Are Green Magazines Really Green?

Is it just me or are you seeing a massive increase in Green issues Magazines?  And call me stupid, but what exactly is green about producing a magazine and distributing it in paper form across the country?  Even if it is recycled, which many of them are not, the distribution alone has to have a massive carbon footprint.

Now don’t get me wrong, I applaud the raising of green issues and the green debate.  I just feel there have to be better ways of doing it than circulating printed material.  Perhaps we should also have large neon signs around the place promoting saving or using green energy?  Or how about manufacturing “lets recycle” T Shirts from polymers produced from oil?  Or how about having large numbers of green conventions world wide that we can all fly to in order to show our support?

“Shouldn’t we all turn off our computers and stop running web sites about the green debate?”

I do laugh (and sometimes cry) when politicians fly around the globe to promote green issues, but in all seriousness, there is probably more valid argument for this than against it.  Whilst I for one do not like the emissions generated by David Cameron flying across the Atlantic on green issues, I have to hold my hand up and say the emissions from that single trip are currently outweighed by the awareness and global publicity that such an activity can produce.

Its a tough one if we are honest with ourselves.  Right now, our focus has to be raising awareness and getting mass “buy in” to green issues, climate change, and getting individual, corporate and governmental acceptance of responsibility for our carbon footprints.  Sadly, some of the methods are far from green, and viewed in isolation seem to be at odds with what we are promoting.  But if we were truly so purist shouldn’t we all turn off our computers and stop running web sites about the green debate?  And would that really help?

“Where the green debate is concerned, it is more about the shades of gray.”

So whilst I can feel guilty about the carbon cost of promoting my blog, the My Eco World web site, I also need to lighten up a bit and accept we are all living in a world that is not yet shades of green, but where the green debate is concerned, it is more about the shades of gray.

We need to focus on the positive aspects of the green debate rather than the negative.  So although I find green magazines at best ironic, I need to accept that this may be helping, and for all I know the editors could be planting trees at a rate that far outweighs and offsets their production (yes, it is unlikely, but who can be sure).

I would like to see a greater focus on how well we are doing, how much CO2 we reduce, how many people we convert to the quest, rather than get too hung up on the ironies of many methods.  None of us are completely pure, if you were then you wouldn’t be reading this online article.  So lets recognise the irony, improve it where we can, but focus on the positive results.

Magazines themselves are an accepted medium in our society.  Many people simply will not digest matter on-line, and are only converted through TV, radio or print.  We have to engage these people as well and not ostracise them purely because we think their carbon footprint is too high.

I’ll not cancel by Green Magazine subscriptions just yet, but I will recommend to them all that they convert to eZines sooner rather than later.