MFHTDWF #7

Principle: The recent trend toward “green” living should be followed to the letter, or it won’t count.

When you’re marketing yourself as a “green” celeb, or a spokesperson for “green living,” you’re appealing to a particularly by-the-book, neurotically/obsessively conscientious crowd that generally mocks famous people and considers all efforts to live with a smaller carbon footprint null and void if you haven’t proven yourself by living in a tree through at least two television seasons.

Remember, even in "green living," your primary goal as a famous person is to fascinate and terrify. This is your responsibility as a wielder of influence; I cannot emphasize enough how important this is.

You must join every environmental group that approaches you for a donation or membership, but only speak out for the most extreme – i.e. PETA or the variety of Greenpeace that blows stuff up. Do not let it be known that you are a member of the World Wildlife Fund, the Nature Conservancy, or related groups (such as the ASPCA or Audobon Society) unless asked directly or when speaking with other members of the same groups.

Bring the conversation back around immediately to your more extreme environmental group involvement and drop in fascinating/terrifying "facts," such as that the dodo egg was a known cure for cancer before dodos were mercilessly destroyed by the nascent pharmo-industrial complex, or that a million and a half acres of trees are cut down every fourteen seconds. Do not allow anyone to question your facts. Be aggressive in your defense, and allow arrogance to do the work for you, rather than checking facts.

If you are unable to extricate yourself from a fact-based debate, point out that while you were arguing over how many trees can actually be cut down in fourteen seconds, three more species went extinct. Then say "the time to act is now," and make a dramatic exit.

You may freely admit that you are a member of the Sierra Club, but be careful when name-dropping marginally obscure conservation-minded artists or authors (Wallace Stegner, Wendell Berry, Ansel Adams) to ascribe to previous members a godlike status in your personal life. Imply, but do not state directly, that these authors and artists have had a revolutionary impact on your life; then quickly change the subject as though too affected to continue. Any actual discussion of the content of authors’ work or artists’ photographs should be avoided, as it will reveal you as a sham. (These types of fans can smell blood in the water a mile away, and they enjoy ripping others apart in a debate.)

Carrying a work of nonfiction by one of the “green” authors should suffice. Extra points for older, more obscure conservationists, and for dog-eared copies that appear to have been read multiple times. Ansel Adams photos tastefully framed and displayed are acceptable, but coffee table books of his work are not. They have been overplayed.

Here are some equivalencies between typical markers of fame and “green” fame:

Lamborghini = Prius

Ray-bans = Black framed, rectangular glasses (designer label)

Vera Wang wedding dress = funky short dress “picked up from this awesome little vintage store in the village”

Shoplifting = Chaining oneself to something in protest

Paying for new wing at local hospital = paying for new hospital in African country

Black = Green

Plastic surgery = “Eating raw”*

*If you are a beautiful woman in the Western tradition (blond and buxom), the “green” crowd will forgive surgical enhancements, despite their otherwise unrelenting focus on the “natural.” If you are an ugly woman trying to become beautiful, or a man, surgical enhancement will reveal you as the poseur you are.

Examples of famous people who succeed at this principle by living “green” to the extreme: Pamela Anderson, Cake (the band)

Examples of famous people who succeed at this principle by not caring at all about the environment: Marie Antoinette, all male characters on half-hour sitcoms

Examples of famous people who fail at this principle by being not green enough: All male characters on hour-long dramas