Talk:Criticism of Greenpeace

Is this the best we can do?

This page is really very weak. Greenpeace is considerably worse than this article makes out. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 207.237.230.38 (talk) 06:37, 17 September 2008 (UTC)

I think Greenpeace soon removes whole page. Quite much supporters of Greenpeace in Wikipedia users. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 85.77.232.97 (talk) 19:13, 5 October 2008 (UTC)

serious bias

Seriously, how can cite information from the Greenpeace website when that site is totally biased? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.234.168.147 (talk) 13:40, 23 May 2008 (UTC)

Stolen Tree Stock incident

I decided to add this back. Look discussion from here: [1]

As far as I know, Greenpeace did not claim that the tree trunk was from a protected area, but rather that the tree trunk was from an ancient forest that ought to be protected. And as old forests cover only a few percent of Finland, I think you can say that the forest was endangered. The issue that Greenpeace has in Finland is that old growth forests are treated just like any other forests and therefore continuously cut down. "Forestry area" is a technical term describing how the forest is going to be used. It is not a biological term to describe what the forest is like. So a forestry area in Finland can also be an endangered old growth forest. That's the issue, so I'm changing the wording. It is not entirely clear either did the activists know that the tree was blown down by a storm. They might have indeed thought that the tree was cut down.81.175.134.236 18:36, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

Sorry but it's sure Greenpeace knew that the tree was blown down by a storm. Their leader "M.I." was born in the North Carelia and knew very well that area. In his earlier job he was even recommending that area as "an example of good forestry habits" (that was year 1993, two years before - I can not yet give facts about that year but I try search papers). During May 1995 they tried to pick parts of tree with their SUV vehicle but didn't succeed. Farmer who came to help with tractor didn't know that they were from Greenpeace, most probably he believed they were from the Forest Administration or scientists from University.. Otherwise it would have been .. well, "not really friendly meeting" with local people and activists.

About the tree itself? Yes, it was old, around 200-300 years old. But notice following: It was left untouched by the owner of forest "during forestry process" because it was so old! They didn't touch it because according good forestry standards very old, different or just remarkable trees should be left living. But why it crashed during storm? It's very simple to see why many trees crash down near motor ways. There is no other trees supporting it and storm can push without obstacles. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 85.156.157.5 (talk) 20:19, 29 October 2007 (UTC)

Actually it isn't that old. The pine forests turnover time in lapland is 170 years. If the pine was 200 years old that would be only about 15% over the mean age, even at 300 years old itdoesn't make it especially old. So the reason why the tree was left probably isn't the age. What's more the good forestry standards don't state that old, different or remarkable tree's should be left, but dying or dead trees should be left. These are to be left for species that are dependant of rotting wood, mostly beetles, find food and shelter. There's no art comitee to decide for trees to be left for being 'remarkable'. So by removing the stump greenpeace removed a habitat for beetles.Talitintti (talk) 01:26, 27 December 2009 (UTC)

Ice covered lake which was said to be clear cut

I added case "Kahlschlag am nordfinnischen Peurakairasee" (Greenpeace Magazin 6/2005). Photo where was said to be clear cutting, but which in reality was a snowy bog and ice covered lake, which has never been a forest (at least not in last 10000 years) [2], [3]. Just more lies from this organization.

Or a human error.81.175.134.236 19:06, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

Maybe something to discuss

Soviet Union supported Greenpeace? More sources? And what was this Leif Blaedel case. I don't remember? Did it happen in 80's? [4], [5]

"Gudmundsson's film reexamines evidence produced in 1986 by award-winning Danish journalist Leif Blaedel, which shows that one propaganda film used by Greenpeace was faked by using paid animal torturers. Greenpeace has tried to silence Gudmundsson, with demands for injunctions and/or damages in the courts of Iceland, the U.K. and Norway. Gudmundsson has spent about $40,000 in legal fees so far" ... "Greenpeace then threatened lawsuits against Danish television, but decided instead to sue the two journalists most responsible for compiling the devastating information. One of these reporters is Leif Blaedel, a recipient of the prestigious Cavling Prize for Danish journalism" (those links say original sources are The New American, November 19, 1990 and Forbes, November 11, 1991, unfortunately can not check) 85.156.154.143 22:53, 17 March 2007 (UTC)

