# Are environmentalists cowards on immigration? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [June 11, 2011, 6:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-environmentalists-cowards-on-immigration/585086 "2011-06-11T06:04:25Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 11
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 8:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-environmentalists-cowards-on-immigration/585086/201 "2011-06-15T20:14:00Z")
> [@magellan01](#): > > Not really. Immigrants become Americans, for good and for ill. So you are disputing the cites that say that high immigrant cities have a substantially smaller footprint than low immigrant cities? ---
**Author:** ![magellan01](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@magellan01](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/magellan01)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 8:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-environmentalists-cowards-on-immigration/585086/202 "2011-06-15T20:35:14Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > So you are disputing the cites that say that high immigrant cities have a substantially smaller footprint than low immigrant cities? No. Just that immigrants do not behave like immigrants forever. They take advantage of what their new society offers. Again, for good and for ill. ---
**Author:** ![DMC](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dmc/32/18049_2.png) [@DMC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DMC)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2011, 11:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-environmentalists-cowards-on-immigration/585086/203 "2011-06-15T23:29:44Z")
> [@Chen019](#): > > No they aren’t. Please read the thread before commenting. > > [http://clinton2.nara.gov/PCSD/Publications/TF\_Reports/amer-top.html](http://clinton2.nara.gov/PCSD/Publications/TF_Reports/amer-top.html) > > [| Yale and the World](http://yaleglobal.yale.edu/content/us-immigration-policy-likely-boost-population) > > Also, saying **Tanton!** **Nativist!** repeatedly is not an argument. Actually, it is. I could also say “Tanton! Hates brown people!” and that would be a good enough argument as well, since chasing down every silly excuse he has for keeping out the brownies is a waste of time. By the way, you can’t seem to help yourself, as your second link is also related to Tanton, who hates brown people, in case you missed that. Environment, my ass. ---
**Author:** ![Chen019](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f19dbf/32.png) [@Chen019](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chen019)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2011, 12:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-environmentalists-cowards-on-immigration/585086/204 "2011-06-16T00:05:25Z")
> [@DMC](#): > > Actually, it is. I could also say “Tanton! Hates brown people!” and that would be a good enough argument as well, since chasing down every silly excuse he has for keeping out the brownies is a waste of time. By the way, you can’t seem to help yourself, as your second link is also related to Tanton, who hates brown people, in case you missed that. Environment, my ass. No, it would not be a good enough or sufficient argument. As I explained above, you need to actually address the substance of the argument. It seems you are incapable of doing so, hence the attempts to dismiss it on other grounds. ---
**Author:** ![Chen019](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f19dbf/32.png) [@Chen019](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chen019)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2011, 12:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-environmentalists-cowards-on-immigration/585086/205 "2011-06-16T00:16:36Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > So you are disputing the cites that say that high immigrant cities have a substantially smaller footprint than low immigrant cities? Doesn’t avoid the fact that more people tends to result in greater pollution & greater demand on resources. Also, you seem to assume that immigrants will remain poor - is that right? > [@](#): > > The Los Angeles metro area–known for its thick smog–ranks this year as the most ozone-polluted. Pollutants produced by car exhaust and smokestacks form the raw ingredients for the production of ozone. > > Nearby Bakersfield, Calif., ranked as the city with the most year-round particle pollution and had ozone levels second only to Los Angeles. > **[America's Most Polluted Cities](https://www.forbes.com/2009/04/28/pollution-ozone-air-lifestyle-health-ozone-pollution.html)** > > The counties and metro areas with the nation's poorest air quality. ---
**Author:** ![DMC](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dmc/32/18049_2.png) [@DMC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DMC)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2011, 12:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-environmentalists-cowards-on-immigration/585086/206 "2011-06-16T00:53:49Z")
> [@Chen019](#): > > No, it would not be a good enough or sufficient argument. As I explained above, you need to actually address the substance of the argument. It seems you are incapable of doing so, hence the attempts to dismiss it on other grounds. Yes, it is a sufficient argument. I feel no more need to debate the “substance” of his arguments than I’d do so when discussing the accomplishments of black people with David Duke. That you find Tanton and friends worthy of citing, defending, or even paying attention to is all of the information needed to end this debate. So, treating this like the poll it probably should have been… **No, environmentalists are not cowards on immigration, they’re just not all racists like Tanton.** ---
