-ordinator for commercial free education, Ms. Carmel Morley told THE SLIGO CHAMPION that the school decided to take a stand in response to the growing number of commercial schemes aimed at marketing to pupils and their families through the schools.

She maintained that offering primary school children advertising in the guise of education was ‘unethical and exploitative’.

(from http://www.sligochampion.ie/news/sligo-school-outlaws-store-token-schemes-1495619.html

That last one was rather at odds with the other two, but before you decide whether these schemes are “unethical and exploitative”, it’s worth just explaining some of the techniques used by the supermarkets to ensure the success of these schemes.

The Techniques

This is by no means an exhaustive list, but I have broken them down into four main areas:

1. In-school promotion

The companies operating the schemes provide large amounts of promotional materials for the schools that have registered with them: these include headed paper which which to write introductory letters to parents; branded collection boxes for classrooms and common areas; posters and large banners to attach to internal and external walls, school boundary fences and other visible areas; curriculum resources including resource packs, information sheets and other information related to the scheme. Not forgetting the branding of the vouchers themselves, which always contain a supermarket logo.

2. Community Emphasis

The schemes always operate under the auspices of “community”: this may be by providing the schools with equipment such a play equipment, computers or books; by having a social or environmental angle on the scheme; or by implying that the company are “bringing together” different parts of the community to ensure the success of the scheme. This is reinforced by the schools using the branded letters and other materials to encourage parents and children to take part in the schemes for the benefit of the school. Schools are encouraged to use the local press to promote their participation in schemes to the wider public.

3. Bonus Vouchers

In many cases, vouchers are handed out for a set value of purchases or (in one case) for a set number of shopping bags, but this can be augmented if the shopper buys certain products or a certain number of a particular product, such as buying 3 bottles of drink and receiving more than the individual voucher value of the product. Bonus vouchers are almost always attached to high profit goods, or bulk purchases greater than the shopper would normally buy.

4. Limited Timespan

It is very rare for a scheme to operate over a long period of time. Normally the collection period is no more than a single term (semester), which compresses the activity into a short period. This ensures that schools do not become complacent or lose enthusiasm, and also allows for annual (or more frequent) scheme episodes, which always have a slightly different branding from the previous episode.

I had no idea that such an incredible greenwash was going on behind my back until alerted by F1Fanatic to the astonishing tale of the Bridgestone “Green” Tyre.

The people who read the F1Fanatic website have few allusions that Formula 1 racing can ever be green, as shown by the comments under the linked article…unlike Bridgestone, who have really gone to town over their big fat tyres with green stripes:

Formula One will show its support for the FIA’s Make Cars Green campaign by running on specially prepared green-grooved tyres at the Japanese Grand Prix.

Bridgestone, the global partner for the FIA’s campaign, launched the Make Cars Green tyre at a ceremony in Tokyo today, with support from Formula One teams McLaren-Mercedes and Ferrari, as well as their drivers Lewis Hamilton, Heikki Kovalainen, Felipe Massa and Kimi Räikkönen.

The initiative demonstrates that Formula One’s teams and partners are backing the Make Cars Green campaign’s goal to reduce the impact of motoring on the environment.

The connections between greener motoring and Formula One will be further strengthened next year with the introduction of energy regenerating hybrid devices, one of a number of initiatives in the sport that will be increasingly relevant to the car industry and help accelerate the use of fuel-efficient technology on public roads.

So, if I’m right about this, the people responsible for hurling cars around a track at 200 miles per hour, moving their entire engineering entourage across the globe multiple times, along with the flight-happy petrolheads who slavishly follow their every move, actually think we will believe the FIA (the world motor racing governing body) care about the environment!

The Make Cars Green (sic) website is a treasure chest of greenwashing gloop.

Make Cars Green brings together all aspects of the FIA’s work from encouraging consumers to go green, to representing our members’ ecological concerns towards government and manufacturers, and the introduction of environmental initiatives into motor sport.

Make Cars Green aims to encourage radical rethink in the way cars are considered in society by being at the forefront of encouraging considerate and ecologically sound mobility.

That’s about twelve contradictions in one short statement, and a huge own goal (apologies for mixing my sprting metaphors) for the FIA, because the only way to have “considerate and ecologically sound mobility” is to remove all the engines. Seriously. Coaches and trains are better than cars, trucks and planes, but all of them use fuel, and all of them perpetuate the myth that it is necessary to travel long distances at speed — only in a civilized world is this necessary.