"But Gudmundsson's charges have not gone unchallenged. Greenpeace sued him in Norway in 1989 over his first film, Survival in the High North, which accuses Greenpeace of fabricating a sequence showing a sealer dragging a dead pup. In a mixed verdict, Gudmundsson was ordered to pay 30,000 Norwegian kroner (he didn't) and make changes to the film (he did). Greenpeace says it has also won retractions from Danish television, which produced Man of the Rainbow, another anti-Greenpeace documentary based on Gudmundsson's findings, and from The Irish Sunday Business Post, which published a Gudmundsson-based story in 1991." http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1594/is_n6_v6/ai_17847913

81.175.134.236 19:55, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

unsubstantiated claims on website

Greenpeace has alot of unsubstantiated claims on it's website, such as 'nuclear power plants regularly emit dangerour radiation into the environemnt around them,' and other such tripe and bullshit. They also have a video depicting a hypothetical situation where a hijacked aircraft is flown into a nuclear powerstation, with a final claim 'No one ever flew a plane into a wind turbine.' Curiously enough no one ever flew a plane into a nuclear powerstation either, not to mention it is nigh impossible to hijack an aircraft anymore anyway. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 124.187.85.140 (talk) 06:15, 9 May 2007 (UTC).

The United States at least has sort of no-fly zones around nuclear plants. Anymore, by the time you actually get into that airspace you will be shot down like there is no tomorrow no matter if you're piloting a commercial jet or what. -Theanphibian ^{(talk • contribs)} 01:08, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

I think the hijacked planes ran into the twin towers and the PENTAGON were airborn for a good three or so hours, weren't they? Didn't see much shooting down there. Sorry, couldn't resist the urge to point out the stupid. And as for the above drivel from 124.187.85.140 .. seriously, their claims had that many typos? And further, if someone wanted to, they could just charter a plane, no need to hijack one? 122.107.65.2 (talk) 19:53, 27 February 2008 (UTC)

"Sorry, couldn't resist the urge to point out the stupid." Me neither. No one ever flew a plane into a nuclear reactor. That's a fact. By the way, the policies of the army changed a lot too since 9/11. --Zslevi (talk) 17:28, 14 June 2008 (UTC)

Citations/references

It would be nice if the reference links were given titles. Currently, all I can see are references that look like "35: [25]", which is quite unhelpful. nneonneo 20:17, 17 July 2007 (UTC)

Indeed many of the claims do not offer any citations at all, or where they do the references do not support the claims. Often the citations are to controversialist magazines such as Spiked which themselves offer POV unsupported by evidence. I've made some attempt to tidy up the section on DDT - but the whole page needs an overhaul to remove unsupported POV and to make clear where the criticisms of Greenpeace originate from. --Dean Morrison (talk) 18:33, 1 March 2008 (UTC)

The chlorine paper bleaching insident

Cant find it in the web, but sometime in the 80's greenpeace dammed a ditch from a paperpulp factory in Finland protesting the use of chlorine in the bleaching of paper. What they actually did was endangered the testrun of ozone bleaching. Luckily their damn was lousy.
After they were told that the factory wasn't using chlorine, they tried to save face by claiming that their escapade had brought out the fact. From that they got more egg on it as the factory had given a press conference of it 2 weeks earlier.
The whole incident showed greenpeaces modus operandi
1. Find a easy target far from main body of income. Easy meaning a case that general public can act emtionally even if the case with proper look isn't real.
2. Get banners and a few protestors.
3. Invite press, usually more press than protestors.
4. Make demands
5. If shown wrong, blame others
What we won't see is big controversial protest close to their main income areas. Like, german autofactories, NY private cars, california airconditioning. It's always something far with few voices.

Wikipedia isn't a soapbox.  :) 122.107.65.2 (talk) 19:55, 27 February 2008 (UTC)

Arrested

"Some of its high ranking members have been arrested for offenses including vandalism and trespassing such as Mike Roselle[1], Paul Watson and John Sellers (activist).[2]"

I don't see the sources saying that they have been arrested for vandalism when working for Greenpeace. They have all worked also on protests and organizations other than Greenpeace and the sources don't specify what they have been arrested for when working for Greenpeace. So I don't think you can put that kind of a criticism of a individual person under this article.84.250.50.59 17:39, 9 August 2007 (UTC)

I agree. Nor is there any source provided for the fact that these offenses were committed by 'high ranking members'. As far as I know Greenpeace is not a membership organisation. Paul Watson was an employee and director in the 1970's, but there are no sources provided for him being involved in any offense on behalf of Greenpeace or otherwise. I've therefore removed the passage.Patagorda (talk) 16:13, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