**Author:** ![Chen019](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f19dbf/32.png) [@Chen019](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chen019)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2011, 1:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-environmentalists-cowards-on-immigration/585086/207 "2011-06-16T01:14:14Z")
> [@DMC](#): > > Yes, it is a sufficient argument. I feel no more need to debate the “substance” of his arguments than I’d do so when discussing the accomplishments of black people with David Duke. That you find Tanton and friends worthy of citing, defending, or even paying attention to is all of the information needed to end this debate. So, treating this like the poll it probably should have been… > > **No, environmentalists are not cowards on immigration, they’re just not all racists like Tanton.** You have it around the wrong way - environmentalists cannot address immigration because you fear being associated with **Tanton!** **Nativists!**. Your posts have made this very clear. You can’t logically explain why the issue raised by the Clinton advisory council (yes, they’re all probably Tanton clones) about population stabilization in the US is irrelevant. Unless you have an ideological reason to ignore it. To highlight the illogical nature of your position let’s just consider water. This is consistently raised as an issue for various parts of the US. And population growth is an obvious aggravating feature. > [@](#): > > “At the root of the water supply problem in the Southeast is a growing population,” they wrote. . [http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/02/science/earth/02drought.html](http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/02/science/earth/02drought.html) Now, again the US population is predicted to increase quite substantially: > [@](#): > > If current trends continue, the population of the United States will rise to 438 million in 2050, from 296 million in 2005, and 82% of the increase will be due to immigrants arriving from 2005 to 2050 and their U.S.-born descendants, according to new projections developed by the Pew Research Center. > > Of the 117 million people added to the population during this period due to the effect of new immigration, 67 million will be the immigrants themselves and 50 million will be their U.S.-born children or grandchildren. [http://pewhispanic.org/reports/report.php?ReportID=85](http://pewhispanic.org/reports/report.php?ReportID=85) Now, you don’t have to be **Tanton!** or a **Nativist!** , or even an environmentalist to notice this might be a problem. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2011, 2:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-environmentalists-cowards-on-immigration/585086/208 "2011-06-16T02:34:50Z")
> [@DMC](#): > > Yes, it is a sufficient argument. I feel no more need to debate the “substance” of his arguments than I’d do so when discussing the accomplishments of black people with David Duke. That you find Tanton and friends worthy of citing, defending, or even paying attention to is all of the information needed to end this debate. So, treating this like the poll it probably should have been… > > **No, environmentalists are not cowards on immigration, they’re just not all racists like Tanton.** Yep, What is really a bigger Charade is that there are already examples of Chen019 dismissing and not dealing with the points just because he does not like the cites, so there is already evidence that he is demanding others to do has he is not, to be just happy to pretend that this discussion has not taken place elsewhere, forgetting that his nativists lost, **to pretend that magically environmentalists that do worry about population magically are not also dealing with the population of the immigrants**. And more damming, the nativist organizations have already demonstrated that were it counts, they are a complete and abject failure as environmentalists for not even moving a finger to pressure the current lawmakers that would make a difference regarding CO2 emissions. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2011, 2:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-environmentalists-cowards-on-immigration/585086/209 "2011-06-16T02:44:56Z")
> [@Chen019](#): > > Now, again the US population is predicted to increase quite substantially: > > [http://pewhispanic.org/reports/report.php?ReportID=85](http://pewhispanic.org/reports/report.php?ReportID=85) > > Now, you don’t have to be **Tanton!** or a **Nativist!** , or even an environmentalist to notice this might be a problem. Yes, you do, actually, because there are no precedents to suggest it might be. You’re talking about massive population growth in an already fully-industrialized Information-Age country. That has never happened before. There **are** instances of periods of substantial population growth, by immigration and native multiplication combined, in an already machine-industrialized, or industrializing, country – this one comes to mind. And in hindsight the growth, regardless of sources, was always a **good** thing. Any social problems it brought were ephemeral, the benefits endure to this day. America is very, very far from being full up – look around you – and what is there about the Information Age that would make it different in that regard? ---
**Author:** ![Chen019](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f19dbf/32.png) [@Chen019](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chen019)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2011, 2:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-environmentalists-cowards-on-immigration/585086/210 "2011-06-16T02:57:43Z")
> [@BrainGlutton](#): > > Yes, you do, actually, because there are no precedents to suggest it might be. You’re talking about massive population growth in an already fully-industrialized Information-Age country. That has never happened before. > > There **are** instances of periods of substantial population growth, by immigration and native multiplication combined, in an already machine-industrialized, or industrializing, country – this one comes to mind. And in hindsight the growth, regardless of sources, was always a **good** thing. Any social problems it brought were ephemeral, the benefits endure to this day. > > America is very, very far from being full up – look around you – and what is there about the Information Age that would make it different in that regard? So the water issue is irrelevant? btw. why do you want it full up? Are spaces left for nature & wildlife without people not an environmental concern? @ GIGO Buster, this thread is about environmentalists. Can you address the water issue, perhaps? ---