Take a look at this video, for a quick reality check…

And bye, bye, motor sport (that is, if it wants to be green :-D )

I feel like a cyclist with my mouth open sometimes — keep moving forwards and the flies will just pop in from time to time. Some of those flies will be big and nasty…like this one I received from a PR company this morning:

Hello Keith,

One of the ironies of the modern era is that computers haven’t helped us to use less paper. Instead we are using vastly more than ever before. This is absolute disaster for the environment. One fifth of all wood harvested ends up as paper. Pulp and paper is the fifth largest consumer of energy and in the US paper accounts for 40 percent of all solid waste.

So why do computers cause us to use so much paper?

To be sure it’s easy to print documents out and paper is portable. Another major reason is that we are still using antiquated paper and pen to sign and execute contracts. DocuSign is helping to change that with its end-to-end contract execution service that lets companies process and sign documents on the Web.

Now Fidelity Investments has jumped on board with DocuSign and will be rolling out the company’s e-signature and electronic contract execution services to thousands of independent advisors. Not only does this save time and money for the advisors while improving security, it also greatly reduces the need to print, fax and use overnight delivery services to hand-deliver documents. Instead, documents are sent, signed and processed over the Web.

We see Fidelity’s adoption of e-signatures as a major advancement in the way that financial institutions work and a sign that there is a greener future ahead. Can I arrange for you to speak with executives from Fidelity Investments and DocuSign, as well as a customer, to give you their impression of how this service works industry works.

Please let me know if you have questions or need more information.

Brian Edwards
McKenzie Worldwide PR
(503) 863-2002
briane@mckenzieworldwide.com

Well, of course I’m going to speak to a load of corporate executives and give them some free advertising — after all that’s what The Unsuitablog does all the time, isn’t it? How stupid does a person have to be to send such an e-mail to this web site? I suppose as stupid as they have to be to think that people are going believe a company like Fidelity Investments actually care about the planet.

Let’s take a look at the kind of investments this new, ethical Fidelity are offering today…

Powershares Aerospace & Defense Portfolio

The top ten holdings of this investment fund which focusses on the tools of war are as follows:

Honeywell International, Inc. (“defence” technology manufacture)
Lockheed Martin Corporation (primary arms manufacture)
Boeing Company (“defense” airplane manufacture)
United Technologies (“defense” airplane manufacture)
General Dynamics (“defense” shipping manufacture)
Raytheon Company (primary arms manufacture)
Northrop Grumman Corporation (primary arms manufacture)
ITT Corporation (“defence” technology manufacture)
Textron, Inc. (“defence” equipment manufacture)
L-3 Communications Holdings, Inc. (“defence” technology manufacture)

Claymore/SWM Canadian Energy Income

Primarily invests in oil sands (the most polluting form of energy) and other heavily polluting energies. Top ten are:

Oilsands Quest, Inc. (oil sands)
Canadian Oil Sands Trust Trust Unit (oil sands)
Penn West Energy Trust Trust Unit (oil and gas)
Suncor Energy, Inc. (oil and gas)
Baytex Energy Trust Trust Unit (oil sands)
Imperial Oil (oil sands)
OPTI Canada Inc. (oil sands)
UTS Energy Corp (oil sands)
Enerplus Resources Fund Trust Unit (oil and gas)
Canadian Natural Resources, Ltd. (oil sands)

Market Vectors Global Agribusiness ETF

This is a big one – $1.6billion worth, in companies resposible for changing the way nature works or just destroying it. Top ten are:

Syngenta AG ADR (GMOs)
Potash Corporation of Saskatchewan, Inc. (fertilizer mining)
Deere & Company (deforestation)
The Mosaic Company (fertilizer mining)
Monsanto Company (GMOs)
Archer Daniels Midland Corporation (GM soybean processing)
Wilmar International Ltd (palm oil production)
IOI (palm oil production)
Yara Int’l (fertilizer manufacturer)
Agrium, Inc. (fertilizer supplier)

This is just a small sample of the kinds of products you can buy from Fidelity — the company that are promising “a greener future ahead” — out of many more that contain every awful company that you can imagine. In short, Fidelity offer investments in all of the least ethical companies on Earth, and by implication that makes Fidelity a completely unethical company, and thus by further implication, by linking themselves in a press release with Fidelity, that makes Docusign a completely unethical company as well. And finally, by sending out this e-mail, supporting both Fidelity and Docusign, that makes the company who sent it to me — McKenzie Worldwide PR — a completely unethical company too.

(Oh, and by the way, the reason companies use so much paper is to churn out endless amounts of crap telling us why we need them…)

Children should get out more; they need to discover the world for themselves, connect with this world and understand that life does not exist in a bubble of technology or commerce. In fact, under the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, article 31 states:

1. States Parties recognize the right of the child to rest and leisure, to engage in play and recreational activities appropriate to the age of the child and to participate freely in cultural life and the arts.