Merge

It seems to me like the material on this page should be merged into the main Greenpeace page. It is inherently POV to have a separate article. If combined, these issues would hopefully get fair treatment from both sides, and would be more visible. Are the pages kept separate because of fear that a merge could not be done civilly? Other thoughts? AAMiller 07:44, 17 August 2007 (UTC)

I agree with the proposed merger. You're right, the Greenpeace article itself if POV in one direction, but the concept of this article is POV in the other (though it seems well sourced). Were these really long enough to be separated? I don't think that's the case. -Theanphibian ^{(talk • contribs)} 18:00, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

I agree that they should be merged. My assumption is that there would be bitter disagreement concerning how much weight is given to such a criticism section. The main page holds no awards, so having a new section that would be disputed and changed frequently at the beginning, isn't a problem. On the Greenpeace discussion page, the sections on criticism don't address this, so I've started a new section to discuss a possible merger. Paul haynes 11:28, 28 August 2007 (UTC)

I too agree with merging, however this article will have to be radically shortened. If someone can weed out POV or inaccurate info and contain the same information in a shorter format, I would support merging. --Fearfulsymmetry 20:20, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

Dude, I went through and touched up the references so that the bad information could be identified as you're talking about. Once that can be accomplished, I don't think there's any length requirement, because I'm almost positive most high profile articles have super long criticism sections. And look through the history before deleting something and making demands. -Theanphibian ^{(talk • contribs)} 00:08, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

Everyone here seems to be under the illusion that the article must either be merged or kept separate. The obvious solution for anyone who understands the structure and organization of Wikipedia articles is to Summarize it there and leave this article as it is. Merging it would either leave Greenpeace containing more criticism than anything else, or throwing away notable information that people have obviously worked on.

And please, keep the discussion in one place. Everything should be taken to talk:Greenpeace from now on. Thanks. Richard001 09:55, 18 September 2007 (UTC)

I "anonymous" also would like to see this merged. Thanks! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 85.156.157.5 (talk) 20:22, 29 October 2007 (UTC)

DDT

Careful when it comes to the DDT discussion. Trace your sources and make sure they don't tie back to professional industry shills such as Steven J. Milloy, who has done hatchet-job pseudo-science work for the tobaco industry, asbestos producers (on the latter, he parrots the false claim that asbestos would have saved the WTC towers), chemical companies, etc, and as an attack-dog against the concensus on AGCC ("global warming"). It's stunning how much of the attack-dog stuff traces back to an interconnected handful of paid shills.

69.95.70.128 21:17, 24 September 2007 (UTC)

The DDT information was either POV, wildly innaccurate, or the unsourced repetition of claims made lobby groups.

I've removed it Dean Morrison 21:07, 5 October 2007 (UTC)

You are forgetting to include Elders of Zion, Freemasons and the trilateral commission in your reasons for deleting the DDT article. Try refuting individual sources. I will be including artiles published by African and UN affliated sources as well. But I Guess the asbesdos industry could get their slimy tentacles over there too.

If you are a conspiracy bent kind of bloke why not talk about the "Big Pharmaceuticals" that get over $300 million to treat an easily preventable disease.—Preceding unsigned comment added by Mricbm (talk • contribs) 23:20, 25 October 2007 (UTC)

Malaria is an natural control to prevent overpopulation, i dont see why it should pe prevented —Preceding unsigned comment added by 90.14.9.167 (talk) 10:36, 15 February 2008 (UTC)

I've tidied up the DDT section to remove POV and unsubstantiated claims. I've also made it clearer where the criticisms of Greenpeace come from - namely Libertarian political critics and controversialist magazine Spiked. I feel this page is itself being used to mount an attack on Greenpeace, rather than giving a balanced summary of the criticisms of the organisation, and the sources of these. --Dean Morrison (talk) 18:37, 1 March 2008 (UTC)

I edited the DDT criticism. Not all of the sources actually were critical towards Greenpeace specifically, but just generally towards the total ban of DDT, which is irrelevant as Greenpeace does accept the use of DDT in certain cases and therefore does not demand a total ban of DDT currently. There was also a lot of general text about DDT without sourced explanations on how it relates to GreenpeaceShubi (talk) 10:35, 30 December 2009 (UTC)

Relevance of Wind Power criticisms to article?

