How Long Can We Get Away With This?

Edition #130 — April 28, 2010

There's no better time to rub the crude slime of reality into the face of ignorance than during a major human failure of epic "I told you so!" proportions. What could well have been avoided has happened and we have a wide open window of opportunity to analyze our collective actions toward global self destruction.

Residents of Louisiana's coastline are in the path of yet another disaster. As I write, helpless emergency workers are bobbing around in boats, scratching their heads about how to avert a major environmental catastrophe from heading inland on the Gulf of Mexico. Sadly, such crucial thinking always seems to occur after the fact, rather than as a preventative measure.

As many already know, last week their offshore oil rig exploded and immediately oil began leaking from the hole they had drilled into the ocean floor to make money selling that oil. As of today, their last resort is setting fire to this expanding toxic mass that brings a slow, black death to all life in its path. Beyond this, these guardians of our environment are helpless to save the wetlands, animals and people of the coast.

Greed And Denial

Each year, needless ecological and economic destruction is being forced upon the innocent and the environments upon which their lives depend. Naturally, this always happens far from the gated lives of those who profit from putting the rest of the world at risk. This includes the energy executives and lobbyists who recently won a victory that allows them to increase offshore oil exploratation along US territorial waters. What this means is more people bobbying helplessly in the water waiting for death to come ashore.

It was only a few weeks ago that we watched a Chinese transport ship laden with about 65,000 tons of coal and 950 tons of oil threatening catastrophe upon Australia's precious and singularly unique Great Barrier Reef. The accident occured because the captain took a shortcut. It was faster than following the rules that would have respected nature. In light of this common way of thinking, I must wonder how long nature will allow us to take our shortcuts? How much longer can we further punish an already ailing ocean environment and planet?

Wanted: More Oil Spills

Humankind should be on suicide watch. Look at the decisions we make as a species in how we choose to eat what can no longer be considered food; how we tear up precious farmland to make room for crowded concrete bunkers and shopping malls; how we kill animals to the last specimen to avoid disrupting our lifestyles; how we refuse to change course in the face of oncoming peril. And now we have also given the green light to further offshore oil exploration in ever more delicate and unique environments along the US coastline.

How long do you think we can get away with this? Or is this how we express a common desire to end our lives? Maybe our problem is that we no longer care if we live or die because we can't find a reason to exist. Consider this - if you had been given a choice to be born, would you have chosen this life?

Let us prove ourselves worthy of this precious gift, if we dare.



Subscribe to free newsletter
Search Realitycheckers.com