UPDATE: CAME ACROSS THIS ARTICLE TODAY (10/10/21) OF A DIFFERENT VOICE SAYING WHAT I WROTE BELOW A COUPLE MONTHS AGO: https://www.thecut.com/2021/09/how-can-i-fight-climate-change.html
It used to be that a normal guy like me, along with his family, could DO something about pollution. We could throw stuff in our green carts and boxes to be recycled.
I got used to seeing, “Reduce. Reuse. Recycle.”
In the 1970s, as I was growing up, we had Earth Days. Entire schools would turn out to clean up waterways, pick up highways, and generally become better stewards of the Earth. We could do our part! We could help save the Earth – though no one ever, actually thought it was the EARTH that needed saving, but WE who needed saving.
At least some of us understood it that way…
I read Rachel Carson’s SILENT SPRING when I was fifteen. I did my part. As a classroom teacher, I ran off “overheads” https://i.redd.it/rwoqn01wlna71.jpg of 50 THINGS YOU CAN DO TO SAVE THE EARTH. https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/41dGmkr57qL._SL350_.jpg
https://i.ytimg.com/vi/2Mkwhe6LOBo/maxresdefault.jpg
https://api.getepic.com/utils/resize.jpg?jpg_quality=100&url=https%3A%2F%2Fcdn.getepic.com%2Fdrm%2F2%2F75182%2Fcover_large%402x.png&width=600
https://s18670.pcdn.co/wp-content/uploads/this-class-can-save-the-planet-400x400.jpg and worked to create students who could do their part to fight pollution.
And then, this happened: https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/I/51PUuqcrldL._SX339_BO1,204,203,200_.jpg (it’s also clear that the “exemplary board leaders”, who are “the greatest minds in governance” hadn’t read the book, because they ignore the book’s advice.)
We, as a SPECIES were the only thing that stood between extinction and flourishing. It was clear then, that as a single member of the God Species, I was hopelessly helpless. There was NOTHING I could do to save the Earth. I couldn’t possibly speak for any kind of Accord with people in China or India or Uzbekistan or American Samoa…the ONLY people who could make the changes necessary to SAVE THE EARTH now were governments, multinational corporations, billionaire manufacturing companies, and of course the Mother of All Organizations, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
The IPCC “an intergovernmental body of the United Nations mandated to provide objective scientific information relevant to understanding human-induced climate change, its natural, political, and economic impacts and risks, and possible response options.” There are 195 members of the IPCC (see list here: https://www.ipcc.ch/site/assets/uploads/2019/02/ipcc_members.pdf)
For me, the message is clear: “Buzz off, buster, and let the smart people (ie, politicians and scientists, both with numerous and impressive degrees and years of experience in handling BIG problems) save the world!”
If you want it in more inclusive language: “NACD Summit is the largest and most influential director’s forum in the world, attracting more than 3,600 professionals from across the globe…NACD Summit is where the greatest minds in governance convene to take on the most important issues facing today’s boardrooms, collectively discovering the future of exemplary board leadership.”
The invitation is quite clear: only “exemplary board leaders”, who are “the greatest minds in governance” need apply.
“You, puny normal person, can best serve by supporting the IPCC and other GOVERNMENTAL bodies without question and immediately, because they really KNOW what they’re doing because they are the greatest minds in governance…”
Is it any wonder that normal people are objecting to the government telling them what to do? It’s not just in the US (as certain congresspeople would like you to think). France is in turmoil over mandated COVID identification; China has lifted its ban on having more than two children – a third is now welcome (on a stage of impending scarcity, why has this move gone virtually unremarked by the exemplary board leaders and the greatest minds in governance? Even the scientific community has remained silent – when it’s clear that MORE mouths than ever before will clearly stress an already bending world. Australia, that “polite land down under” is experiencing social disruption (https://www.spectator.com.au/2020/06/lockdown-and-the-new-left-privilege/); and everywhere, there’s growing concern about what to do with your Tesla’s battery when it gives out (https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2021/05/millions-electric-cars-are-coming-what-happens-all-dead-batteries -- lots of ideas, but no real plan…) and the blades of broken windmills are ALSO a problem the new green economy hasn’t solved yet: https://www.azocleantech.com/article.aspx?ArticleID=1209.
