• by Jack Feuer , November 14, 2007

Memo to NBC: green peacocks don't look environmentally responsible. They look sick.

OK, considering the network in question, that's probably as much a business commentary as it is a societal suck-up. But that's not the point. This whole green thing has taken on critical marketing mass. It is now officially total crap.

Social change is not a seat-of-the-pants kind of thing. But--aided and abetted by marketers--nobody is willing to get off their ass, away from the computer and out into the streets to save the planet--except some nut jobs living in trees.

What is this, the Sixties?

Nope, we don't even have to stand up to stare down climate change. All we have to do is fire up that old digital drive. I, for example, am now pestered by invitations to join "I'm Making a Difference" on Facebook. I am pounded by entreaties to buy stuff online by ads drenched in earth tones.

And, naturally, the dog that the Internet tail wags, a.k.a. television, looks like Emerald City. Throw a rock, hit an eco-ad. I don't know about you, but I totally accept that Chevron and BP care like you wouldn't believe about skies that don't rain blood and rivers that don't melt your face. And naturally, I'm moved to buy a Subaru because it has, like, deer on their factory grounds or something.

See, we can have a healthy, clean world. And you don't even have to get up.

Sacrifice? Us? Hell, no. What is this, World War II?

Only someone born after 1964 would fall for this.

Memo to my fellow but younger Americans: Writing a blog is not the same as taking a bullet for what you believe. Or a beating from a baton-wielding bacon on motor scooters. This is why Boomers are better than you. Sneer all you want. We're the Me Generation, we don't care what you think. But we are willing to lay it on the line for what we believe. We put skin in the game of social change.

And you just know where all this is going: Coasters from beer makers touting the green vats in which they brew a beverage that eats your liver. Green experiential marketing from car companies in which consumers race to a lake in hot V8s to save a fish. And contests from BBDO clients in which the best amateur green ad wins some lucky dope an 800-inch TV and a trip to the Super Bowl, which as we all know is the most energy-efficient event on earth.

Bah.

You know what? Let San Francisco slide into the sea. I'm greened out.

Well, except for the Eco Gift Expo, a "unique shopping experience for the environmentally and socially conscious consumer," coming to the Santa Monica Civic Auditorium in December. Maybe I can get a good deal on a Subaru.