The discussion of some of the problems of wind power under the 'renewable energy' heading of the main article is clearly argued and well-sourced, but it doesn't seem to have much to do with Greenpeace. It would seem to be better located in an article on wind power. The claim is made that Greenpeace 'failed to report' the findings of a Scottish government inquiry into wind power, but without further context, I can't see why GP should be faulted for this particular omission. 68.183.237.174 (talk) 01:31, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

I totally agree that this detailed Renewable energy discussion is not relevant to this article, and in any case it is highly POV, and much of the material quoted is from 2002 and 2004, which also makes it out of date. The Energy security and renewable technology article draws on more recent sources and shows that renewable energy can actually enhance energy security. In 2007, the prestigious International Energy Agency had this to say:

The deployment of renewable technologies usually increases the diversity of electricity sources and, through local generation, contributes to the flexibility of the system and its resistance to central shocks. The IEA suggests that attention in this area has focused disproportionately on the issue of the variability of renewable electricity production. However, this only applies to certain renewable technologies, mainly wind power and solar photovoltaics, and its significance depends on a range of factors which include the penetration of the renewables concerned, the balance of plant on the system, the wider connectivity of the system, and the demand side flexibility. Variability will rarely be a barrier to increased renewable energy deployment. But at high levels of penetration it requires careful analysis and management, and any additional costs that may be required for back-up or system modification must be taken into account.[6]

So I'm removing the following offending text from the article: Johnfos (talk) 07:40, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

---

Renewable power (removed from article)

Greenpeace also fails to point out that the renewable options they champion, like solar, wave, wind and tidal, are all intermittent power sources, and that intermittancy presents some major challenges. Greenpeace also failed to report the recent findings of the Scottish Parliament's 'Renewable Energy in Scotland' inquiry of February 2004. 'Renewable Energy in Scotland' was a major and comprehensive inquiry into the future of renewable energy in Scotland, which made some important recommendations. Its summary stated:

When a wind power station is connected to the grid a similar conventional capacity must be maintained as spinning reserve to cover the uncontrolled intermittency. The presence of an increasing number of distributed intermittent and unreliable micro-generators to replace more secure forms of generation leads to grid instability.

Wind energy will always be a secondary, intermittent, unreliable energy source and can never satisfy a base load demand. (Wind energy) is a profligate waste of our most precious resource - wild land.

The experience of Denmark, which has one of the greatest percentages of wind power utilisation in the world, is that the intermittency of wind power is a major problem in practice, as well as theory. The ICE report on Danish wind-systems stated that wind power was so variable that Denmark exported most of its wind power, rather than use it itself. In addition, in 2002 the entire system had a total of 54 days without usable power generation. The report concluded that it would be very difficult for countries like Britain to use a large percentage of wind power.

There were 54 days in 2002, for example, when wind supplied less than 1% of demand.

The variations, which are inherent in any wind energy system, can be readily accommodated in west Denmark because there are very strong electrical connections to the much larger grid systems of Norway, Sweden and Germany that can absorb these variations, particularly due to their reliance on rapid-reacting hydropower. Countries such as the UK, which operate an ‘island’ grid, will find it difficult to do this with slower-reacting thermal power stations and may thus have to limit their reliance on wind power.[7]

A similar report by the Renewable Energy Foundation confirms the problems experienced in Denmark and goes on to indicate that the UK may actually experience a rise in CO2 emissions through using wind power:

The key lesson learnt by the Danish and German utilities is that wind does not generate as much power as anticipated (typically an 18-20% annual load factor – not the 30% assumed for UK onshore wind turbines) and production does not match the daily and seasonal fluctuations of demand. Both countries have experienced consistently low annual load factors that have led various commentators to articulate concern about the cost and the level of subsidy needed to approach the targets set for renewable energy by the European Union.

