By Hilary S.
I've been an active environmentalist for years, but nothing makes me feel more powerless than two words: "Global Warming." I'm SO done with the debate about whether or not climate change is happening. What I want to know is this: can we as individuals actually do enough to stop it in time, or should we just do what little we can and enjoy the time we have left?
I think a lot of people feel very upset about global warming but do nothing because they feel their individual actions cannot really make a difference. I can understand how someone mostly focused on spending her next paycheck would simply ignore the whole thing; it's too big and scary to think about.
I feel that way too, at times. I know that growing my own food, owning a fuel efficient car, and riding my bike to dinner add up. I make fewer emissions in that moment, but it's hard to overcome the feeling that my singular action is less than a drop in the bucket of melted glacial peaks. Even if I add up everything I do, which is a lot more than the average American, the earth continues to warm and dead sea lions keep showing up on my beach. So sometimes, I just ignore my concerns and drive.
The government's been no help. By heel-dragging for years, the White House has set a terrible example of apathy. If our elected leaders can't do better than declaring CO2 emissions a health threat, we're sort of... in deep trouble.
Yet, I also find that taking action - doing ANYTHING - makes me feel better. When my whole family gets out and bikes to dinner, we're all happier. The simple joys of fresh air and wind on our cheeks give me hope and inspire me to do more. When I resist the urge to buy my kids a new toy and instead offer them an old silky sheet and clothespins, I'm making a difference and my kids are happier than they'd have been with a new "thing." And since it's my children who will suffer most from the effects of global warming, it gives me the resolve to keep trying.
In truth, the White House's recent global warming report indicates that we need massive change now. We need everyone to make significant changes, and I don't know how to make it happen. We need ideas, and then we need to implement them. And while passing belated legislation to slow warming is key, it doesn't seem good enough. Do we need to wait for the government to mandate all the changes we'll need to make if global warming is to be stopped?
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Comments: 11
Very interesting question! I say we do something about it. What about today's children and their children?
Your right Savo but what individual citizens can do isn't even a drop in a bucket.
We recycle the very things that contribute to global warming like plastic so corporations can use it over and cause more environmental destruction at our expense. Why not stop the political scam and stop the use of plastic when other more environmental friendly materials are available?
We need political hacks to stop sucking up to the biggest lobby payoffs and start doing the job they were hired for.
Nothing will get done about global warming or health care or any other problem until the people insist that our congress and president do what is best for the people and not what is best for the corporations and their lobbyists. This country is run by the aggressively greedy and we are all going to parish because of it if we don't stand up and change the way government works. The government should work for our protection, not assist in our victumization.
We will never get anywhere unless we stop corporate lobbying and the states enact term limits.
Obama is on a course of neocon control of the worlds energy sources and his lip service to cleaning up the environment is just another political hack lie.
I feel as you do, Jack. My family is doing all the right things, but there are so many people are us that simply don't care, whether through ignorance or laziness or defiance. We hardly put anything in our garbage can each week for pickup - we use very little to start, compost everything we can, and recycle the rest. When I drive by other homes on the way to work on garbage pickup day, their cans are over-flowing with crap. Recycling containers are over-flowing with plastic bottles. And, at least we have recycling! Many parts of the country don't. As a SCUBA diver and someone who loves the oceans, I feel like crying when I see pictures of that massive island of garbage in the middle of the Pacific, or see an ocean creature with some plastic piece wrapped around it, killing or disabling it.
I fear we have gotten to the political state in this country where only a total catastrophe will make people wake up. When there are mass migrations from the south into the country and anarchy insues, people will start paying attention.
Your right Sheryl and that catastrophe is falling on us now in more ways than one.
When the public does wake up they are going to find America is no longer the free country they thought it was.
And it will be too late to do anything about it, Jack. I don't like to think about it, because my children who are young adults are just starting their lives and like most people want to have children someday. Our love of money and the propaganda that surrounds it in this country is ruining their chances and the chances of their children for long-term survival.
eat drink and be merry, for tomorrow we shall die. Especially the drink part!!!
just kidding. I do have kids, and I am troubled by the prospect of their lives being diminished.
We cannot accomplish anything until the public decides to stand together and end the politically correct rhetoric that is destroying the country.
Charles is that the latest from Limbaugh?
Wolverine figures, death is good anyway. "nearer my God to thee", right? That's what the band played when the Titanic went down.