THIS IS CONSISTENT WITH MY OBSERVATIONS: Environmentalism and the Fear of Disorder: Greens engage in rituals to allay their anxieties.

Why do people recycle and buy organic foods? According to Marijn Meijers and Bastiaan Rutjens, a couple of social scientists at the University of Amsterdam, they do it to realize a sense of personal control stemming from their fear that disorder is increasing in the world. Technological optimists, meanwhile, are more likely to eschew the comfort of such rituals.

This also explains why they’re largely immune to facts and reason: It’s basically something more like a religion, or maybe compulsive hand-washing.