‘Ocean Rights’ Movement Gives Globalist Elites Power to Halt Development: Marc Morano

Dolphins swim near an underwater viewing area on a whale watching vessel operated by Capt. Dave's Whale Watching Tours outside of Dana Point Harbor, Calif., on April 7, 2022. John Fredricks/The Epoch Times

The movement to grant legal rights to waterbodies such as rivers and oceans would end up concentrating power to a small group of globalist elites in the name of protecting the environment, said author and climate change skeptic Marc Morano.

“We are seeing human rights being degraded, particularly since COVID,” Mr. Morano said in an interview on EpochTV’s “Crossroads” program. “At the same time, this whole movement now is pushing for ocean rights, which is basically saying the oceans are going to attain a certain level of personhood.”

Ocean rights activists recently renewed their advocacy at the United Nations General Assembly.

During the Ocean Race Summit held in September at the U.N. headquarters in New York, they called on the international organization to adopt a Universal Declaration of Ocean Rights, a framework focusing on aligning human activities with the idea that oceans are living beings, not a resource.

Specifically, such a declaration from the U.N. would acknowledge that the ocean has its own inherent rights, such as those to life, ecological integrity, freedom from irreversible pollution, and the right to continue its natural cycles.

It also means that there would be an international body overseeing matters related to maritime management, and that the ocean would be given a seat at the table.

“We acknowledge the Ocean’s right to representation and to have a voice within a multinational governance system, which requires further establishing mechanisms to facilitate and ensure all stakeholder interests are properly represented,” read the document ocean rights activists submitted to the U.N. General Assembly.

“They literally want a lawyer to represent the rights of [the ocean] against human activities,” Mr. Morano said.

“In the case of the oceans, you’re going to have, essentially, a much harder time doing anything that benefits humans, i.e., fishing, boating,” he continued. “Any activities in the ocean will now be evaluated based on the, essentially, inherent rights of the ocean—not on whether, you know, it’s going to harm human populations, not on whether it makes sense to do, whether it can benefit humans. It’s all going to be on what left-wing progressive Marxist activists, essentially, are going to claim the ocean feels, believes.”

Giving Up National Sovereignty

The ocean rights movement is relatively new, but the quasi-religious idea that the nonhuman parts of the Earth’s ecological system have inherent legal rights and deserve legal representation has been around among environmental activists for a while.

Mr. Morano said environmental activists promote the “defense of the rights of Mother Earth to ‘ensure harmony between humanity and nature,’” referring to an agenda adopted in 2011 by a working group of the U.N.’s Framework Convention on Climate Change. “Ultimately, this is them saying, ‘We’re going to grant personhood to trees, to certain animal species, to bodies of water.’”

Recognizing that nature has its own entitlements would open courtroom doors to environmentalist attorneys on behalf of their plant, animal, and water clients, according to Mr. Morano. In fact, progressive legal groups such as the Community Environmental Legal Defense Fund have been drafting and promoting “nature rights” laws that could be used as a legal weapon to shut down the development of natural resources.

But the problem doesn’t end there, Mr. Morano argued. “It’s about national sovereignty,” he said.

“These activists are going to be tapped in by billionaires and multimillionaires to all these international organizations that want to shut down our modern development, and they want to be in control of every decision,” Mr. Morano explained. “They’re going to appoint people with that ideology in charge of every industry. This would include development from transportation to agriculture to shipping, economic development.”

Mr. Morano said these entities will not likely ban these activities outright, but the power to make decisions will become concentrated to a few people at the top of the World Economic Forum, the United Nations, and the World Health Organization.

“No longer will it matter if your local legislative body wants to do something,” he said. “It’s not going to matter. You’re going to be violating the international Earth rights of a river, a lake, a tree, or some animal species.”