Killing the oceans slowly
I've posted on this topic before -- and this special report from the Economist, does nothing to make me feel better about the slow suicide the human species is committing. The state of the world's oceans is horrifying. We piss, shit, dump garbage, toxins, chemicals, nuclear waste, and more into our oceans -- and on top of all of that, heavy amounts of CO2 from our consumptive society, is making the oceans 30% more acidic since the industrial revolution. We pillage the ocean using modern, destructive fishing techniques, that scours life off the ocean floor, and dredge entire species out of the depths and onto our plates.
Our collective appetite for destruction knows no end -- as despite the dire warnings from countless experts, and the usual crowd of treehuggers, who, let's face it, have much more foresight than the general public in denial -- we have more plans to plunder the oceans. Oil and natural gas must be everywhere under all that water. Precious metals are there just waiting for the modern prospector willing to go kilometres under the water. And life -- unique, undiscovered and never before tasted by humans -- lie in the dark depths, waiting for our harvest to cure baldness and erectile dysfunction.
When we've finally done to the oceans what we've done to the land, we'll sit back and gaze at the wake of destruction in wonder -- and wonder we will, just what the fuck were we thinking, as we draw our collective last breath, choke and die.
Mostly, my species is such a disappointment.
If we were ignorant of the destruction we wrought, we'd have an excuse -- a poor one, but an excuse nonetheless. But we're not ignorant. We know. We know what we do is wrong. We know that short term thinking is unforgiving in the long term. We know the wrongs we do to the diversity of life on the planet. We know we're killing ourselves slowly. But with false optimism, we think someone else in the future will figure a way to get themselves out of the mess. We fail to see that we are the future, and we are the ones that need to figure a way out of the mess.
Our collective appetite for destruction knows no end -- as despite the dire warnings from countless experts, and the usual crowd of treehuggers, who, let's face it, have much more foresight than the general public in denial -- we have more plans to plunder the oceans. Oil and natural gas must be everywhere under all that water. Precious metals are there just waiting for the modern prospector willing to go kilometres under the water. And life -- unique, undiscovered and never before tasted by humans -- lie in the dark depths, waiting for our harvest to cure baldness and erectile dysfunction.
When we've finally done to the oceans what we've done to the land, we'll sit back and gaze at the wake of destruction in wonder -- and wonder we will, just what the fuck were we thinking, as we draw our collective last breath, choke and die.
Mostly, my species is such a disappointment.
If we were ignorant of the destruction we wrought, we'd have an excuse -- a poor one, but an excuse nonetheless. But we're not ignorant. We know. We know what we do is wrong. We know that short term thinking is unforgiving in the long term. We know the wrongs we do to the diversity of life on the planet. We know we're killing ourselves slowly. But with false optimism, we think someone else in the future will figure a way to get themselves out of the mess. We fail to see that we are the future, and we are the ones that need to figure a way out of the mess.
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