January 18th, 2011
By some coincidence, my hubby and I were introduced to the movie, The 11th Hour, which is produced and narrated by Leonardo Dicaprio, and discusses the future of our planet given the way people are treating it now. The movie is not exactly new, as it was released in 2007, but we only learnt about it recently.
The movie documentary left us with many feelings.
I felt very sad about the sufferings, to man and other living creatures, that were caused by Man’s irresponsible actions. Seeing pictures of polar bears scrambling amongst rubbish piles (where’s the ice??), dead human bodies floating in the water of a climate-change-triggered flood and a giant turtle struggling to breathe on a dry beach — made it worse.
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I started to understand a question that a young friend of mine, Vincent, posed to me previously — is growth necessarily good? While “growth” usually has a good connotation, the “growth” as we (the human species) widely define it today — economic growth — the ability to produce more and do more communally, the ability to earn more and own more individually — may not be such a good thing after all. In fact, as the movie suggests, Man’s “growth” could have unwittingly led us to the dire situation we have today. I will find a chance to elaborate more on what the movie shared in a later entry.
All that said, fortunately, the movie also left us with some hope.
Hope, because there are already many people (including many important ones) out there who are aware of the environmental issues we are facing and are doing something about it. We are not alone in our concern for the earth.
Hope, because we are very likely to have the intelligence and technology to make things right, if we put our hearts and minds to it.
Hope, because even if we still continue in our blinded ways and see to Mankind’s own extinction, our planet Earth and the other forms of life living on it, would likely still persistent, and in fact be in happier harmony without us.
Whatever we do to protect our environment, is really, to protect ourselves.
If you have a fellow human you love very much, or have a beloved pet, or aquarium or garden, please, just take a simple first step.
Watch the movie yourself, and you will understand.
(to watch the movie for free, go to http://freedocumentaries.org/int.php?filmID=321)
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April 23rd, 2011 at 1:27 am
The cabability to distribute water fairly and efficiently is also complicated every now and then by the fact that water resources often span political boundaries. Regardless of whether a government hopes to recognize the right to water, its relationship with neighboring nations might impinge upon its ability to accomplish that. Another problem, the one that increases in seriousness with each passing year, is the fact that there exists simply less water to go around. Poor agricultural practices plus the expansion of your world?s deserts have remaining some places without water to dicuss of.