Monday, November 22, 2010

Ignorance ain't Bliss

At the facility where I work, much of my job involves talking about the environment and getting people to adapt eco-friendly habits for the benefit of every living organism on this planet. To be clear, I’m not asking anyone to do extreme stuff like getting on a boat and using their own bodies to defend whales from harpoons… in reality, all I usually ask is for everyone to remember to throw their trash in the proper place, recycle when you can, minimize the use of plastic bags, and so on. And I do what I can to make the message as entertaining as possible while retaining the importance of the lesson. When you consider that it is the quality of our lives that is at stake, you’d think that everyone would want to hear what I and my colleagues have to say. So why is that not the case?? Why is it that whenever the topic of the conversation turns to the environment or conservation, most people automatically give you a deaf ear and a blank stare?

I find it rather bizarre that people are willing to shell out thousands of pesos to watch the upcoming Taylor Swift concert – or any concert, for that matter (just to be clear, I’ve nothing against Taylor herself) – but refuse to accept free invitations to talks on how to conserve water! I mean hello! This is water we’re talking about! The substance each of us needs to survive! If you don’t take any for three days, you DIE! Obviously, without water you won’t be attending Taylor’s concert in February…

Am I the only one who thinks this situation is completely absurd??

Why is it that we have become a society that values entertainment so much that we consider it a top priority when deciding how to spend our time and money? As an example, I understand that many people find dolphin shows fascinating and amusing: they love watching the marine mammals as they jumps through flaming hoops, the acrobatic mid-air twirls, and their engaging “smiles”. But after being entertained by these animals, do you even care what happens to them? Are you touched enough by what you saw that you decide to learn all you can about dolphins in captivity? Because if you did, you wouldn’t like what you’ll discover; in fact, you will most probably regret having gone to that dolphin show in the first place! And that’s really my point: when it comes to choosing between what’s important and what’s fun, the important stuff gets left by the side of the road because the fun stuff is the focus of all our attention.

Now don’t get me wrong, I’m not trying to be some killjoy out to prevent anybody from having a good time. I enjoy having fun just as much as the next person. However, I believe I know enough to tell when the fun must stop and serious action must take its place, or when I must admit to not knowing enough about something that I must take the time to study it further before my fun can continue. And for the longest time ever since I was young, I was of the impression that all adults were responsible and thought things through this way. Imagine my disappointment when I grew up and finally realized that the world isn’t populated with responsible adults. The nagging question in my head now is: why is this so?

Is it really so hard to understand that the water which we all must drink to survive has to be protected at their source, which in most cases in our country are watersheds surrounded by lush, virgin forests? That consequently, allowing illegal loggers unhindered access to such forests directly threatens our own access to clean drinking water? In a similar manner, do people really think that the candy wrappers or cigarette butts they throw out of the windows of the vehicles they are riding will somehow disappear forever just like that? Is it so difficult to fathom that an “out of sight, out of mind” attitude is extremely unrealistic and irresponsible in this context, since plastics simply do not melt away and evaporate like an ice cube would, but instead they persist and release toxins into our waterways, infiltrating the marine food web and the seafood we eat? As a result, we end up consuming the plastic trash we ourselves carelessly threw out in the first place!

Does what I’m saying sound too farfetched to be true? Then perhaps you haven’t been listening to what my colleagues around the world have been saying for the past few decades. But even without going through all the scientific and anecdotal evidence, you need only consider the high incidences of cancer among people of all ages as well as the increasing reports of developmental disorders being found in newborns and young children, and then mull over the fact that these kids were born into an era where the cities have a constant smoggy haze floating above them, where toys covered with lead-based paints are actually the norm and not the exception, where babies regularly drink from bottles that release toxins when heated, and where plastic, not plankton, is already the dominant ‘inhabitant’ in some of the world’s oceans, outnumbering aquatic organisms 6 to 1.

We eat, drink, breathe, walk through, and swim in all manner of toxic filth, yet instead of channeling all our available resources into generating solutions for these problems (which, by the way, we created in the first place), we continue to act like everything in our world is okie-dokie, as if willfully ignoring the problems will somehow make them go away. Additionally, we choose to entertain rather than to educate ourselves, preferring to splurge on the latest electronic gadgets, CDs, clothes, cars, cigarettes (or whatever habit-forming substance strikes your fancy), and going to the latest gigs, fancy malls, and celebrity events, because these are FUN…

Is being diagnosed with cancer, and then taking an agonizing 10 months to slowly, painfully deteriorate and die… is that fun?? Or how about bringing into the world a child saddled with all kinds of developmental and physical disorders, and then having to pay for the astronomical medical expenses necessary to treat all that child’s symptoms, only to have him or her die young anyway… is that fun as well??

Perhaps what I and others like me have to say cannot be considered fun; in fact, I will admit that it can be downright depressing. But I assure you it is as important to every one of us as breathing. Imagine, if we all decided that breathing is boring and simultaneously stopped respiring, the human race would be extinct in 10 minutes!

Is something like THAT (simultaneous human asphyxiation) ever occurring an absurd thought? Most definitely it is, and it is just as absurd as the attitude many people have when they ignore the environmental crisis at hand. “Ignorance is bliss” may be true for a while, but this is like ignoring a small fire in your home kitchen: pretending it isn’t there will not make it go away, and it may very well grow to consume your home and everything in it, including yourself and your family. And that is an apt metaphor for what is happening today: a ‘fire’ of environmental degradation is slowly but surely consuming the planet that is our only home, and unless we all choose to do something about it – initially by educating ourselves on what the problems are and then taking it from there – we may soon end up watching as our home, our loved ones and eventually we ourselves are consumed as well.









I imagine if our Mother Earth could talk, this is what she'd be saying...

1 comment:

  1. Your post is provocative. Keep it up to build awareness and understanding.

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