Global Warming All Over Your Ass

[dotinthesky]

When I lived in Canada, whenever a topic of conversation went serious - frakenstein food, globalization, destruction of the planet - some of my friends would interrupt by saying "oh, Amazon forest conversation." It was their way of saying the topic was another highly serious one which shouldn't/couldn't affect their lives; or that it was a cliche to talk about something so heavy, overly played out in the media. They would rather think about the latest fashion trend then the consequences of drinking coffee ground by exploited workers.

I wonder if the current bandwagon-jumping on global warming fears is a little too similar to the one two decades ago when people became worried about the Amazon forest disappearing. At the time, Sting went to Brasil and visited the natives in the forest; millions proclaimed that Brasil should stop destroying the world's lung; but then something else went on the front pages and the story slowly disappeared out of view. I would like to believe that the current warnings on global warming will change the world, but who can say how oh-so-predictably-crap-at-hearing-warnings human beings will react? Will the papers be interested in this story by next year?

My feelings tend to go from extreme negativity to positivity. This morning, looking at the weekend newspapers, I'd swear on the Bible that we were heading for deep shit. How could we not? We as a species refuse to memorize our history lessons. In doubt, read Jared Diamond's Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed. Many human civilizations have been destroyed before and it wouldn't be impossible for ours to go the same route. If you add up all the stories in the papers - collapsing fisheries, escalating civil wars, disappearing water resourses, etc - it's enough to make you wish Virgin would hurry up with their space flights so you could book yourself on the next one to the Moon. And the majority of news editors and journalists don't help matters by scarying the public with twisted stories on the government's upcoming green taxes.

But this evening, on my gym's treadmill, with The Kooks on the stereo, and all these different people sweating beside me, it became obvious that in some aspects we are no longer like our ancestors, and perhaps we won't commit the same errors they committed. Sure, there's a vast majority of people who don't give a crap and will continue leaving their lights on when they leave their home, but the percentage of people who are not like that is higher than ever before. In the past, civilizations collapsed sometimes due to factors beyond their control (e.g. enemies or viruses) but the vast majority of them suffered because they didn't understand how important their environment was to them. We are no longer like that.

That the shit is going to hit the fan is obvious. Rich countries are going to have to deal with masses of refugees in the future, and probably the rise of extreme right-wing politics as a consequence; but there will also be places where environmentalism will show definite improvements in people's lives, and this will in turn encourage other communities to follow suit. I have to believe things will turn out OK, otherwise I might as well not get out of bed.

Comments

[commonpeople.livejournal.com]

I've read some stories recently in the national papers of the drought going on in Australia, and how the desert is growing into the farmlands. It's sad that so much will be lost before the population forces the government to take an attitude. It seems like the polls in England are doing the talking and the government is finally willing to put it at the top of their agenda, but now the papers over here are trying to scare us into believing we'll lose our money on taxes. But to me, if the taxes are in place to revert the damage, then for god's sake tax us all!

[sor-eye-ah.livejournal.com]

Well . . . It's a bit tricky really. Australia never had much 'natural' farmland. There weren't the grassy open plains of the US, most of the fertile farmland (ie: where my parents are esp) came from the early settlers bulldozing 100's of hectares of forest, bush and -swamp-. The land here as been so royally fucked around with in the last 200 years that it's incredible.

We've just had the hottest October in 92 years. Grain prices are already on the rise (there is talk of companies only dealing with existing customers and restricting the amount of feed to be trucked in for animals) and there are people already running out of water - something that wouldn't usually happen until Feb/March - the end of summer.

We're on Stage 1 water restrictions. A normal part of life over summer, can't water your lawn, hose your car down, water your garden during certain times. (basically the water restrictions you guys got to at the end of last summer). But as I've mentioned -we're not in summer yet. We're in Spring, which is meant to be one of the wettest seasons of the year in Aus.

I'm kinda glad not to see Summer in Aus this year. Drought is a gut wrenching thing; it will be spread over the news when all the animals start dying, they'll show the big pits that are dug to take all the dead bodies. Water restrictions will most likely get to the level where you're only allowed to take showers for a certain amount of time - or perhaps even every second day (I remember one year we got down to once a week showers and sponge baths the rest of the time). I think the rest of the world has little concept of drought!

What makes me sad though is the waste here. There are no water recycling plans (they're -thinking- about it). True, the land is unsuitable for domestic farming on the most part - but alternatives aren't really pushed; I guess most people don't want to eat roo as part of their diet. There is talk that it's El Nino and not global warming but really; there is a natural cycle and then there is totally fucked.

Drought is part of the natural cycle - but it shouldn't and didn't happen this often. In my life time we've seemed to bounce chaos like from one season of drought to the next, only years apart. At least here it's still green - living in the most fertile part of this country has it's plus sides. But it's very, very sad.

[commonpeople.livejournal.com]

Do you sense in the people around you a similar attitude to how things are, i.e. that it's sad the state things have reached and something has to change. Is there, in other words, a possibility of a green revolution in Australia (despite the government)?

[sor-eye-ah.livejournal.com]

Some, but not many. General mentality is a hard thing. Most people aren't sensetive enough to notice small changes and aren't strong enough to stand up and voice something iabout it.

Eg: I have a teacher at school about is about 5 months pregnant now. She came in the other day with -freshly dyed hair-. You don't EVER dye your hair if you're pregnant! I just looked at her, stunned. "You dyed your hair!!?" she just shrugged and said "hey, it's not proven."

It may not be proven, and even if it is, so many people won't listen to it. And that is what you're working with.