Hypocrisy as an expression of bad faith

Valley's Edge-how could we possibly do better?

A few days ago, I wrote a short article on the hypocrisy of the Butte Environmental Council.  By coincidence I’m sure, Friday’s paper featured a half-page story on the virtues of BEC. In that story was the following description of BEC:

“It has become a multi-faceted grassroots nonprofit organization with the mission of protecting and defending the land, air, and water of Butte County and the surrounding region through action, advocacy, and education.”

That sounds so noble.  If only it were true.  As I’ve recently pointed out, how can you claim the mission of defending the land, air, and water, and remain silent about the unprecedented environmental damage being done by the illegal encampments throughout the town and along every single waterway passing through Chico?  We have a word for that: hypocrisy.  Hypocrisy is a betrayal of trust because a hypocrite says one thing and does another.

How is such hypocrisy rationalized and justified?  Ideology.  If one’s ideology dictates that the poor are a protected class who are victimized by evil rich people, then you are obligated to always take the side of the poor, and never take the side, or even acknowledge the value of anyone who is not poor. Of course, we can excuse those who virtuously take up the causes of the poor, even though rich themselves.  If “rich” is defined as “not poor” then everyone not poor is rich, and therefore evil.  But advocates don’t count themselves as rich because they spend a good deal of time and energy propping up that sleight-of-hand through constant virtue signaling. They may be rich, but they identify as poor.  That makes them one of the good guys.

It doesn’t stop there.  Since one’s ideology and associated virtue-signaling makes you a member of the “right club”, it means that anyone not willing to drink your particular brand of Kool-Aid is in the wrong club.  Therefore, by definition, anyone and anything in the wrong club can be demonized, ridiculed, defamed, vandalized, and constantly opposed as evil.  In this holy war, facts and evidence are not nearly as important as holding to the right conclusion.  If that conclusion happens to contradict other conclusions, well, nothing is perfect. What is most important is to carry on with the righteous war against the “wrong” people.  In this way, hypocrisy can be forgiven and ignored.

No one, in the mind of BEC leadership and their adherents, is more wrong than developers.  Never mind that the very house each of these people lives in, from 20-something renters to well-healed college professors, was built by a developer. Some prior developers went through a process of gaining permission to build the house anyone lives in today. That process has only become more restrictive and costly over time, thanks in some large part to organizations like BEC, which work tirelessly to oppose and obstruct builders of new homes, all from the comfort of their older homes. 

As we all well know, there are no more vile species of deplorable people than the feared and hated “out-of-town developer.”  They are particularly evil because they destroy the environment by building houses and roads, and they don’t even live here to suffer the death and destruction they wreak on our helpless community.

It is ironic and hypocritical to suggest that a) the myriad of laws and regulations you advocated for are there to protect the environment, b) the hated developer is required to comply with every single aspect of those laws, and then c) they are still destroying the environment and must be opposed.

BEC was a prominent voice for the opposition at Thursday’s Planning Commission meeting, where the Valley’s Edge land use hearing was taking place.  Bill Brouhard has lived in Chico for 40 years, so I guess he is technically an “outsider.”  That was just sneaky advanced planning.  He has been working on the Valley’s Edge planning for a mere 14 years.  If you watched the presentation, especially the part where Bill himself talked about the process he has gone through to produce this plan, you will be impressed, I guarantee.

Over those 14 years, any and every person and organization that might have input was considered, and in large part, their inputs were incorporated into the final plan presented Thursday.  I’m not going to go through the long list of impressive features, or even emphasize the fact that this is not a housing plan, but a land use plan that will take 30-40 years to materialize.  I’ll just leave you with one fact.

All current parks and open space in Chico including Bidwell Park totals 647 acres.  Valley’s edge devotes 419 acres to a regional park and combined with the other community parks and public-use lands, totals 732 acres.  Yes, this plan more than DOUBLES the parks and open space in Chico.  Let that sink in a minute.