**Author:** ![Chen019](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f19dbf/32.png) [@Chen019](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chen019)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2011, 3:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-environmentalists-cowards-on-immigration/585086/211 "2011-06-16T03:03:40Z")
edit “environmentalists who are silent on immigration”. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2011, 3:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-environmentalists-cowards-on-immigration/585086/212 "2011-06-16T03:05:59Z")
Yep, it must be magic. ---
**Author:** ![Chen019](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f19dbf/32.png) [@Chen019](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chen019)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2011, 3:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-environmentalists-cowards-on-immigration/585086/213 "2011-06-16T03:06:56Z")
> [@GIGObuster](#): > > Yep, it must be magic. In terms of the US water supply, care to elaborate? ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2011, 3:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-environmentalists-cowards-on-immigration/585086/214 "2011-06-16T03:20:22Z")
> [@Chen019](#): > > In terms of the US water supply, care to elaborate? Would your heroes do something about it? Once again you are pretending that magically environmentalists are not taking into account the whole population (including immigrants) when looking at the future water needs. ---
**Author:** ![Chen019](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f19dbf/32.png) [@Chen019](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chen019)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2011, 3:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-environmentalists-cowards-on-immigration/585086/215 "2011-06-16T03:38:44Z")
> [@GIGObuster](#): > > Would your heroes do something about it? > > Once again you are pretending that magically environmentalists are not taking into account the whole population (including immigrants) when looking at the future water needs. Great 🙂 In that case, you’ll presumably agree that stablizing the US population makes sense? As I noted above: > [@](#): > > “At the root of the water supply problem in the Southeast is a growing population,” they wrote. . [http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/02/science/earth/02drought.html](http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/02/science/earth/02drought.html) Consider some of the cities that are running out of water - perhaps continually adding to the population isn’t a great idea? [http://finance.yahoo.com/real-estate/article/111186/the-ten-biggest-american-cities-that-are-running-out-of-water#mwpphu-container](http://finance.yahoo.com/real-estate/article/111186/the-ten-biggest-american-cities-that-are-running-out-of-water#mwpphu-container) ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2011, 4:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-environmentalists-cowards-on-immigration/585086/216 "2011-06-16T04:00:26Z")
> [@Kobal2](#): > > I would also add that it’s not “guilt by association” when it’s\* the same guy saying the same things\* under different sock puppets. If, (as it seems, although perhaps you intended a different meaning), you are accusing a poster on this board of sock puppetry, then do it via the Report post function, not by way of a vague reference in an active thread. [/Moderating] ---
**Author:** ![Chen019](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f19dbf/32.png) [@Chen019](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chen019)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2011, 4:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-environmentalists-cowards-on-immigration/585086/217 "2011-06-16T04:10:58Z")
> [@tomndebb](#): > > If, (as it seems, although perhaps you intended a different meaning), you are accusing a poster on this board of sock puppetry, then do it via the Report post function, not by way of a vague reference in an active thread. > > [/Moderating] I think **Kobal2** was referring to **Tanton!** having various groups that are essentially sock puppets for his views. Of course all this talk of [water shortages](http://finance.yahoo.com/real-estate/article/111186/the-ten-biggest-american-cities-that-are-running-out-of-water#mwpphu-container), increasing demand and [population growth](http://pewhispanic.org/reports/report.php?ReportID=85) is probably manufactured by the same evil people. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2011, 4:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-environmentalists-cowards-on-immigration/585086/218 "2011-06-16T04:24:36Z")