Denmark achieves little or no direct reduction of emissions, because its CO2-free wind power is working alongside CO2-free hydro-power ... operating fossil capacity in (standby) mode generates more CO2 per kWh generated than if operating normally. [8]

---

Wind Power Criticisms IS Relevant to article

The Wind Power criticism is entirely relevant to this article. Greenpeace has made an entire career out of promoting renewable energy in general and wind power in particular, and they have delivered many articles and features that make it appear as if wind power is a complete panacea. The fact that Greenpeace never points out any of the pitfalls and problems with large-scale wind power generation is a major failing of this organisation, especially as their pressure has now led to large government investment in this field. Therefore, this is a genuine criticism of Greenpeace that deserves to be in this section.

http://www.greenpeace.org.uk/climate/solutions/renewable-energyhttp://www.greenpeace.org.uk/climate/solutions/renewable-energy

The date of these reports is not a valid criticism either. It takes a few years to get a balanced picture of what problems these large capital investments in wind power actually produce, and these are the latest reports that are available. Besides, that newer IEA report must be one of the most biased reports ever. It optimistically comments that:

The annual power output of a given turbine varies greatly with location and capacity factors of over 45% are rare

without reporting that average utilisation is 25% in the UK and 15% in Germany. It then says:

Western Denmark already successfully integrates a 20% share of wind energy into the electricity system, but this ability relies on good inter-connection to the German and Nordic grids for back-up and export.

when this is an contradiction in terms. Denmark does not integrate its 20% share of wind power precisely because of the inter-connector, which Denmark uses to export all of its wind power to Norway and Sweden. Balancing wind power with non hydro- electrical generation is near impossible. This report also says:

Three year data (2000-2002) in Denmark identified that the longest duration of calm weather with wind generation below 1% of capacity was 58 hours in 2002 and 35 hours in 2000.

without mentioning that in 2002 Denmark had 54 whole days below 1% of wind power and it conveniently forgets that in 2003 it experienced a whole week below 1% generation. So why did the much later IEA report forget the 2003 outage eh? (in fact, in 2003 Denmark had about 14 weeks below 10% generation, which is also a problem).

The bottom line here is that the earlier 2005 ICE report is a lot more factual and honest than the 2007 IEA report, which is why the latter should be ignored.

The criticism of Greenpeace stands. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Narwhal-tooth (talk • contribs) 03:11, 26 December 2007 (UTC)

I wish I could give a better critique of what's going on here, but the net amount of information has just gotten overwhelming for me. Those are very interesting numbers about days below 1% generation. However, the renewable energy section needs to have external sources that specifically criticize Greenpeace on it's position in order for it to not be WP:OR. I don't think this is impossible, but it doesn't look like that's the current state. It looks like the current references deal with the feasibility of wind power, which just isn't a topic to be covered in this article. -Theanphibian ^{(talk • contribs)} 06:18, 26 December 2007 (UTC)

Chernobyl Abortion Scare?

The section about the alleged abortion scare by Greenpeace around Chernobyl, accusing it of complicity in genocide, contained no reference whatsoever. I've removed it. Patagorda (talk) 16:20, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

Pruning

I did very small amounts of editing, I removed a lot of redlinks that would never be made and deleted the end section as it had no real relevance and didn't really make any kind of point. Mattyness (talk) 22:31, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

We're not here to make points, Wikipedia is a place for hard facts, period. The Questionable actions stuff should be the absolute last to go in this article. The notability of the press release thing is established by reliable sources, the relevance is to Greenpeace. -Theanphibian ^{(talk • contribs)} 23:27, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

Anti-Whaling Campaign

It won't be hard to track down citations for this, but as I'm biased and consider myself pro-Greenpeace given that I am a member of the organisation, I do not feel it my place to add the following. Issues have been raised, as far as criticism within the wider media of the world, that Greenpeace are becoming grand-standers when it comes to the whaling issue. Their refusal to provide Sea Shepherd with the coordinates of the Japanese whalers and instead letting an environmental group flounder around for days ineffectively drew a lot of criticism within and without of Greenpeace. In the end, someone onboard the Greenpeace ship broke rank and slipped Sea Shepherd the coordinates. Sea Shepherd were distracted from the pursuit because the Japanese captured and held two hostages who were attempting to deliver written correspondence when the whalers refused to respond via radio, the Japanese held these people and eventually turned them over to Australian Customs on the ground that AC only hand them over well over the horizon so Sea Shepherd effectively will fall out of the pursuit, which occured.

Instead of providing details to Sea Shepherd, and with tensions riding high on the Greenpeace vessel, they turned back to port to refuel. Their refusal to provide the coordinates of the whalers led to Sea Shepherd wasting a week to try and find them again, and cost our ecosystem many whales lives as the Japanese felt free to resume harpooning their catch. Proof perhaps that idealistic biggotry rather than unification and cooperation has cost our environment more yet again.

