How green was my advertising, how uniformed the purchase?

You can put lipstick on a pig, and it’s still a pig. Does this adage apply to the “all-natural” and “eco-friendly” products filling supermarket shelves? In other words, if you put “green” on a water bottle, is it still just a drink?

If you’ve ever watched the television show “Mad Men,” or ever stood back and looked at the influx of consumer media that weaves itself into our lives, you’ll know that advertising agencies aim for our heartstrings and our emotions. Media is as much a psychological game as the $5-an-hour medical school study is. When we don’t know the rules, however, the consumer risks being duped by manipulative advertising schemes. Such psychological manhandling is the key to greenwashing, the practice of suggesting that a product is environmentally conscious through vague, relative, or unsubstantiated claims. Take, for example, that “green” water bottle I mentioned before. “Smaller cap = Less plastic!” it reads, verdant Möbius strip recycling symbol proudly printed like a brand new boy scout badge. The label’s prominent use of natural scenes, the color green, and platitudes about caring for the environment ought to make us raise our eyebrows in skepticism. The important thing to consider is that the company is specifically suggesting that this water bottle is natural and environmentally friendly—the logical, subconscious conclusion ad execs are hoping you make is that this means you are environmentally friendly. You are not what you eat, but what you buy.

This kind of marketing seems particularly egregious: a doubly abusive form of false advertising that harms not only the individual consumer, but our global ecosystem as well. Most dangerous is the reality that current culture is particularly susceptible to greenwashing ploys for three reasons. First, environmentalism has become a buzzword with generally positive connotations. “Green” as ubiquitous zeitgeist has its conceptions in the establishment of Earth Day in the ’70s. Culturally, we understand the terms, images, and associations that can evoke the sentimentality of environmentalism. But as increasing awareness has proactively led to increasing interest, action, and concern, it has also created an easily exploited Achilles’ heel.

This is the second aspect of the customer’s susceptibility—lack of information. When paired with genuine concern, vague understanding of an issue that has such dire consequences naturally leads to a search for authority. Greenwashing provides friendly, immediately recognizable, facilitated access to the kinds of phrases and terms that are lumped into environmental issues, where nonsense claims like “all natural” and “plant-based” shine. These bear no meaning, simply because they hold no significance. Many poisonous chemicals are naturally occurring, and many derivatives of plants are harmful. To emphatically advertise these characteristics as beneficial is like saying All-Natural Arsenic—just because a substance comes out of Mother Nature does not make it good for the environment.

Yet, people find pleasure and power in action and can only act if a logical path is revealed. This is the third vulnerability: we enjoy feeling as though we have asserted our agency, particularly if it is to achieve morally good ends. In this way, our green-washed purchase has a moral kickback for ourselves, and a monetary kickback for the company. After all, feeling good is a powerful motivator to choose one brand over another. It is therefore a religious impulse to seek the broad assurances of a third party to direct our significant decisions. Environmental advertising and glib images become idolatry in the sect of environmental consumerism: they are clues to comforting directionality. The general three I’s—interest, ignorance, and insecurity—lead down a path of religiosity that may keep us from thinking critically about the items we choose for the checkout line.

Like an old car that once ran well and quietly, our consumerism needs a tune up and a new coat of paint. Instead of perpetuating the pseudo-green fluff that provides temporary gratification, both consumers and companies might make a tremendous positive change if the bar were set higher. It is the underestimation of consumer knowledge and the lack of demand for specific information that allows for greenwashing generalities. The prism of corporate transparency would do well to diffuse what has been green too long, and show all the colors of environmental adaptation and change. Embrace the crimsons, scarlets, and magentas of improved chemical processing. Seek the ochres, golds, and yellows of power from alternative energy sources. Delight in the aquas, indigos, and royal blues of low ecological impact. If we can get beyond the hollowness of greenwashing, there is a spectrum of beauty to buy and behold.

Elizabeth Kipp-Giusti is a Columbia College sophomore majoring in religion with a concentration in human rights. She is a Columbia EcoRep. A Tree Grows in Morningside runs alternate Fridays. opinion@columbiaspectator.com