But if you are BEC, that is not good enough.  They are concerned about climate change.  Think about that for a minute.  Every member of BEC likely drives a car, shops at local stores, and lives in a house that they heat and cool.  They eat food and contribute to the methane load in the atmosphere. Any development that takes place anywhere in Chico would have the same fundamental impact on their theories of climate change.  The fact that they do all of the things they advocate against is not hypocrisy because they exclude themselves from their criticisms of others. It is a slick trick.  That is hypocritical by definition.

There were two types of opponents in the audience that night.  The first type is those I consider my peers. These are former “hippies” that came of age in the ’60-the ’70s, like me but stuck with the purity of their ideology into old age.  Karl Ory is the epitome of that personality, and I’m sure most of the people I’m referring to voted for him when he was a sandal-wearing Socialist hippie chumming around with Tom Hayden and Bob Mulholland in the ’70s, and likely voted for him again in his later life.

These are the people that set themselves in opposition to the common and recognizable causes: provide unlimited housing and amenities to the homeless, defund the police and divert that money to social services, fight all perceived enemies of climate change, and declare Chico a nuclear-free zone.  They toddle up to the podium with their virtue mask properly in place and make the predictable arguments against the same straw men they have been tilting at for decades.  They are nothing if not predictable. Like me, time will soon take care of them.  Unlike me, I hope, they are beyond learning anything new.

Then there is this other group, younger, more in tune with the “wokeness” of our current times, but like their senior partners, unfazed by how things work in the real world where planning and effort are required to accomplish anything.  They believe that big things happen when you think and feel the “right” way. So the entire pitch is based on how you should “feel” about things.

The Star of the show was my old friend Mark Stemen.  I call him a friend because he never fails to amuse.  He is like the deadpan comedian who makes you laugh by being over-serious, over-dramatic, and completely ridiculous.  When his time at the podium came, those in the room didn’t know how to react.  It would have been hilarious if he did what some comedians do when they tell a joke a little too close to the line. They give the audience permission to laugh. Mark didn’t do that and missed a great comedic opportunity.

But for those of us watching from home or reviewing the video, it was outrageously funny.  You can find the performance at about 3:36 on the video recording. 

First a little background on Mark.  He is a Chico State alumnus of 1989, then moved to Iowa to complete a Masters and Ph.D. in history and economics.  I’m impressed, and certainly, he was impressed with something.  Anyone who spends the first 30 years in school and just can’t get enough of academia naturally becomes a professor, and to our misfortune, he was hired at Chico State.

Like many professors these days, he views students as junior warriors in training for social justice, and so he requires of them local activism, using the Chico community as his laboratory.  You may be familiar with this version of Stockholm syndrome through another local icon of dysfunction, Lindsay Briggs.  Unlike Lindsay, though, Mark takes a leading role in his dramatic productions.

Mark was a former chairman of the board of BEC.  Mark was also instrumental in getting the Stone/Huber/Brown/Ory council to convert the Climate Action Committee to the status of a Commission, upon which he served as the first chairman.  Mark has been active in driving the “we are all going to die in 12 years” fearmongering into primary and secondary grades over climate change.  He once praised school kids for cutting school to attend his climate protest ala Greta Thunberg, for having their “priorities straight.”

So naturally, a cornerstone of this speech on Valley’s Edge dealt with climate change.  But not the fact of climate change, but the impact of “climate anxiety” on our young people.  My reaction was, “Well what the hell do you expect?   You pound into them the fear of the end of the world, you blame adults for not saving them from destruction by voluntarily returning to the stone age, and then you marvel at the fact that your targets of relentless propaganda develop reactions of anxiety.”

But that was not the funniest part.  After making his emotional plea about our cruelty to children (while miraculously excusing himself as a causal agent), working himself literally to the point of tears, he reveals his planned dramatic climax; a disruptive act of civil disobedience.

First, after the conclusion of his speech, designed to pack as much emotional baggage as possible into the allotted 2 minutes, he proudly announces that he will refuse to yield to the timer or the chairwoman, and force the Commission to adjourn to recess and clear the room.  In the process of this heroic declaration, he expressed his hope that when they reconvened, the next speaker would do the same, and the next and so forth, until the meeting was so disrupted that it couldn’t possibly proceed to a vote.

