22 Jul 2013 Environmental Activists Politicize Dead Bees

In a piece for Politix over the weekend, I provide some much needed context to a widely reported “bee memorial” service that took place earlier in the month.

An estimated one hundred people braved scorching outdoor temperatures to attend a memorial service earlier this month. The honorees, however, were not heroes, community figures, or even human. They were bees apparently killed by accident in Wilsonville, Ore. Deemed a “bee kill,” the insects were found dead in a Target parking lot after a pesticide was sprayed on trees infested with aphids.

Media attention to the incident has been heightened by anti-agricultural pesticide activists trying to score political points off the dead bugs.