We have children too!!

"The people who run the private sector . . . they too have children, they too have grandchildren and they too live and breathe in the world and they would like things dealt with effectively, and that's what this (meeting) is all about," - US Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman speaking at the inaugural meeting of the Asia-Pacific Clean Development and Climate Partnership [as quoted here]

This sounds suspiciously like something John Stauber (author of Toxic Sludge is Good For You and Trust Us We're Experts) describes as being part of the standard anti-environmentalist spiel:

“A typical corporate rap might be to sit down with a concerned group of people and say, ‘Look, you know no one is more concerned than the people at XYZ corporation about chemicals in the environment. After all, we have children too. And we live in this community and we’re just like you. If we’re put out of business, we can’t provide jobs for our community. So let’s sit down and work for a common solution’ ”.

This approach is apparently part of the divide and conquer technique used to combat environment and social grass-roots activists. PR companies hired to make polluting corporations look better divide social activists into three or four categories – the radicals, the idealists, and the realists (and sometimes the opportunists). The above, “we’re just like you, we breath the same air, but want to keep our [polluting] industry thriving because we all need jobs, right?” shtick is intended to “educate” and sway the realists (and to a lesser extent the idealists) away from the radicals. By presenting a “solution” favorable to industry that sounds reasonable to realists, the radicals (no matter how rational and just their demands) will seem extreme and thus have less credibility. At least, that’s the theory.