As usual, Fred started my day with a thought provoking post about Al Gore’s latest contribution to the American culture (should I add wars?). I find I share the fears Fred has for the future.
Fragments From Floyd: The Gore Documentary: A Few Words: “Along with Gore, I’ve been watching this scenario develop since the sixties. I left the movie with a deep sadness in the reality that, while some individuals will see the light, in the end, our political system, and those of China and the developing world will not likely jump from the pot until the water has already boiled. We will continue to treat the earth as if it were nothing more than a passive, lifeless concrete block that we do our living on. We will just keep doing what we’ve always done, and we’ll get what we’ve always got, deferred til the next administration, diluted in air or water downstream or invisible in the atmosphere or dumped someplace out of sight or in other ways deferring the true costs of the effluents of our affluence. We can only hide, ignore and defer for so long before we have to pay. “
As I think about the above words again, I find myself saddened by the reality of what is being said. For many years I held out hope that my generation would be the one to wake up to the reality of the fine balance we stand upon in this world. The 1980s seemed to have a start in the right direction, but the overindulgent ’90s appear to have washed all of the good intentions out of the nations conscience. It would seem to me that only with a change in the political will of this country can we expect a real change in the way we treat the environment and the world.
Sadly, I think it says a lot about the way this country is run that we seem to expect the rest of the world to act as we say not as we set the example…And every political add and story talks about “values”, but the values being given all of the ink are not what I would call values at all.
