Friends, if you’ve been following the world headlines lately, you couldn’t help but notice that floods are occurring in many countries, floods which exceed all previous records. In Pakistan, 21 million people have been displaced and many crops destroyed (see above photos from Reuters). Enormous mudslides have occurred and many people have no food or shelter.
In places like China and South America, it is the same story. At the same time, in Russia, droughts have occurred along with fires. The choking smoke from the fires has brought Moscow to a halt and the effect of the droughts on grain crops has forced Russia to cancel its grain exports. Heat waves have been occurring in the U.S. along with twisters, etc, and so the story of weather-related calamities goes on and on with increasing incidence and severity.
When climate change was first noted, the world did seem to get a shock and many people were determined to bring about change in the use of fossil fuels. Then, when it became obvious that such a change would force us to change our ways and cost us money, the enthusiasm seemed to dissipate.
The climate change conference in Copenhagen turned out to be a colossal failure and soon after the world largely went back to the old ways. Even in Australia, a carbon-pricing scheme, one that would have made the major polluters to pay for the damage they cause, was shelved for three years (although there has been some encouragement for wind and solar technologies).
But, in the main, the oil and coal usage has continued as has exploration for these environment-damaging products.
In fact, in Australia, the party which represents business has offered to fund mining companies to help them to discover new fields and make billions more dollars while polluting the atmosphere. It’s equivalent to offering millions to tobacco companies to help them to advertise their death-dealing products.
Obviously, denial is the name of the game. My question is: what level of calamity will force the world to change its ridiculous, environmentally damaging capitalist system? Will we have to endure a flood of biblical proportions? Will we have to suffer a drought that kills half of the world’s people? Will the smoke from fires accelerate climate change as well as ensure that soon we won’t be able to breathe the air?
Obviously, we must change our ways if we want a habitable world. We can no longer allow corporations to dictate how the world is run. We can no longer allow corporations to control Governmental agendas. We can no longer allow the MSM to be mouthpieces for corporations engaged in fossil fuel extraction or making weapons of war.
Either we change or we perish. And it’s us little people who must force change to take place. Start now. Boycott the polluters. Ride a bike. Use public transport or carpools. Cut down on electricity. Install solar heating. Grow your own food. Form protest groups or set up community purchasing organizations.
ACT NOW BEFORE IT’S TOO LATE!
Great article as always David , This is something that is on the minds of many unfortunately change is slow and looking for anykind of leadership from the current cast of politicians is fruitless as they are bought and paid for by the corporations that continue to undermine anything that would bring positive changes to the world . We must form self sustaining communities that have as little effect on the world as possible and all these changes must begin with us it will happen and is happening as people realize we are not living but existing in a world that is not for us it is a planetary slave ship that has dire consequences for the majority of the worlds beings ,and the elite don’t realize that it will come to them as well ,life is a cycle and it will go back to self sufficient groups how it all comes down is up to us . If all human beings had a little foresight transition would be fairly peaceful , if things stay as they are it will be very ugly
Reply
coco Reply:
August 16th, 2010 at 7:48 pm
unfortunately, i believe we are looking at ‘ugly’………
the time it will take for ‘all’ human beings to get a little foresight will not be quick enough…….
the weather pattern changes are coming fast and furious now and whether it’s because of humans or not i don’t think there’s much we can do about it………..
personally i’m a firm believer in the actions of homo sapiens that have led us to this state now………………………..
Reply
I just shake my head at the thought of the waste that goes into a climate/environmental ‘conference’… With so much technology surely world leaders could learn to use other means such as video calls…Not only would it be better for the environment, but also save taxpayer $$.
I agree with you David that everyone should do their part in taking care of the environment, however I think an essential part of this is to end or at least limit consumerism. We just seem to want everything….I’m sure most of the world’s issues would be sorted if we just stopped buying stuff we didn’t need… We wouldn’t need the amount of natural resources to fuel the factories and industries that manufacture/transport/retail these things….No demand for these resources, no fighting for the control of them… No push for profits, no big business agenda…. But alas…it is not so!
Thanks for bringing this up…as much as I don’t fully understand climate change…but i do understand the need to respect our environment…whether the earth is dying or not.. I mean we don’t clean our houses because we think they’ll burn down tomorrow right?? We do it because we care and respect where we live…silyl analogy really, but it makes sense to me
Reply
Jeff, Coco and Billykat, change will be forced on us. Question is: just how bad will things get before we change the crazy way the world is run? When will we put survival before accumulating things we don’t really need, things that don’t make us happy?
We have been sold a lemon. Our lifestyle is unsustainable. Our values are nil!
Reply
I think the problems have already been solved. The salutions have not been implemitted yet cause they are not cost effective. The majority of us are treated like mushrooms, kept in the dark and fed crap. Barring something drastic, we wont see these changes until most of us living in the West are struggling in 3rd world statis. That is when we no longer have any more capital to be squandered. Peace and goodwill to all!
Reply
David G Reply:
August 16th, 2010 at 11:41 pm
Too true, 76-water! Peace and goodwill to you as well though it’s a shame they are both in such short supply due to greed.
Reply