O.P.T 4 Green Youth Conservation board

When does something become wrong? Where is the line that says “you should not do this”? Does it start when you hurt someone physically, or can it go deeper, hurting them mentally or spiritually? Do animals feel when you hurt them? All of these are questions that no one can answer perfectly, and I am not even going to pretend to be able to do so, but I think that I can explain the mentality of what causes people to “do wrong”.

First of all in today’s world convenience is what boosts you to the pinnacle of society. If you are super-rich you can afford cooks to get you food, a plane to fly you around the world without having to share the seat next to you, you can buy a car that gets 8mpg and no one will bat an eye. Now days even in lower and middle class society we all beg for convenience. People get loans to buy their houses, then they get loans against the house they have a loan on to buy vehicles, toys (water skis), etc.

Somehow we have even managed to simulate playing games, and meeting with friends (I count myself as an offender in this category; I love my Wii and facebook). So now that we have all this convenience, now that we have reached the point where cooking is popping a bag into the microwave, vacuuming can be done by robots (same with lawn mowing and mopping) and we don’t even have to wash our own dishes; what is next? What can possibly change? Have we made progress, or are we now at the point where we are regressing as a civilization? 

Much of it depends on how you look at certain things. With computer technology I can reach an audience and attempt to inform them about what is going on in our world, but you can also turn that around and say that with computer technology things like terrorism and war have become even more deadly than we could have ever imagined. 

Another big thing is electricity. Now that we have it industry has boomed in the past 100 years, and along with that population. It sounds like complete success, with new technologies the world can support more people, with more people we can become more advanced and make better technologies—the chain just continues on and on. But electricity has also brought upon us some of the worst crises in history. If there were no electricity Pollution would not be as much of a problem, we would not have as much industry that releases air and water contaminants, we would not have to power people’s homes, and there would be no weapons of mass destruction that destroy us and the other beings that we share this planet with. 

Now we are even seeing the effects of overpopulation. There is not enough fresh water to sustain the growth of population that earth is seeing, and there are not enough habitats for endemic animals where population centers are most likely to be located. A prime example of this is the Nile Valley; once a lush, forested area full of wildlife, it is now a major population hub holding well over 64 million people, about 4% of the world’s population in 4,250 square miles of land (about the size of Connecticut). So we do not have enough land or water to sustain the amount of people that could theoretically be on the globe, as a matter of fact there are places where human life is already majorly affected by water shortages. Not only that, but much of the water that is available is not fit to drink. This is a fact that surprised me, and it will likely surprise you as well; undrinkable water is the number one cause of death in the world. Every year over 5 million people die from water born diseases. To me that is a shocking number, it is like wiping Chicago off the face of the earth, then Houston, then in two years LA, then in three more New York, then Cleveland, then Dallas, then Salt Lake City, Oklahoma City, Milwaukee, San Antonio, and Denver. That is a lot of people, too many. 

The point I am trying to make is this: technology can only take us so far, when there is a problem we say, “let the scientists deal with it”, when something annoys us some entrepreneur comes out with that fancy contraption that does it for you—but when is the point that we are relying on those things too much? We litter, and expect it to be cleaned, industry spews toxic fumes , and expects to “offset” it with trees. To a point those things work, but there is a time when we are past that point. People die every day because of pollution, they die every day because they cannot get water, they die because there is no place for them to go. All of this is so we can sit in our high-chairs and say “look at me, I can do this!” No, my Facebook has not directly killed someone, and no, having cable or a PS3 does not make you evil, but it is time that people think about what they are doing and the affect it will have on others. IF we pollute we kill animals, IF we take habitat of endemic species they go extinct, IF we pour toxic waste into the ocean we kill out neighbors across the sea. Am I over reacting? Maybe, but if we all just try and do our part, even if it is just little things like turning off the lights when we leave the house, then we can make the world a better place, then we can survive, then we can advanced and not all become vegetables who sit in hover chairs and play virtual golf without even looking around us and experiencing the truly good things in life (if you do not get this part go watch Wall-e).

My plug is done, I hope that it inspires somebody. It would be wonderful if everyone who reads this blog can tell us one “little” thing they do to help the world. I will start it off, I pick up my trash…..and now I am ready to listen and see what ideas you have about the subject.