Talk:Greenwashing

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This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 12 January 2022 and 6 April 2022. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Ahhenderson (article contribs). Peer reviewers: Yingzhuo Yang.

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This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 24 August 2020 and 16 October 2020. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Ql5225kr.

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Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment

This article is or was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Mikeiwata. Peer reviewers: Amaziarz, Tbartlett16, Mgattoni.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 22:45, 16 January 2022 (UTC)

Proposed merge with Greenscamming

It's not clear that there is enough coverage of greenscamming as a separate concept from greenwashing to justify a separate article. Of the cited sources, only #2 appears to even use the term greenscamming, and it doesn't give more than a single-sentence definition for it (as well as using it as a label for other groups). I wasn't able to find any more coverage online or in a Scholar search. As such, it would appear to not meet notability guidelines, but is definitely worth including in Greenwashing.

I realize that the article was started as a translation of the German article, but my prognosis there would be that it has the exact same issue (with the exact same sources) and should probably be merged as well on that project. _signed, Rosguill ^talk 04:46, 22 September 2019 (UTC)

Oppose. The term is used in nearly every of the referenced literature and therefore there is coverage in several scientific publications. That should qualify for a separate article. Andol (talk) 11:45, 22 September 2019 (UTC)

Question @Andol: could you explain how it has a different meaning? A merger doesn't abolish the ability to have greenscamming point to the merged article, it merely asserts that it's a non-independently-notable aspect (maybe subtopic or substantially overlapping, even if not synonymous) of the main. DMacks (talk) 14:36, 22 September 2019 (UTC)

Andol, could you provide clear quotes to back that up? I was not able to find "greenscamming" in most of the currently cited sources. Moreover, it's not enough to simply use a term, sources need to discuss its provenance, usage, etc. _signed, Rosguill ^talk 18:09, 22 September 2019 (UTC)

When it comes to scholarly articles according to a search using Google Scholar: the term "greenscamming" appears only 27 times:

see: https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C24&q=%22greenscamming%22&btnG=

the term "green scamming" comes up only 17 times:

see: https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0,24&q=%22green+scamming%22

In other words, the term "greenwashing" is clearly the most acceptable use with over 26,500 results:

see: https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C24&q=%22greenwashing%22&btnG=

At least in the English language. Cheers, CZmarlin (talk) 21:22, 22 September 2019 (UTC)

At the moment I don't have much time now to provide every sentence, so for now only in short: As far as I remember, the term greenscamming is used/explained in Beder, Washington/Cook, Ehrlich/Ehrlich and Harper (which back up the main part of the article), while the other sources describe the procedure without explicitly using the term. Lastly I am not sure about Schneider, because that sentence was added by another author. Andol (talk) 23:17, 24 September 2019 (UTC)

Here are some of the quotes I used. Washington/Cook, Beder, Harper, Ehrlich/Ehrlich, UIA, which are the main sources. Powell doesn't mention the word greenscamming, but clearly writes about it, emphazizing that many climate denial organziations have several things in common, "the most obvious may be their admirable names" and that "not a single one has a name that reveals its opposition to global warming". The he goes on and gives examples. Andol (talk) 22:03, 28 September 2019 (UTC)

Thanks for providing these sources. Having reviewed them, I'm on the fence. I think that there is enough coverage of greenscamming to narrowly meet notability guidelines independent of greenwashing. I think this puts us in a WP:PAGEDECIDE situation, as I think that readers looking for either greenwashing or greenscamming may benefit from having information about both at the same article, and I would thus still lean toward merging the articles. _signed, Rosguill ^talk 18:15, 29 September 2019 (UTC)

Oppose. If anything, greenscamming should be merged with greenwashing, not the other way around. Not all greenwashing is intentially scamming, it can also just be from ignorance and the term greenwashing is far more ubiquitous in scholarly and mass media. Oneultralamewhiteboy (talk) 06:43, 15 October 2019 (UTC)

Oneultralamewhiteboy, I don't think anyone here is advocating to merge Greenwashing into Greenscamming, the proposal is the opposite. _signed, Rosguill ^talk 17:05, 15 October 2019 (UTC)

Agree. The greenwashing entry may well include to the word greenscamming. Note that no stable concept of greenscamming exists in english research articles. The word greenscamming is mostly used as a synonym for greenwash, at other times it is suggested that greenscamming refers specifically to the use of "fake green" labels by non-green groups. In sum, greenscamming is not used very much. google ngram has not even registered the word. Greenscamming might be redirected to greenwashing. (And yes @ Andol, questioning EIKE, etc is very important in a context of alternative facts...) Ingmar.lippert (talk) 19:32, 3 January 2020 (UTC)

@CZmarlin, Andol, Oneultralamewhiteboy, Rosguill, Ingmar.lippert, and DMacks: have you all given up on this? Doug Weller talk 16:07, 19 February 2020 (UTC)

