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Global Warning - Feb 26, 2006 - Printable Version
- Go Ahead, Ignore Me
by Robin Buckallew
Sometimes I get the feeling of "déjà vu all over again". Lately, I feel like I went to sleep and woke up back in the 1970s. In fact, this feeling is so strong that I am convinced I hear the raspy tones of Wolfman Jack coming from my radio, while the strains of "Sugar Sugar" run endlessly through my head (please, make it stop!). As I slip into my bell bottoms and put on my "Make Love Not War" tie-dyed vest, I ponder what could be stirring up such a frightening retrospective. Suddenly, I realize. The déjà vu is coming because I am hearing the dulcet tones of the shortsightedness of the liberal left once again in my ear, moaning and bitching about how we are being "distracted" from the important issues of the day by environmental issues. Perhaps many of you don't realize this, but in 1970, the year of the first Earth Day, the environment was not a liberal issue. It was, in fact, dismissed by those on the left as being merely a distraction from the cause of ending the Vietnam War. The environment became the cause celebré of the conservatives, who also saw it as a distraction from the Vietnam War. Eventually, however, the Republican Party fell out of favor with the American people following the Watergate Scandal. The Vietnam War ended when Richard Nixon, desperate to save his flailing presidency, withdrew the troops. Nixon resigned, Ford fell over a few things, and Carter moved in to take over the White House. Environmental sentiments changed, also. As the Republicans slunk away to lick their wounds and plan their revenge, the left took up the banner of environmental protection, and it has been recognized as a "liberal" issue ever since. Few on the left now remember that they once dismissed this issue as a "distraction". Many on the left, however, are returning to that old refrain, that shortsighted dismissal of the environment as a truly important cause. After a brief burst of popular sentiment following such revelations as Love Canal and Three Mile Island, environmental issues fell out of the top three concerns of most of the country, even though the environment has consistently polled in the top ten issues that people are concerned about. To many, however, it is a luxury issue, something we really can't afford right now when there are so many other, seemingly more pressing issues that must be dealt with. The environment? A distraction. It can wait. Déjà vu.
I am reminded of Todd Rundgren - "Go ahead, ignore me". He was holding a bomb. I can think of no better metaphor for the current situation that the world is facing. While the public shunts aside concerns about the environment, calling them a distraction, a time bomb is ticking. This is no ordinary time bomb, however. No bomb squad can defuse it. It can be defused only by those who built it. Unfortunately, the makers of the bomb have no clue when it will go off, or where. In fact, they are oblivious to its existence. This powerful bomb is perhaps the greatest threat the world has ever faced, and it has one of the most complex fuses ever designed. Who made this bomb? I did. You did. This is our bomb. The fuse is attached to the ignitions of our cars. It is attached to the thermostat, and to the outlet plug on the wall. It is under our sink, and in our toolshed. We built the bomb, we attached it to a myriad of fuses, and we light another fuse on it every time we turn on a light, start our car, or spray pesticides and fertilizers on our lawn. Our lawnmowers, our detergents, our television sets and our refrigerators are also attached to this ticking bomb. This bomb goes by many names - global warming, ozone depletion, pollution, habitat fragmentation, desertification, deforestation - and it has many causes. The causes are rooted deep in our history, in our progress toward greater human health and happiness. This is the greatest irony of all - in seeking a better life for all of us, we are instead endangering our lives. When our ancestors began building this bomb, they didn't know it was explosive. They weren't aware of its potential destructive power. Now, we have no such excuse. We are aware of the consequences of our actions, but still we bicker endlessly over the details. Preservation must get weighed against profit. Conservation must get weighed against development. Ecology must not interfere with the economy. The problems are often seemingly insoluble. It seems much easier to simply dismiss these problems as a distraction, to table them until a later date when perhaps we will have more time, more energy and more willpower to confront them. This is the same shortsighted approach that has characterized the American response to environmental issues. The image of an American public yawning while holding a ticking bomb is like something in a Salvador Dalí painting - or perhaps an Inspector Clouseau cartoon.
It becomes particularly urgent when one considers the news around the world. The ice in the Arctic is melting rapidly. Inuits are dying from falling through the thinning ice, and polar bears are finding themselves stranded too far out to sea to swim back, and are drowning (a polar bear can swim about 100 miles). The Maldive Islands are being swallowed by the rising seas. Glaciers in Greenland are melting, and the rate of thaw is double what science expected it would be. There are signs that the Atlantic conveyor belt that keeps western Europe from being encased in ice is slowing down, and the shutting down of the conveyor belt could plunge much of the region into a new Ice Age. Recently, scientists have produced reports that we are rapidly reaching the "tipping point", where the human induced changes will become irreversible. We are, in short, on a collision course to disaster. The good news? For the first time in the history of the earth, a species has the knowledge and the ability to prevent its own extinction. This is not a distraction from THE issue (alternately defined as the war, poverty, hunger, disease, or even Stockgate by various sources). This IS the issue. Listen to the Earth - it's saying "Go ahead - ignore me".
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