Will they be? Well…there IS a solution to handle nuclear waste safely – but no one can execute the plan because too many transit points between the spent reactor cores and the storage facility standing empty while Humans argue about the danger of moving the cores…and they’ve been arguing for over 34 years with one administration telling everyone THEY had a plan…and then doing nothing about it…(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yucca_Mountain_nuclear_waste_repository)
I hope the plans to deal with electric car batteries and windmill blades fare better than the plan to deal with spent nuclear fuel rods.
As well, the media and those very same exemplary government leaders, have forgotten to comment that the population of California has risen by over a six million in the past ten years; and Los Angeles gets 100% of its drinking water from the Colorado River – through a massive civil engineering project that is 242 miles (389 km) long (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colorado_River_Aqueduct). Even so, the nation is shocked that fires break out in California – though RECORDS of wildfires have been kept since 1932, California became a state in 1850. The current claim is that the worst fires have happened ONLY since 2000. Hmmm…use the tool. It’s amazingly useful, yet no TV broadcast I’ve seen has used it. It puts California’s wildfires into historical perspective. Amazingly in perspective…
So, do I believe that the climate isn’t changing?
As well, the media and those very same exemplary government leaders, have forgotten to comment that the population of California has risen by over a six million in the past ten years; and Los Angeles gets 100% of its drinking water from the Colorado River – through a massive civil engineering project that is 242 miles (389 km) long (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colorado_River_Aqueduct). Even so, the nation is shocked that fires break out in California – though RECORDS of wildfires have been kept since 1932, California became a state in 1850. The current claim is that the worst fires have happened ONLY since 2000. Hmmm…use the tool. It’s amazingly useful, yet no TV broadcast I’ve seen has used it. It puts California’s wildfires into historical perspective. Amazingly in perspective…
So, do I believe that the climate isn’t changing?
I DO believe Earth’s climate is changing. Ten thousand years ago, my desk would have been under a glacier nearly two kilometers thick. The glaciers melted and inundated the Earth. LIFE did not vanish. Humans may have become scarce, but life adapted.
Do I believe that the god-like powers of Humanity are destroying the planet and wreaking so much havoc on it that massive governmental intervention is the only possible solution to stop us from destroying the planet?
Do I believe that the god-like powers of Humanity are destroying the planet and wreaking so much havoc on it that massive governmental intervention is the only possible solution to stop us from destroying the planet?
I do not believe that. It’s true, Humanity may vanish, but life will remain. Will there be suffering? Yes; but there is suffering in Washington DC, and Beijing, and on the French Riviera, and in Kabul, and in Tokyo (the wealthiest city on Earth) even today, as there has been since these cities were founded.
However, I especially do not believe that we can change our ways by decree of the “greatest minds in government” and the "exemplary board leaders" and the world's most BRILLIANT scientists...
Oh, I could certainly buy a Tesla to save the Earth! I could certainly make sure that scientists flew on jets to meet in the next Real IPCC World Accord Conference, because the Paris Accords were RUINED by stupid people!
But the only part of that sentence that makes any sense to me is “stupid people”, and board leaders, governments, and scientists are all made up of those very same "stupid people". There's one typing this essay, actually.
Image: https://www.compliancesigns.com/media/catalog/product/r/e/recycle-sign-nhb-14263_1000.gif
However, I especially do not believe that we can change our ways by decree of the “greatest minds in government” and the "exemplary board leaders" and the world's most BRILLIANT scientists...
Oh, I could certainly buy a Tesla to save the Earth! I could certainly make sure that scientists flew on jets to meet in the next Real IPCC World Accord Conference, because the Paris Accords were RUINED by stupid people!
But the only part of that sentence that makes any sense to me is “stupid people”, and board leaders, governments, and scientists are all made up of those very same "stupid people". There's one typing this essay, actually.
Image: https://www.compliancesigns.com/media/catalog/product/r/e/recycle-sign-nhb-14263_1000.gif
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