Excellent point Julie, and a thought provoking article!
It seems that many people are looking for the one “perfect” solution to the worlds problems, as if they consciously or subconsciously believe this can actually happen overnight.

Using Kolbert as an example…Yes, perhaps he wasn’t 100% environmentally sustainable during his experiment, and perhaps his intentions weren’t entirely sincere (I don’t know! I don’t know the guy). But the fact is, he made the conscious effort to be informed, and to take ACTION. What he has done takes a level of commitment that few people have.
He took action to lessen his own environmental impact, and to simultaneously raise further awareness and inspiration on this subject (even if some may claim it was a “stunt”). That effort alone, in my opinion, is very worthy of respect.
If we all sat back and played the devil’s advocate, and tried to unravel every inconsistency in another person’s efforts, we will ultimately change very little.
Like you’ve said, if many of us just did something small to lessen our own individual impact on the world, the effect as a whole would be much greater.
It’s not like we all have to suddenly stop using electricity, bathe in the river, and compost our own organic waste to be considered environmentally aware. Small things like re-using plastic bags, and turning off lights when you’re not in a room may seem too minuscule to solve immediate problems, but if lots of people are doing the same samll things, the actual change would be HUGE. I think that’s exactly how we can initiate proper change; one little action at a time.

And, yes, I agree it IS one of our biggest obstacles to creating change.

No doubt Beavan’s affected by htt-ism himself, and like I said, dragging someone along on your own experiment–be it a year of low environmental impact or a month of fasting–is problematic to me. Everyone needs to come to his or her own decisions about what kinds of actions they want to take to address certain problems. It’s not that I find Beavan unproblematic in any way. It’s the tone that Kolbert and numerous other writers have taken toward Beavan that I find problematic and unproductive. Rather than engaging a deeper issue through mature analysis, there’s this tendency toward cutting down and pooh-poohing that’s really off-putting. And I don’t think mentioning or questioning the New Yorker’s affiliation with certain advertisers qualifies as any kind of holier than thouism. I think it’s an honest, critical question. Just as I don’t think Beavan should be dismissed wholesale for his experiment (or praised uncritically), I don’t think we should read Kolbert uncritically (or dismiss her, either) when she publicizes her “efforts at change” in the New Yorker.

I think his impact on the people around him is part of it, too – people have less guilt about getting all holier-than-thou with someone who they view as being holier-than-thou themselves in the first place. (Ha. It’s a vicious h-t-t cycle.) I mean, hassling his wife about tampons? I might suck up a lecture from an enviro-feminist about the diva cup but I will NEVER tolerate the same lecture from a man.

I dunno. I guess I figure you could turn this argument right around on some of Matador’s own criticisms of Kolbert and the New Yorker. Does the big oil advertising in the New Yorker undermine the good done by her excellent expose on the Alberta tar sands? In a recent article, Tim said yes. But isn’t that perhaps the same phenomenon – of holier-than-thouism (in this case, seeing Kolbert as being flawed for writing for a mainstream mag) blocking efforts at change (namely, her truth-telling about the oil sands)?