2. States Parties shall respect and promote the right of the child to participate fully in cultural and artistic life and shall encourage the provision of appropriate and equal opportunities for cultural, artistic, recreational and leisure activity.

Pretty unequivocal. In the UK (for this is the focus of this article), a charity called Playday, also have this to say:

– All children need opportunities to take their own risks when playing; they need and want challenge, excitement and uncertainty in play.
– Through play, children can learn how to manage challenge and risk for themselves in everyday situations.
– Opportunities for children to take risks while playing are reducing, as increasingly health and safety considerations are impacting on children’s play.
– Adults should provide for children and young people to have adventurous play opportunities.

Which reinforces the UN Convention in a very positive way. In short, children should be playing as much as possible, without interference.

Interestingly, Article 32 of the UN Convention says the following:

1. States Parties recognize the right of the child to be protected from economic exploitation and from performing any work that is likely to be hazardous or to interfere with the child’s education, or to be harmful to the child’s health or physical, mental, spiritual, moral or social development.

For a while now Persil, or rather the manufacturer of this detergent, Unilever, have been running a campaign called “Dirt Is Good”, the implication being that it doesn’t matter how much mess kids get into, it’s all part of being a child. Of course, by running a campaign that links such a positive message with what is — if we are being perfectly honest here — a bunch of cleaning chemicals, Unilever get big kudos for their positive attitude but, more importantly for them, get big sales.

Is this child exploitation? According to the UN Convention Article 32 any such exploitation would be completely unacceptable — and while this is bread and butter to a huge corporation, a charity like Playday really should know better than to let commercial interests get in the way of good clean fun.

Then there is this list…

Pentasodium Triphosphate Builder
Sodium Silicoaluminate Builder
Sodium Carbonate Peroxide Oxidising Agent
Sodium Dodecylbenzenesulfonate Surfactant
Aqua Bulking Agent
Sodium Carbonate Buffering Agent
C12-15 Pareth-7 Surfactant
Sodium Acetate Tablet Disintegrant
Tetraacetyl Ethylene Diamine Oxidising Agent
Sodium Silicate Builder
Sodium Sulfate Bulking Agent
Sodium Stearate Surfactant
Ethylene Diamine Tetra Methylene Phosphonic Acid Ca/Na salt Sequestrant
Maize Starch Bulking Agent
Parfum Fragrance
Citric Acid Builder
Cellulose Gum Anti-redeposition Agent
Dimorpholinopyridazinone Optical Brightener
PVP Dye Transfer Inhibitor
Sodium Acrylic Acid/MA Copolymer Structurant
Simethicone Antifoaming Agent
Sodium Chloride Bulking Agent
Sodium Bentonite Softness Extender
Sodium Polyacrylate Structurant
Glyceryl Stearate Emulsifier
Protease Enzyme
Sodium Polyaryl Sulfonate Surfactant
Amylase Enzyme
Lipase Enzyme
CI 74160 Colourant

That is the full ingredient list for the best selling form of Persil, the biological liquid. I’m not going to go into the chemistry of this list, but it would be fair to say that to blindly go into a trusting relationship with this product, containing all of these substances — whether as a parent, charity or most importantly, a child who usually has no choice over what their clothes are washed in and what substances pour into the waste water system and eventually into rivers, lakes and seas — is pure folly.

Persil is a commercial product; it exists to make money for business. Never forget that.

I’m really, really sorry. I had no idea at all that I was living a terrible life, but it took those folks at BP to pull me back into the real world. According to their Greencurve there’s so much more I could be doing to make my life greener. Look at the graph (sorry “curve”) above and you can see I’m nowhere near “Aspire!” — whatever that means. I must be re-educated by BP.

Here’s what they say I should do to be greener (and my feelings):

“Try to travel when other people aren’t. This keeps you from wasting gas starting and stopping and can cut down your energy use considerably.”

(But I almost never drive — there was no option for going everywhere by foot, bus or train.)

“Wash your car at a car wash. 85% of car washes’ water is reclaimed and their systems are much more efficient than ours.”

(I never wash my car; the rain does it for me. It uses no energy and wastes no water.)

“For outdoor lighting, use solar. It’s easier to find than you might think (on most home and garden furnishings websites, do a search for “solar lighting”)”

(But…but…I don’t have any lights in my garden.)

“Start a recycling program in your neighborhood, local community center or school — anywhere a lot of paper is used.”

(Please sir, my council already do collect my recycling, and I don’t produce much waste anyway. And what about everything apart from paper?)

Gosh, how castigated I am feeling.