Further criticism has been raised with the fact that Greenpeace have an estimated $100m budget for their Southern Ocean Whale Sanctuary endeavours, they arrived in the SOWS a month after Sea Shepherd, and left a week before Sea Shepherd, running only one vessel whereas Sea Shepherd had two ships, a helicopter, and various other smaller craft operating on an estimated $1m budget. After refuelling, Greenpeace actions seemed to fall of the radar, a week later Sea Shepherd had to return to refuell and immediately resumed their return to SOWS, still on their microbudget while Greenpeace were too busy hanging signs and waving in protest at Heathrow Airport.

The priorities illustrated show that whilst Greenpeace have done wonders for drawing media attention to the plight of the whales in the sanctuary, their inaction has for the most part cost more whales lives. This year they gave themselves a big pat on the back when the whalers turned and ran on seeing their ship, something that has never happened before. They neglected to aknowledge what the Australian, New Zealand and English media (and possibly many more) picked up on; the whalers knew if Greenpeace found them, Sea Shepherd were close behind. Waving banners and shouting through loud speakers has never made a whaling fleet run, but every year Sea Shepherd have.

Make of it what you will, but I think this material is integral to addition to the criticism sections, especially as it has high proximity and notability to the matter, including on the Greenpeace page proper. As I stated above, as a member of Greenpeace (and no, I'm not a member of Sea Shepherd, although if Greenpeaces' attitude doesn't change I think my time and funding would be better spent elsewhere) I believe I have less ability to retain NPOV. 122.107.65.2 (talk) 19:49, 27 February 2008 (UTC)

I have syndicated the above also to the main Greenpeace article and requested they direct comments to this version. 122.107.65.2 (talk) 19:56, 27 February 2008 (UTC)

You're sadly misinformed, if you check the facts, the global Greenpeace income is around USD150 million from all offices. I doubt after running three ships around the world conducting global campaigns on forests and the climate that they would have much left after that. Try around $4-5 million and you might be closer to the mark. Are you sure you're not a sock puppet for the Sea Shepards? 80.57.219.94 (talk) 20:24, 7 December 2008 (UTC)

Peurakairasee is Peurakaira

"Peurakairasee" or Peurakaira is an actual location and its protection has been discussed with Metsähallitus (Finnish Forest Administration). See: http://www.forestinfo.fi/metsalappi/kartat/peurakaira.pdf (Page 3) 89.166.23.148 (talk) 09:09, 10 May 2008 (UTC)

But it's still a lake or swamp, not a forest and has not been a forest. Greenpeace wrongly said in media that it's a clear cut. LOL. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 85.77.228.122 (talk) 18:10, 3 September 2008 (UTC)

I just wanted to clear up the claim that there is no place called "Peurakairasee" which implied that Greenpeace invented the place. And by the way, if this article is about "Criticism of Greenpeace" then I don't see a mention of a magazine editing error as a relevant thing to point out. If Greenpeace makes a mistake, it's a mistake, not criticism. If this article is about criticism it should present the criticism Greenpeace has received.

If the photo mistake should be kept in this article it should be edited to something like "X has accused Greenpeace for spreading disinformation when Greenpeace published a photo of a frozen lake saying it was a clear cutting area".

The criticism about the photo error comes from two private web pages. Wikipedia policy states that "Anyone can create a website or pay to have a book published, then claim to be an expert in a certain field. For that reason, self-published books, newsletters, personal websites, open wikis, blogs, knols, forum postings, and similar sources are largely not acceptable" and "Self-published material may, in some circumstances, be acceptable when produced by an established expert on the topic of the article whose work in the relevant field has previously been published by reliable third-party publications".

So, what makes those two personal web pages so notable and relevant, that their opinions about the photo mix-up should be mentioned? Greenpeace made a mistake while editing a magazine and they corrected their error in the next edition. I do not see it relevant to this article to mention the criticism from two private persons, who think that it was intentional disinformation. What makes them especially relevant persons to criticize Greenpeace? I do not think that we can start listing every critical private web page as a source for criticism of Greenpeace.89.27.54.2 (talk) 18:11, 5 October 2008 (UTC)

Yes, right. Greenpeace invented the place and wrote there was a clear cut. Accidentally or not, who knows. Anyway it was not a forest. I will try to scan details from the Lappish newspapers of that year, maybe those can be put to wiki commons. Not all articles are in electronic form. Maybe also you can do it because your ip 89.27.54.2 seems to be from Helsinki. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 85.77.232.97 (talk) 19:09, 5 October 2008 (UTC)

Um, as I pointed out Peurakaira does exist. Here's a map of the area: http://forestinfo.fi/metsalappi/kartat/peurakaira.pdf and you can also see pictures (also with cutting areas) in here: http://www.peurakaira.fi/index_tiet_eng.htm so Greenpeace did not invent the area or the cuttings. They simply used a wrong photo. Shubi (talk) 19:42, 5 October 2008 (UTC)

They don't know what's forest and what's lake? It's "Questionable action" like header says!

