Not to be a Debbie Downer or to sound like Chicken Little, but we are creating our future right now and we’re doing a poor job of it. The news surrounding climate change is getting worse and worse and people just don’t seem to care. My day job is frightening me, because as I talk to people about our product (wind-generated, pollution-free electricity) I see that their only concern is the price of our service (which is competitive). I have been told:
- “I don’t give a rat’s ass about the environment, just the price.”
- “I’ve been a customer of … for years and years and won’t change, no matter what you tell me.”
- “Yes, your product is less expensive and I understand it doesn’t pollute, but the saving just aren’t enough for me to change.”
From the “GASAN” Facebook group
I see people parking their gasoline-powered vehicles in charging spots, reserved for electric vehicles, showing either complete ignorance or an actual animosity toward those trying to make a difference, and I am dumbfounded. I see Hummers driving around with only one passenger and am angered.
There is a small group of people out there switching to electric vehicles and plug-in hybrids which gives me hope, but I’m afraid it may be too little, too late. Their camaraderie puts a smile on my face. Often another EV driver will wave or flash his/her lights at me and we’ll smile at one another, realizing we’ve found a like-minded person in a sea of (best-case) ignoramuses or (worst-case) self-centered jerks.
Our elected officials (especially here, in Texas) appear to be oblivious to the change that is occurring, but I fear that it goes much deeper than that. I now believe they are bought-and-paid-for representatives of those who have too much to lose if we change our energy industry.
I am astounded by the short-sightedness of this. Do these people not have children or grandchildren? Do they cling to the hope that an amazing breakthrough will develop that stops climate change while still allowing us to treat the world the way we currently do? Do they believe that their fortunes will allow them to escape the effects they’re helping to bring about, while not caring about the rest of humanity that will be decimated? Don’t they see what’s coming?!?
I’m not just talking about climate change. We are starting to genetically modify our food sources as if we fully understand the genome of various species and how genomes between species interact, via the food chain.
Man has such hubris. When coupled with a very short memory (or worse, ignoring said memories), we are damned to repeat horrible errors with ever more dire consequences. Remember the Thalidomide tragedy of the 1960’s? We invented an anti-nausea drug, gave it to pregnant women with morning sickness. Great idea, right? Well, no. It unleashed birth defects on the unborn children.
How about DDT? We developed a pesticide which we now know causes liver damage (including cancer), reproductive problems and damages the nervous system. Although outlawed in the United States in 1972, it is still being used in other parts of the world and is still found in our environment! I remember trucks driving around my town, spraying pesticide to kill mosquitoes. Kids thought it fun to ride their bicycles behind the trucks, in the cloud of pesticide and parents didn’t seem to care.
How about the tobacco industry’s denial of health issues related to their product’s use? Surely, you remember that… You don’t have to think back very far, because it is still going on as recently in 2003!
What’s the common theme here? In my opinion, it is that people with a financial stake in a product or way of life, will deny deleterious effects of said product/lifestyle in favor of riches (even deny them to themselves). We, as a species, remain short-sighted, when there’s money and comfort on the line. We as a people allow these same interests to manipulate our politics in order to preserve their position. We allow their mouthpieces to spew disinformation because we are convinced the “other side” is lying.
I wish I had answers. Truly I do. As long as we remain sheep, as long as we allow ourselves to be pitted against one another, just to keep the debate going, rather than to begin making change, as long as we allow our power to be usurped by not becoming an informed and active electorate, things will continue to progress the way they have.
We will wake up, eventually.
I pray we don’t slumber too long.
Companies rule over us by proxy, because politicians need their money just to get their names known to us. To get that money, they have become the representatives of the money sources, rather than of the citizens who elected them.
I encourage everyone to register to vote AND THEN VOTE. My recommendation is that we all print the name of every elected official that is currently in office for our precinct, city, county/parish, state, as well as our federal officials and vote them out of office. Ignore the paid advertising. Ignore the speeches. With the podium paid for by the special interests, they will tell us what they think we want to hear. Their best bet is to keep the citizenry polarized so it’s an us against us war.
Let’s make it us against them.
We are the boss. The politicians are our paid servants, not celebrities or someone worthy of our deference. We need to remind the politicians of this by jerking the chain the Constitution gives us. If every current politician is voted out of office, we will have sent the message that there’s a new sheriff in town and that we demand that our servants start acting like our servants.
A little revolution from time to time is a good thing, especially if it’s constitutional…
