With a tip of the hat to Bruce McQuain at Q&O, the country of Ecuador is about to take a step into environmental extremism that is (so far) unparalleled.

The South American republic of Ecuador will next week consider what many countries in the world would say is unthinkable. People will be asked to vote on Sunday on a new constitution that would give Ecuador’s tropical forests, islands, rivers and air similar legal rights to those normally granted to humans. If they vote yes – and polls show that 56% are for and only 23% are against – then an already approved bill of rights for nature will be introduced, and new laws will change the legal status of nature from being simply property to being a right-bearing entity.

This is a complete rewrite of the definition of the concept of a “right”. 

And where did they get this idea?  American leftists.

Thomas Linzey, a US lawyer who has helped to develop the new legal framework for nature, says: “The dominant form of environmental protection in industrialised countries is based on the regulatory system. Governments permit and legalise the discharge of certain amounts of toxics into the environment. As a form of environmental protection, it’s not working.

“In the same way, compensation is measured in terms of that injury to a person or people. Under the new system, it will be measured according to damage to the ecosystem. The new system is, in essence, an attempt to codify sustainable development. The new laws would grant people the right to sue on behalf of an ecosystem, even if not actually injured themselves.”

Linzey is a member of the Community Environmental Legal Defense Fund.  This is their liberalism and environmental policies running out of control, and is a peek into what they really want in our country.

Linzey admits that Ecuador may be taking a step into the legal unknown. “No one knows what will happen [if the referendum goes in favour of new rights for nature] because there are no examples of how this works in the real world,” he says. “A lot of people will be watching what happens.”

Yeah, good luck with that guinea pig thing.  Just waiting for the Plant’s Suffrage movement.

Related posts:

  1. UN v Human Nature
  2. Me No Understand
  3. Nature Recapitulating Theological Ontology
  4. Math, Nature, and Knowledge
  5. Logical Inconsistancy and the NSS

Filed under: Doug • Environment • Liberal

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