Doug Weller, I wasn't actively working on this. At this point I think the way to move forward, other than leaving it be, would be to call an RfC? _signed, Rosguill ^talk 17:09, 19 February 2020 (UTC)

I asked for a clarification of the distiction between the two terms, and the response does not to my mind support separate articles. I would instead support merge (...scamming into ...washing). DMacks (talk) 18:48, 19 February 2020 (UTC)

As noted previously, the coverage of ...scamming does not justify a separate article. As per DMacks, support merge of ...scamming into ...washing. Cheers, CZmarlin (talk) 00:15, 20 February 2020 (UTC)

Oppose Greenscamming feels more like a subtopic of the broader greenwashing topic.--Buzles (talk) 23:30, 21 April 2020 (UTC)

Buzles, that sounds like an argument in favor of the merge. If it's a strict subtopic there's no reason not to cover it in a section of the article. _signed, Rosguill ^talk 23:33, 21 April 2020 (UTC)

Rosguill WP:SPLIT allows it. If too much content exists on a subtopic, it deserves it's own page.--Buzles (talk) 00:11, 22 April 2020 (UTC)

Merge I am an academic and the concept of green-washing as well as pink-washing is established. Greenwashing is commonly used in Marketing, Media and Communication, and Sociology and it refers to a deceptive strategy of Corporate Social Responsibility Greenscamming is not a common term. I propose to merge the two pages (...scamming into ...washing) and redirect green scamming. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Ms4263nyu (talk • contribs) 04:55, 1 May 2020 (UTC)

Support merge, on the grounds that these are very closely related (or identical) concepts best discussed together. Note that we don't need a separate pages just because different terms are used for a similar concept by different authoers (As per WP:NOTDIC). The specific merge reason is overlap or duplication. On a procedural point, I considered RfC (as suggested above), but WP:RFCNOT suggests that that's not the way to go. Klbrain (talk) 09:10, 20 September 2020 (UTC)

  Y Merger complete. Klbrain (talk) 11:58, 20 November 2020 (UTC)

Removal from History section

I just removed the following vague, poorly-sourced passage from the "History" section:

In 2010 a study was done showing that 4.5% of products tested were found to be truly green as opposed to 2% in 2009. In 2009 2,739 products claimed to be green while in 2010 the number rose to 4,744. The same study in 2010 found that 95% percent of the consumer products claiming to be green were not green at all.[24]

The extremely vague phrasing of this passage makes it useless (what makes a product "truly green"? What types of products? Who performed this study?). The reference cited does not support the statements made, rendering them unverifiable as well. I think removal is therefore warranted. WeirdNAnnoyed (talk) 15:44, 10 August 2020 (UTC)

Removed some seemingly irrelevant text

In addition, the political term "linguistic detoxification" describes when, through legislation or other government action, the definitions of toxicity for certain substances are changed, or the name of the substance is changed, so that fewer things fall under a particular classification as toxic. The origin of this phrase has been attributed to environmental activist and author Barry Commoner.

not sure why this text is in the article or what the relevance is, so took it out for now.

--Genetics4good (talk) 13:06, 20 November 2020 (UTC)

References

Examples of greenwashing

Following need balancing out: "Clean Coal," an initiative adopted by several platforms for the 2008 U.S presidential elections is an example of political greenwashing. The policy cited carbon capture as a means of reducing carbon emissions by capturing and injecting carbon dioxide produced by coal power plants into layers of porous rock below the ground. According to Fred Pearce's Greenwash column in The Guardian, "clean coal" is the "ultimate climate change oxymoron"—"pure and utter greenwash" he says.

The issue here is that it gives the perception that carbon capture on coal fueled power stations is greenwashing. This simply isn't true, if all carbon that is otherwise emitted (by all coal-fired power station in the US) is effectively captured. The issue here I assume is that this hasn't been the case in the US Clean coal program. Also, I doubt all coal produced in the coal mines are actually being sent to these power stations (a large portion may also still be sent to consumers, and they probably don't have a (100% effective) carbon capture installation either).

--Genetics4good (talk) 13:44, 20 November 2020 (UTC)

Some Proposed Changes

Hello, I am employed by Boston University's Fineman & Pappas Law Libraries. After reviewing this Wikipedia page, I believe that information from one of our faculty's scholarship might provide a valuable addition to this page. I would appreciate it if this requested edit could be reviewed.

Add missing citation to this sentence in the article (second paragraph of the article): "Many corporate structures use greenwashing as a way to repair public perception of their brand."

Cf2022 (talk) 18:45, 24 January 2021 (UTC)Cf2022

 Done RandomCanadian (talk / contribs) 02:00, 29 January 2021 (UTC)

References

"Examples of greenwashing" section tagged as NPOV

There was a POV tag in this section which referred to the article; I changed it to a section POV, which is presumably what was intended. No comment from me. However, guidelines discourage "drive-by" tagging and say that there should be a discussion. Go ahead ... Best wishes, Pol098 (talk) 20:48, 10 November 2021 (UTC)