Greenpeace cofounder Patrick Moore fired back at the environmental group he spent years leading over attempts to rewrite the history of their founding.
“This is a case of historical revisionism,” Moore told The Daily Caller News Foundation in an interview.
Greenpeace renewed their years-long feud with Moore, tweeting in response to President Donald Trump’s touting of Moore’s comments on Fox News that the ecologist “was not a co-founder” of the group and called him a “paid lobbyist, not an independent source.”
However, Greenpeace’s website listed Moore among its “founders and first members” before quietly removing it around 2007.
Moore is only listed as a member of the group’s 1971 maiden voyage to oppose nuclear testing. Greenpeace’s revised history also claims that Phil Cotes founded the group in 1970 with Irving Stowe and Jim Bohlen.
Yet, there was never a Phil Cotes. Greenpeace is likely referring to Paul Cote, but he is not listed as a founder on the group’s website despite being mentioned (as Phil Cotes) in the group’s public statements.
Moore, who left Greenpeace in 1986, called the group “corrupt, decadent and lazy.” Indeed, Greenpeace has been rocked by scandals in recent years, including losing millions in donations speculating on international currency markets.
“I can think of all kinds of words that are worse to describe them,” Moore said. “These guys are floating around on a $32 million boat like a bunch of college kids. Then they always forget to mention it’s powered by a 1,800-horsepower diesel engine.”
Moore said Greenpeace achieved great things while he was there, including restricting whaling and atomic testing, but by the 1980s the group had become too radical. Moore also served as the president of Greenpeace Canada for many years.
“My decision was made in the 1980s. At the time I said very clearly, ‘I’m going to stick with science and logic, you can keep your fear-mongering,’” Moore said. “We did a good job and it’s a shame it got turned into a racket. They should retire.”
Now, Moore is an outspoken opponent of what he calls “fake science” that’s often used by activists to push an anti-energy, alarmist agenda.
Moore got into his most recent spat with Greenpeace after publicly criticizing the Green New Deal resolution, which Greenpeace supports.
Specifically, Moore called the resolution’s main champion, Democratic New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a “pompous little twit” for pushing anti-fossil fuel policies that would result in “mass death.”
Moore took part in the 1971 voyage aboard a shoddy fishing vessel to protest hydrogen bomb testing in the Aleutian islands. Greenpeace came about in the wake of that journey, which is widely considered the group’s birthday.
Moore said Greenpeace seemed to have no problem with him calling himself a cofounder until he came out in favor of nuclear energy.
The Nuclear Energy Institute launched the “Clean And Safe Energy Coalition” in 2006 with Moore and Christine Todd Whitman, who headed the Environmental Protection Agency under President George W. Bush.
“It was the only position in my 15 years at Greenpeace that I regretted. I made a mistake in conflating nuclear war with nuclear energy,” Moore said.
Read more at Daily Caller
Trackback from your site.
Robert Beatty
| #
Patrick Moore is not the first to receive this air brushing of history after providing the starting momentum to a good cause.
Sir Maurice Mawby http://adb.anu.edu.au/biography/mawby-sir-maurice-alan-edgar-11090 was one of the doyens of the Australian mining industry and was instrumental in the formation of the Australian Conservation Foundation:-
“Although an early member and councillor (1968-74) of the Australian Conservation Foundation, he decided that the conservation movement leaned towards people whose attitudes were ‘based on hearsay, intolerance and sheer emotionalism, with little regard to facts and citizenship responsibilities’. He withdrew from the foundation.”
You would not find this information at the ACF site. Here the mining foundation legacy is brushed from the record. Based on the quote it seems ACF’s radical approach started early in the life of the organisation. It is disappointing to see such good intentions being subverted by radicals at great cost to the community at large, and the small mindedness of those responsible for such air brushing action.
Reply
Judy
| #
There is also a photo of Patrick Moore with the other co founders of Green peace. I have seen it. I have also had the pleasure of meeting him when visited Canberra Australia several years ago. I share his opinion of how Greenpeace has deteriorated over time. I think we should ban overseas funding for Greenpeace as they did in India.
Reply
sunsettommy
| #
The evidence that he was there in 1970 and then listed as a founder in 1971 when they changed name to Greenpeace is overwhelming.
Greenpeace disappears a founder, much like ‘The Commissar Vanishes’ in Soviet Russia
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2014/01/25/greenpeace-disappears-a-founder-much-like-the-commissar-vanishes-in-soviet-russia/
Greenpeace is lying.
Reply