> [@Chen019](#): > > Great 🙂 In that case, you’ll presumably agree that stablizing the US population makes sense? As I noted above: > > [http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/02/science/earth/02drought.html](http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/02/science/earth/02drought.html) > > Consider some of the cities that are running out of water - perhaps continually adding to the population isn’t a great idea? > > [http://finance.yahoo.com/real-estate/article/111186/the-ten-biggest-american-cities-that-are-running-out-of-water#mwpphu-container](http://finance.yahoo.com/real-estate/article/111186/the-ten-biggest-american-cities-that-are-running-out-of-water#mwpphu-container) And that shows that you are then just debating ad nauseam. Give it up, your sorry attempts at making immigrants the boogeyman does not magically mean that the nativists then become environmentalists. Population control includes all people, and for the 100% time, it includes immigrants. [http://www.treehugger.com/files/2010/09/is-immigration-a-green-issue.php](http://www.treehugger.com/files/2010/09/is-immigration-a-green-issue.php) > [@](#): > > I must admit that I’ve always been confused by the “immigration control is green” argument I hear bandied about from time-to-time. Citing overpopulation, activists often claim that reducing the number of immigrants in the US will help keep carbon emissions down. Yet it doesn’t take a genius to note that migration from one country to another does not impact global population—which seemed to me to be the only level that matters as far as climate is concerned. > [@](#): > > The Center for New Community video does include an excerpt from an anti-immigration commercial that sheds a little more light on this stance. In it, the anti-immigration folks argue that we should keep immigrants from the developing world out because they pollute 4-times-less at “home” than they do in The States. On the face of it, this has at least a bit more logic to it—but it’s a logic that could be used to argue against economic development, Fair Trade or any number of other schemes. We could also use it to demand massive cuts in the general per-capita income, or a huge hike in taxes raises—because let’s face it, the more money you have, the more you pollute. > > The idea that we greens should focus our efforts on combating immigration seems misguided, to say the least. Over consumption, carbon emissions, fossil fuel addiction, industrialized agriculture, peak oil—these are all massive environmental problems that we must tackle right now. Restricting the movements of the poor and the landless will do little to help get us there. **However, helping to avoid a growth in climate refugees or using clean energy as a development tool just might.** ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2011, 5:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-environmentalists-cowards-on-immigration/585086/219 "2011-06-16T05:01:58Z")
> [@Chen019](#): > > So the water issue is irrelevant? btw. why do you want it full up? Are spaces left for nature & wildlife without people not an environmental concern? :dubious: It is irrelevant at the moment. We were talking – that is, you were talking – about immigration/population-growth-engendered problems one would **not** need to be an environmentalist (or Tanton!, etc.) to notice or foresee. Remember? ---
**Author:** ![Chen019](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f19dbf/32.png) [@Chen019](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chen019)\ **Post date:** [June 16, 2011, 5:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-environmentalists-cowards-on-immigration/585086/220 "2011-06-16T05:41:15Z")
> [@GIGObuster](#): > > And that shows that you are then just debating ad nauseam. > > Give it up, your sorry attempts at making immigrants the boogeyman does not magically mean that the nativists then become environmentalists. > > Population control includes all people, and for the 100% time, it includes immigrants. > > [http://www.treehugger.com/files/2010/09/is-immigration-a-green-issue.php](http://www.treehugger.com/files/2010/09/is-immigration-a-green-issue.php) Hahaha. So I provide an example of your illogical position and it turns out I am “debating ad nauseam.” I’ve shown you that [population growth is linked to water shortages](http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/02/science/earth/02drought.html) in the US. This is a problem in a number of [cities](http://finance.yahoo.com/real-estate/article/111186/the-ten-biggest-american-cities-that-are-running-out-of-water#mwpphu-container). So again, why wouldn’t a US environmentalist think it makes sense to reduce immigration which is the main cause of US [population growth](http://pewhispanic.org/reports/report.php?ReportID=85)? It seems only an ideological commitment to never restrict immigration can explain this. > [@](#): > > But the discussion is always about accommodating growth, never about slowing, limiting, or stabilizing it. Mention the idea of somehow trying to limit the population and politicians react as though you have suggested that our society eat cats and dogs instead of cows and pigs. Curb population growth? The very notion is unthinkable because—well, this is America… > > Ben Zuckerman, a Harvard-educated UCLA professor of physics and astronomy, serves on the board of directors for both CAPS and the Sierra Club. “I have thought quantitatively through my whole career in the sciences, and I just look at the numbers, the extrapolations of the current trends, and they’re just horrific both for the United States and for California,” he says. Zuckerman advocates immigration reductions, but in doing so he takes pains to make clear that he doesn’t speak for the Sierra Club, which officially abandoned that position in 1996. In the past decade, most other U.S. environmental groups have backed away from the issue as well—the “deafening silence,” Zuckerman calls it. It’s a paradoxical shift given that human population growth underlies virtually every environmental problem. Indeed. > **[Infinite Ingress](https://www.latimes.com/local/la-tm-growth04jan25-story.html)** > > A human wave is breaking over California, flooding freeways and schools, bloating housing costs, disrupting power and water supplies. Ignoring it hasn't worked. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-environmentalists-cowards-on-immigration/585086.md?page=10) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/are-environmentalists-cowards-on-immigration/585086.md?page=12)