Three Fingers Back At You

Australia's decade long drought has caused food shortages in a first world nation who is now required to ship in bottled water to support some of its major municipalities. Global warming is an accepted, irrefutable fact. Acceptance of this fact was difficult to come by, and maintaining clarity long enough to do something about it is proving to be even more difficult. Those who benefit from our collective indifference use fear to manipulate us into resisting the change that is required to pull us off this unsustainable path of consumption, excess, and destruction. Technology, blame, and the economy are all used as justification to stay the course.

Technology may someday provide some answers to address our current pollution intensity but it will not provide a solution to our current consumption intensity. We've already reached the limit on many of our resources - technology cannot reverse that.

It is easy to fall into a state of blame-fuelled apathy. The bigger the target, the easier it is to slough off the blame. China, India, the USA, Walmart, McDonald's, and Exxon are all easy targets. Yet would China and India's thirst for industrialization be where it is if the West hadn't defined the standard of living that everyone has come to expect? Would Walmart, McDonald's, or Exxon even exist if we didn't provide the overwhelming demand for their products?

I am told that any plan to address global warming and other environmental issues must take the economy into account. The irony of putting our consumption-based economy's continuous growth ahead of the long term needs of the planet whose resources are required to fuel this growth should not be lost on anyone. Yet here we are and there we go.

“Let everyone sweep in front of his own door, and the whole world will be clean.” - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749 - 1832)