I have been seeing the term “Environmental Justice” popping up everywhere these last few weeks. It must be a huge deal because everyone is talking about it. It even has the word “justice” in it. We are all for justice right?

So I jumped on the old google-box (not literally, I use duck-duck-go) and looked for a definition. Here is what I found at EPA.gov:

Environmental justice is the fair treatment meaningful involvement of all people regardless of race, color, national origin, or income, with respect to the development, implementation, and enforcement of environmental laws, regulations, and policies. This goal will be achieved when everyone enjoys:

• The same degree of protection from environmental and health hazards, and
• Equal access to the decision-making process to have a healthy environment in which to live, learn, and work.

Wait. If you are like me, you read that and thought “That is just a fricking word soup! You strung a bunch of lofty sounding items together to sound important!”

A question that immediately came to me is “We don’t have that already?” The government treats people in accordance with the law. Furthermore, laws are meant to be applied equally. I can’t think of any environmental laws where a race or income level is called out for different treatment. I am not a lawyer, but the 14th amendment is still in effect as far as I know.

The Cost of Justice

This isn’t the only “justice” that is out there. There is racial justice, climate justice, social justice, economic justice, and probably lots of other words mashed in front of justice. What they all have in common is that they seem to cost a lot.

The google-box wasn’t able to find any concrete numbers, but all of the articles agree that it will take a bunch of your dough to advance the cause. It doesn’t matter which cause exactly, just pick one.

One of the reasons that you can’t find a price tag is that these concepts are just fuzzy feel good issues. They don’t really have meaning that can be nailed down and quantified. That is one of the advantages of using justice. You can’t put a price on that.

Single issues like the Flint Water Crisis, or the California Creek Fire can be bounded by costs. If you take a step back and say instead that they were caused by environmental injustice, it becomes something larger. Something with a much bigger cost.

What is it really

This makes me think of the “Bad News Bears” episode when they need new uniforms and get people to donate to a fake charity. Everyone is guilted into it because you can’t be against saving endangered bears. This is the same play, you can’t be against justice.

So it boils down to being just another club in the arsenal of the wokesters. If you aren’t for justice (in this case environmental) then you get beat up in the media and on the interwebs for being a callous ass.