Monday, October 26, 2009

Three Hundred and Fifty!



As the International Day of Climate Action (350 day) swept over the globe in a wave of demonstrations (and hopefully longer-lasting shared sentiments), I made my small contribution to the cause. Despite the driving rain, Colin and I headed out to mow our "official" 350 in the clover of the upper field. It's actually a bit smaller than the old one, the small clover patch was the only good display medium left on the farm, not like the bountiful bouquet of grasses covering many acres that I could pick from in the Summer.

There were demonstrations in Wolfville, Halifax, Ottawa (where protesters disrupted the House of Commons) and all over the world, now lets turn this sentiment into positive action to actually change things! We need to demand that the world's powers that be place our life-giving planet at the top of their priorities, where it should be. At the same time we can't continue taking, taking, taking while wanting government to do things for us, this is a problem created by 6,000,000,000+ people, or more accurately a small percentage of those taking far more than their share. The government is (or should be) a reflection of the people and if the people are complacent consumers, or worse yet, actively wallowing in the vast (and very temporary) material wealth created by exploiting millions of years of fossil sunlight, we're going to have similarly minded leaders in charge pushing for more of the same and denying that there's even a problem (look no further than our current government). Sure, the government has the power to regulate industry (and it will have to if there's going to be change) but we forget that we as individuals are largely responsible for that industry and many of the Earth's problems as whole by buying their products and amassing far more "stuff" than we really need. WE are the ones most responsible and we also hold the most power to produce positive change!

2 comments:

  1. You said it. We must all take responsibilities for our actions before it is to late to make any meaningful changes. Our love of this consumer driven economy could well be the death of us all.

    I love the 350.:)

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  2. Thanks! I totally agree and appreciate the support.

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