This is what is known as “conchoice” — consumer choice with the emphasis on the “con”. As I write in A Matter Of Scale:

Consumer choice would be far better entitled “Conchoice”, a term describing the true level of choice that individuals are provided with, should they find themselves within the consumer culture. Benjamin R. Barber puts it like this: “The apparent widening of individual consumer choices actually shrinks the field of social choices…For example, the American’s freedom to choose among scores of automobile brands was secured by sacrificing the liberty to choose between private and public transportation. This politics of commodity…offers the feel of freedom while diminishing the range of options and the power to affect the larger world.” The individual is being conned: there is no choice.

Look at the way you are currently living: you can “choose” between plasma, LCD, cathode ray tube or Internet TV, but not having a television is inconceivable to most people in the consumer culture; you can “choose” between shopping at Walmart, Aldi, Tesco, Carrefour or any other supermarket, but not using a supermarket is impossible for hundreds of millions of people who need to buy food and have no way of growing it themselves.

How much of your life was simply picked off the shelves of the Conchoice Mall, and how much of it came out of a conscious decision to live in that particular way?

I recommend you try out the Greencurve yourself, and have a think about the “choices” BP are presenting to you. This is not BP’s world, it is your world, and you can make your own choices, regardless of what a polluting oil giant might think. Tell them where to stick their “Greencurve”.

A few years ago, before I had hit the “green curve” (as BP like to call it — more of that in another post) I bought a dishwasher. I still have one — not the same one, which eventually broke down irreparably, but an identical model which someone else was throwing out — and because my hot water doesn’t come from renewables yet, but my electricity does, we still use it. It’s a Bosch, an “AA” rated one, which means it doesn’t use much electricity or water. But (big but) we don’t actually produce a lot of washing up compared to the average family; we reduce the need to wash before actually washing. That’s just common sense.

When Bosch — who, quite frankly, exist solely to sell appliances — come out with an advert entitled “Planet savers” (note my annotation in the picture, being rather cross when I read it) I have to be very suspicious indeed. The implication is that their products are actually saving the planet. Forget the fact that you might have no washing up at all to do, or you boiled your washing up water on a wood stove — if you buy a Bosch product then you are SAVING THE PLANET!

Does that seem a little disingenuous on behalf of the planet to you? Like all “techno fixes”, when you imply technology has a critical part to play in the restoration of the Earth’s natural systems and habitats to their previous state, you are effectively saying that nature can’t do things well enough on its own. That is certainly true when bombarded with pollutants and greed-driven destruction; but remember that the pollutants and greed-driven destruction are the result of human (more accurately, Civilized Human) agency. Nature doesn’t need technology — commerce and growth needs technology.

It gets worse, though. You might not be able to read the small print at the bottom of the advert, so here it is, with the original emphasis shown:

“Trust your instincts. Bosch manufacture some of the most energy and water efficient appliances available. Where possible we use materials labelled for environmental recycling and because we believe product performance need not be compromised to embrace the planet we live on, they are designed to give you the best results every time. To discover more and a chance to win a trip to Florida including a live space shuttle launch and other Disney themed prizes, visit WALL.E at www.boschappliances.co.uk/wall.e”

Words fail me. I only have so much tolerance for bullsh*t.

First prize for the most infuriating and patronising e-mail of the year so far goes to American Express for this hideous gem:

Good Afternoon,

Adam
212-373-6106

Just a few points I’d like to pick AMEX up on here:

1) “My Readers” can do whatever they damn well like with their time, and have far better things to do than post ideas that will ultimately lead to AMEX looking really good.

2) The $2.5m “Members Project” is just one project for the year — that’s it. $2.5m is less than 0.01% of the annual revenue of this global corporate giant. Not exactly a generous piece of philanthropy, is it?

3) American Express is probably the largest travel company on Earth, selling flights to millions of people every year, warming the Earth up just that bit more.

4) With anything between 50 and 100 million card holders, Amex is responsible for a considerable proportion of the global credit market; credit is one of the key drivers of the global economy — if people do not have credit then they are far less likely to buy goods. It is the acquisition of consumer goods and services that ensures that the planet will continue to be degraded.

Actually, this is far too polite. Here was my response to Adam (who I don’t know from Adam, and had spammed me…):

Adam

Keith Farnish

To which he responded:

Keith,

Adam

To which I respond: if it wasn’t for the degradation of the global environment and the increasing drive for resource extraction, and the greed driven corruption (greed for the trappings of the industrial economy), all of which are hitting Africa incredibly hard, causing conflict, disease and famine; then those 3.5 million people — a lot more in fact — would not need your piddling bit of help.

In fact, why do we need Amex to fund clean water, when that $2.5m could come from the defense budgets of the world’s industrial nations: about the cost of a couple of ground-to-air missiles, if I’m not much mistaken?

No Amex, you’re not fooling anyone with your philanthropy promotions…