As should be clear from my last post, I think our demise by self-induced ecocide was set in motion by certain inherent traits, evolutionarily derived - thanks to random happenstance and natural selection - long before the currently popular bogeyman, Industrial Civilization, kicked it into overdrive. Still, the iDiots video is hilarious for its condemnation of our particular brand of modern collective stupidity.
With holidays and family obligations (most pleasurable obligations, I'm not complaining!) impending, I may not post very often for a while. There is no need to - everything remains the same. Just look around - trees are dying from pollution; the ecosystem is in collapse. For newcomers, the archives are there - for instance, this post with excerpts from the Royal Society's report, Ground-level ozone in the 21st century: future trends, impacts and policy implications, is as good a place to get started as any.
Instead of blogging for a while, I'll likely be posting more short updates at The Panic Room and EarthwRecked on facebook, for those who want to join groups there. Any thoughts, questions, or other comments are always welcome though - email me at witsendnj @ yahoo.
If this embed gets taken down, here's the link to the vimeo version.
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Hey Gail,
ReplyDeleteEnjoy the holidays and don't worry about posting every few days. Though i'll miss your thoughts and links, i'll be content knowing you're living life to the fullest while we still can!
Tom
Hi Gail,
ReplyDeleteHaving to put the bar somewhere, I decided not to ever do facebook. So, I will not know what is going on in the panic room. Thank you for the absolutely incredible work you've done to this day.
Yesterday, I was in one of the big parks in the center of montreal. They finally started cutting HUGE trees to avoid accidents. The centers of the cut trees are completely empty...
Second son, 28, is barricaded with profound depression in his room in our apt since a few weeks. I have nothing to tell him to motivate him to do anything for his future. Just waiting.
Thanks Tom...and Michelle, I'm so sorry about your son. It is a waiting game. Like there is a trainwreck about to happen and it's impossible to look away, no matter how much we want to. Can you send me some pix of the trees?
ReplyDeleteMichele, if I may, encourage your son to live his life despite the future - it makes no difference so one should enjoy the moments they have. A zen story to illustrate the point goes something like: a guy is chased to a cliff by two hungry tigers. In desperation he leaps off only to fall about 10 ft before luckily snatching a vine growing out of the cliff face. As he's hanging on for dear life, the tigers above him and a shear drop to the bottom, two mice come from opposite ends and begin gnawing on the vine. Just then he sees a wild strawberry plant tangled in the vine and plucks one - how sweet the taste!
ReplyDeleteI hope he can delve into the deeper meaning of the tale.
Tom
here it is, I mangled it of course:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.101zenstories.com/index.php?story=18
A Parable
Tom
my son is 28. He knowns what is happening. As I already said it many times, here in the city, the trees (and all vegetation for that matter) is in a very advanced stage of decaying. The birds, squirrels, racoons and all sort of animal life that was abundant has all but disappeared. My son does not have a job (where he would have to endure stupid guys of his age completely oblivious to what is happening). So he does not have money and cannot move or do anything but watch things on his computer (including porn, I'm sure). He will never have a family of his own, neither a house, or anything that he always thought made a life livable. It is already death all around us. He does not and will not have a companion, or children, because he knows it is useless now. And when you know how close the end is, how can you invest energy in a new relationship?
ReplyDeleteI am completely sick (this is not against you tom) of being told to enjoy life, enjoy what is left, take advantage of what I have, and blahblahblah... This is not a fairy tale we are living in, this a death spiral where the beautiful nature and the blue sky and the pure air and the clear water +++ are definetely things of the past. For ever.
My son is already in hell, and paradise can only exist on the screen for him from now on. With me paying the rent, and the food, and the telephone, and the internet, etc. Nothing will change for the better.
Yes Michelle I too am finding it rather difficult to "enjoy what is left" because it's so fucking ugly. It like enjoying a stinking decomposing body. I try to concentrate on the birds (I feed them) and my family.
ReplyDeleteMichele: I understand, being a functioning depressive myself (I've known in my soul that we'd "pay the price" one day since my teen years) and completely empathize with him (and you - I too find it hard to "enjoy" watching it all decay and fade day by interminable day). It was just a suggestion and is still true: our attitudes are the only thing we can change at this point and we're going out either way and time is running out.
ReplyDeletehumbly,
Tom
Hi Gail, Michele, all:
ReplyDeleteIt just gets worse by the week (shit, it's every effing DAY) now. Here's some crazy headlines from around the blogosphere you might be interested in.
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/11/24/sunday-review/the-year-the-monarch-didnt-appear.html?smid=tw-share&_r=3&
(which concludes:)
First and foremost, said Dr. Tallamy, a home for bugs is a matter of food security. “If the bees were to truly disappear, we would lose 80 percent of the plants,” he said. “That is not an option. That’s a huge problem for mankind.”
http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2013/11/21/2977521/botswana-secret-frack/
Botswana Secretly Fracks World’s Second-Largest Wildlife Preserve After Kicking Out The San People
(oh, you're gonna love this - prime example of industrial civilization running over indigenous people and wildlife living in harmony with the earth)
and, before we get to the continuing disaster that's Fukushima, there's this:
http://robinwestenra.blogspot.co.nz/2013/11/oil-pipeline-explosion-in-china.html
Oil Pipeline Explodes In China, Killing 35 And Setting The Ocean On Fire
and, finally
http://robinwestenra.blogspot.co.nz/2013/11/fukushima-radiation_24.html
Sunday, 24 November 2013
Fukushima radiation
Comments from Mike Ruppert -
I believe that the reality is starting to sink in that so much radiation has been released from Fukushima that our fates may have already been sealed. Bear in mind that none of the continuing releases over the last 32 months have been stopped yet. Every day the rads just keep on pumping.
300 tons of radioactive water a day, plus many direct discharges from nearly full and deteriorating storage tanks. Add to that, recent stories here confirming that TEPCO is just going to dump contaminated water directly into the Pacific seeing no other options.
Japan continually incinerating radioactive waste directly into the atmosphere. I thought this had been stopped but in recent weeks we have seen multiple confirmations that it has never stopped. Atmospheric readings are currently showing the highest levels of radiation in North America since the earthquake. They have been posted here.
Emissions from three cores deep in the ground through ground water and occasional (perhaps continual) steam venting into the atmosphere.
FOIA documents from the NRC shown by Hatrick Penry saying that 100% of the fuel pool at #4 burned in the original fuel pool/zirconium fires after the explosion. (This may or may not be accurate. We simply cannot know.) Personally, I believe that a sizable amount of spent fuel remains at 4 but that much more was burned and released than has been admitted.
A fuel pool above the exploded Unit 3 that is no longer visible in any photograph. Where is it? Where is that spent fuel?
Spent fuel pools at 1 & 2, the conditions of which cannot be known (or haven't been disclosed) because the areas are too hot. According to Helen Caldicott there are/were six spent fuel pools at Daichi.
And now this...
“A very alarmingly high number”
Magazine: Fukushima released up to 100,000 times more cesium-137 in surface ocean waters than Chernobyl or nuclear weapons testing
It's okay though, it's Thanksgiving week and Lord knows we have so much to be thankful for . . . .
Tom