Have you ever thought of a situation where you planned a big party, and no one came?  There you sit, alone with your party hat and noisemaker echoing in an empty room.  As I said, comedy was precious.  First, Mark expressed his surprise that the meeting was not recessed.  The Chairwoman simply asked the police to remove Mark from the room.  While he was waiting for the drama that never arrived, he tried to give them a hint. “You’re not even going to get up, huh?”  She didn’t bite. “I guess I should have chained myself to the podium.”  I’m sure next time he’ll plan better.

Eventually, after a few more appeals to a dramatic ending that never came, Detective Jim Parrott, who was on hall monitor duty, approached him with his hands in his pocket and could be heard asking “What’s it gonna be.”  You can see Mark’s shoulders droop.  “Walk me out?” “Sure.”  Jim never took his hands out of his pockets.  It was the most non-confrontational confrontation I’ve ever witnessed.  Once out of the room, the meeting proceeded normally, having hardly missed a beat.

Let’s review.  BEC as an organization is hypocritical when it comes to opposing actual environmental destruction compared to the theoretical kind that only comes after years of planning how to minimize environmental impacts according to the rules and laws which BEC supports.

Their former Chairman of the Board performs a one-man show that flops at the box office on the theme of the emotional harm he has visited on the young.

BEC hired Addison Winslow, the recently elected Socialist youngster, to write a response to the General Plan Housing Element, to criticize the general approach of General Plan development, which Valley’s Edge, which he campaigned against, completely reflects in every respect.  The very first planning objective of the project is “Implement the General Plan.” No one says it doesn’t conform to that.

The Director of BEC is Catlin Dalby, by far the most radical “woke” advocate on the CSUD school board, and given the makeup of that board, that is saying something.  It appears she quit her teaching job in the same district to take on BEC full-time.

There were two votes against the project. One came from Bryce Goldstein, appointed I presume by Alex Brown, who also happens to be Addison’s girlfriend and very flattering photographer.  Her objections, not surprisingly, were very specific, so specific that I might be forgiven for assuming that her boyfriend helped her formulate her speech. It had to do with objecting to the senior housing being clustered in a specific area, rather than being evenly dispersed throughout the project, so that the young and old can intermingle.  She probably wasn’t listening to the part where the applicant explained that the request for clustered senior housing, near transportation and services like shopping, was a specific request of seniors consulted during planning.  I think she believes that people should not get what they want, but only get what they should want.

The other “no” vote was from Rich Ober, a two-time failed candidate for City Council and running mate of Scott Huber, who granted him the consolation prize of Planning Commissioner.  His objection was based on climate change.  He probably wasn’t listening when the question was asked and answered that any development anywhere in Chico could be seen as a negative impact on climate change theory.  The only way to avoid those impacts is to eliminate humans from the environment. This conclusion flows from the central premise of climate change theory, which is that the most significant driver of climate change is human activity. Eliminate humans, and Voilà, problem solved.

In both cases, these no votes are hypocritical to the commissioner’s logic but true to their ideology. They are commanded to oppose all projects that are proposed by a “developer” since developers are only interested in massive profits at the expense of the quality of life for everyone else. Because they are “out of towners” they don’t suffer along with the rest of us.  In their view, “good” developers only build public housing for the poor at public expense. Those are not “developers” but good Samaritans.  The rest are the enemies of utopia.

The ideology assumes people are either evil or ignorant, because if they are neither, then they only want what they “should” want according to an ideology that defines enemies and allies.  “Rich” people are also evil, and developers are all rich, which is defined as anyone who has more than they do. Of course, blanket condemnation excludes rich people who invest in virtue-signaling activities, such as supporting groups like BEC. Those rich people are cool.

Psychologically, this ideology is rooted in resentment against those, either evil, ignorant, or both, who must be either opposed or educated. Those who refuse to be educated must be opposed.  Eventually, you sort everyone into only two groups, good and evil.  Let’s forget that the conduct they oppose is the very same thing they do themselves every day. As with the pollution of encampments, offensive conduct can be forgiven if it’s done by the right people.  Climate-harming activities of daily life can be forgiven if it’s done by the right people, like themselves.

