In Climate Terms, ‘Brown’ Is Always Bad—and That’s a Problem

It took Rev. Lennox Yearwood Jr. months to find an outlet that would publish his essay on the words used to talk about clean vs. polluting investments. Under the headline “The Language of Brown Finance in Climate Finance is Racist,” the minister and activist in the fossil fuel divest-invest movement patiently explained why using “brown” to refer to dirty and polluting assets is not OK.

“‘Brown’ has been linked to dirty and ‘white’ to clean, and this has significant racial undertones,” he wrote. “Language that frames ‘brown’ as bad is...