ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH
Thursday, Jan. 10 2008

Eco-conversions of elites obscure the truth
By Colleen Carroll Campbell

Britney Spears' latest meltdown — involving a three-hour standoff with police
that ended in her forced hospitalization — has saddled the pop star with a
public image that even Dr. Phil can't seem to fix. But celebrity makeovers are
always possible. When Britney is ready for hers, she should go green.

It's the hot new trend in celebrity damage control: Stars fresh from rehab,
jail or an adulterous affair can use an eco-conversion to transform their
reputations almost overnight. All it takes is the purchase of a Toyota Prius
and some compact fluorescent bulbs coupled with a simple-living sermonette
uttered under the paparazzi lights.

Just ask reformed jailbird Paris Hilton, who enjoyed her first positive press
in years after broadcasting her intention to buy a hybrid car and turn off the
TV before leaving her mansion. "Little things," Hilton instructed reporters, ".
. . make a huge difference."

That planet-friendly platitude is the mantra of Hollywood's eco-warriors. From
Charlize Theron's chicken-fat-fueled eco-limo and Alicia Silverstone's organic
underwear to Sheryl Crow's one-square-per-potty-visit policy on toilet paper
and Cameron Diaz's proudly proclaimed habit of turning off the shower while
shaving, Tinseltown's environmental activists have a passion for incrementalism.

Of course, few stars apply this less-is-more logic to the rest of life.
Examples of Hollywood hypocrisy abound, from the private jets and fleets of
gas-guzzling cars owned by eco-scolds like Madonna to the $3,200
remote-controlled, seat-warming "eco-friendly" toilet that environmental
documentarian Leonardo DiCaprio recently bought and the 2007 study that found
environmental filmmaker Al Gore's Nashville-area mansion consuming more
electricity per month than the average American household consumes in a year.
To deflect criticism and assuage guilt, many celebrities now buy "carbon
offsets" — eco-indulgences that allow them to keep their sprawling mansions and
private planes while paying third parties to execute Earth-friendly penances in
their names.

It is an irony lost only on celebrities that America's most outspoken champions
of conservation are elites for whom extravagance is a way of life. Their
message of sacrifice and self-restraint loses its persuasiveness when delivered
by messengers unwilling to live by the limits they advocate for others.

That's unfortunate, because the environmental movement, for all its alarmist
and misanthropic excesses, represents an important cultural shift. In a society
convulsed by conspicuous consumption and the frenzied quest for
self-gratification, environmentalists insist that the indulgence of our
immediate desires is not the highest good. Nature has limits we must respect
and laws we must obey, they remind us, laws that exist whether we acknowledge
them or not. And our decision to respect or disregard those natural laws has
moral consequences, not only for us but also for those around us and those who
will come after us.

Just as celebrity activists rarely adopt the simplified lifestyle they preach,
many also neglect to extend these principles of restraint and reverence for
life beyond the realm of plants and animals: They apply restraint to their
showers but not to their spending habits or sex lives. They show reverence for
the lives of baby seals but not the lives of unborn baby humans. They moralize
about nature's laws but deny that human nature, too, is inscribed with
universal moral laws that exist independent of our opinions and desires.

Celebrities know that it's more fashionable to tout two-minute showers than to
defend moral absolutes, just as it's easier to buy carbon offsets than a
humbler home. Sadly, their attempts to score eco-redemption on the cheap
obscure the very aspect of today's conservation ethic that could make it a
vehicle for deeper cultural change: its insistence that we respect the laws
inscribed in nature, laws that remind us of those inscribed in the human heart.

Colleen Carroll Campbell is an author, television host and St. Louis-based
fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center. Her website is
www.colleen-campbell.com.