But if it’s done by developers, or more precisely, by those who will eventually buy and occupy the housing over the next 30-40 years, it is evil and must be stopped.

This brings me to my final point. Developers are not evil. They are essential.  They risk millions of dollars and years of effort to try to bring housing to the market, against constant, costly, and many times irrational opposition.  The fact is, there are only five remaining special planning areas in Chico. They are North Chico, Bell Muir, Barber Yard, South Entler, and Valley’s edge. 

As many of you know, Barber Yard was recently purchased by Dan Gonzales, who also developed Marion Park.  When all of those areas are developed and built out, let’s assume over the next 100 years or so, Chico will have reached its limits, constrained on the west by the Greenline, enacted to preserve agricultural lands to the west, and the Goldline on the east, the natural constraints imposed by the geography and geology of our region.

Every house ever built in Chico was the product of development, and those in that business are just as essential to a community as doctors, plumbers, restauranteurs, and brewers.  Teachers, students, the elderly, and even local industries all contribute to the economic vitality and quality of life in our community. 

Think of this.  Even if Valley’s edge is approved, which it appears it must be, it will be several years before the first construction of any kind occurs.  There are still permits from other state and federal agencies that must be secured.  In addition, if history is any indication, those activists that opposed the project Thursday are not likely to accept defeat gracefully or work with anyone on the “other side” to make the next 40 years better than they would otherwise be.  That is not the objective, and that is not consistent with an ideology that demands resistance. 

Voter initiatives and lawsuits will likely arise, further adding to the eventual cost of the housing that does eventually get built.  The many laws, regulations, and processes which include public hearings such as occurred on Thursday, all add to the cost of housing for the eventual homebuyer.

The irony of ironies includes the demand for “more housing” and declarations “we are in a housing crisis” being echoed constantly as the root of all social ills, yet when new housing is proposed, the same small group of true believers can be counted upon to stand up in virtuous and righteous opposition to anyone’s brand of “progress” but their own.

Richard Harriman, another famous actor in the resistance, recently tried to stop the long-planned and required improvements to Bruce Road.  He used his favorite weapon, CEQA, the California Environmental Quality Act, to try to accomplish his ideological goals, claiming that the very General Plan which he participated in during adoption, was now defunct by the declarations of his lawsuit. The net effect he was going for was to hold up the buildout of that region as leverage to try to impose his “woke” agenda against automobiles and newcomers.  The delay also affected a low-income housing project.

That did not work out well for him, contrary to his past experiences using this weapon of obstructionist litigation.  This time he got slapped with a settlement that cost him big bucks, owing to the frivolous nature of his suit.  Good.  For once, fair was fair.

This reminds me of another recent lawsuit, brought by Karl Ory, who sued the city for not letting his incoherent argument against Measure H appear on the ballot.  This is the argument that all three of the defeated city council candidates signed, only later to change their minds.  That lawsuit was equally frivolous, and one hopes that eventually, Karl will also pay a price for abusing the system for his social justice agenda.  He got away with this tactic in the Chico Scrap Yard affair.  I hope this time he is not so lucky.

I say these things not out of hatred for the people involved.  I believe they are sincere.  But so am I, and I also believe people are not stupid, that they can tell fact from fiction, and they understand hypocrisy when they see it.  The whole point of good faith negotiations is reaching a fair bargain for everyone involved. When hypocrisy rears its head, you know bad faith is also present. Honest people of good will do not allow themselves the humiliation of hypocrisy, they correct themselves and strive to support consistent principles that accommodate credible facts and evidence in any given situation.

When someone accepts or justifies their hypocrisy, they are showing you they are willing to be dishonest to stick with the ideological goals they take on faith. Faith divorced from humility can only create suffering.  We have to be willing to admit when we are wrong.  We cannot excuse our errors as somehow benefiting the greater good.  That is hypocrisy, and people willing to be hypocrites in plain view of their contradictions cannot be trusted to have your best interests at heart.

My hope for the next few years is that we can begin to be honest with each other in this big tent called Chico, where everyone who is here is a part of the conversation, both for good and bad. We can handle the truth. We just need to have the personal moral courage to know the difference and be honest about it with ourselves and others.