Questionable action according to who? (BTW frozen lake covered with snow is not that different from a flat terrain covered with snow, obviously because you cannot see is there a lake or ground under the snow. I'd imagine that a German editor might not know Finnish nature that well and could miss the difference.) But anyway, the point is that no relevant parties have criticized Greenpeace because of the error. No relevant party has deemed the mistake as "questionable", so why mention the mistake in this article, when there are no good sources that have criticised Greenpeace for this and said it was questionable? Shubi (talk) 22:55, 6 October 2008 (UTC)

What's relevant party? Local newspapers and public opionion is not? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 85.77.235.42 (talk) 17:02, 19 October 2008 (UTC)

Criticism about the deforestation picture comes from a private web page, not from a local newspaper. The criticism about the nuclear power press release wasn't sourced at all. The newspaper that informed about the blunder just informed about it. It did not criticize it. So those two incidents cannot be labelled as "questionable" when there is no relevant source that has deemed the incidents questionable. And no, one personal web page is not "public opinion" either.Shubi (talk) 23:11, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

And while I'm on it, why does the article have a section "Questionable actions" for actions that no source has deemed questionable? If Greenpeace has made mistakes, the section should be named "Mistakes by Greenpeace" or something like that. Mistakes aren't questionable per se. Saying they are questionable without sources is stating an opinion and that's not neutral.Shubi (talk) 23:13, 6 October 2008 (UTC)

Anti-capitalism motives rather than ecological motives.

I have seen a number of articles, suggesting that the environmental movement, and in particular Greenpeace, has been usurped by motives to obstruct capitalism, rather than promote ecology. I'm not suggesting that the two motives are diametrically opposed -- indeed there is some overlap, but it seems an accurate and legitimate criticism. Founding member Patrick Moore in particular has voices such concerns, as part of his reason for leaving Greenpeace. I think this justifies a new section. --76.26.220.148 (talk) 17:47, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

Population control

It was unsourced since November last year! 'Some say' really is just a cheap trick for someone to throw his own criticism in there. Wikipedia is not a soapbox. Mtijn (talk) 14:17, 15 August 2008 (UTC)

Penn & Teller.

On Showtime, Penn & Teller's Bullshit accused Greenpeace of a few things. On the third, of doing the same thing cure-for-cancer groups do:

1)Make people feel like they're contributing to the environment simply by being there & buying stuff when they're not doing anything useful, just so people can feel better about themselves.

2)Being wasteful environmental hypocrates. It'slike "Are you really environmentaly friendly? Your lifestyle wouldn't suggest so."

3)Throwing fundraising events where almost all of the money goes into paying for the event itself & very little money going into the cause. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.160.77.255 (talk) 15:16, 23 November 2008 (UTC)

Brent Spar

"After the occupation of the Brent Spar it became known that Shell had misled the public as to the amount of toxic wastes on board the installation." AFAIK it was not Shell misleading the public but in fact Greenpeace. If it was Shell, why is Greenpeaced critized. --84.58.155.174 (talk) 21:54, 5 January 2009 (UTC) Linne

Unsubstantiated or official?

"It is in fact alleged that Greenpeace has had no factual evidence, instead relying on unsubstantiated official company information for the report in order to garner publicity,"

How could it be unsubstantiated and official at the same time? Were the companies putting out unsubstantiated information, which Greenpeace picked up on? If so, it's not clear why that's Greenpeace's fault?

Original research on nuclear criticism

The criticism about Greenpeace's nuclear stance does not have any references to any source where criticism is apparent. The entire chapter is just original research.Shubi (talk) 13:06, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

I'll start merging

I'm working on the Greenpeace article and I'll start merging criticism from here to the main article in appropriate sections. This article has had a lot of unsourced parts for a long time, so unless someone can find sources I'll remove those parts on the merge. So, whoever knows sources for unsourced parts, pleace add them.89.27.56.101 (talk) 22:43, 21 January 2010 (UTC)