Cartoon by Wayne Stayskal, from Slate Magazine Online
I join Tankwoman in her musing on why global warming is not the frontpage headline on every newspaper in every state in every country. But, the simple truth is that it's not. A crisis which may be far more universally dangerous than international terrorism is being largely ignored by most people. Seth Godin says it's because it's not being marketed well,
We are facing what might be the greatest threat ever to the future of mankind. And yet no one is marching in the streets, the outrage is largely intellectual and action is slow.
Is the lack of outrage because of the population's decision that this is bad science or perhaps a thoughtful reading of the existing data?
Actually, the vast majority of the population hasn't even thought about the issue. The muted reaction to our impending disaster comes down to two things:
1. the name.
Global is good.Warm is good. Even greenhouses are good places. How can "global warming" be bad? I'm not being facetious. If the problem were called "Atmosphere cancer" or "Pollution death" the entire conversation would be framed in a different way.
2. the pace and the images.
One degree every few years doesn't make good TV. Because activists have been unable to tell their story with vivid images about immediate actions, it's just human nature to avoid the issue. Why give up something we enjoy now to make an infintesimal change in something that is going to happen far in the future?
and he may be right - the last point in particular strikes me as true. It's not really that the images aren't out there - they are, I'm afraid, from the carcasses of polar bears that have drowned trying to swim from ice floe to ice floe, to villages in Africa where entire populations are starving because increasing desertification has made water entirely unavailable for agricultural or personal use. But we don't see these images very often, and when we do they are alien and distant. Wild animals, African villages. Too bad, huh? Hey man, it's almost time for "Lost," isn't it?
But the reality of the problem is a lot closer to home than most of us know. Do you, gentle reader, know that yesterday was World Water Day? That a weeklong international meeting on the future of the world's fresh water resources ended yesterday in Mexico City, the World Water Forum? We are all aware by now that oil scarcity is a looming global crisis, but how many of us are aware that there is a global water shortage crisis, instrinsically linked to global warming, that will threaten the "security, stability and sustainability of the planet and, consequently, of humanity itself." This quote is from an Environmental News Service article on the Water Forum, Global Warming Will Make Water Crisis Intolerable, which I urge you to read at your earliest convenience.
And, in the midst of one of the worst Southwestern droughts in fifty years, I am myself moving to the high desert of New Mexico. Should I have my head examined? (Although right here in the normally damp and humid coastal Mid-Atlantic we are daily having serious brush and forest fires, having had no rain at all in well over a month, and ongoing high winds.) Maybe so, but there are compelling reasons for the move. And to prepare for life in such a totally different climate, I have been researching xeriscape gardening and water conservation in all its aspects.
I had no idea how to organize all the information I had been gathering, until Jeff at Sustainablog called my attention to his Squidoo Lens on worm composting. I hsd no idea what a "lens" in this sense might be. Now I not only know, I have one of my own. It's a great way to gather information on a subject into one easily accessible location. My lens is called Stranger in a Dry Land, and it's both a learning and a teaching experience. I am learning from these resources, and hoping to share them with anyone else who cares to explore these ideas. Water conservation is an issue that will increasingly affect us all, wherever we live. Rainwater harvesting is one I have been practicing for quite some time, greywater use is one I plan to utilize more.
If you have links or book titles that will help out with this project, please leave them in the comments, this is most definitely a Work in Progress, and something like this should really be a community project.
Cartoon by Wayne Stayskal, from Slate Magazine Online
