We have the most difficult part of our garden fence completed. We should be able to get most of it done tomorrow. Today is a rainy day, so I have time to blog.
When did the acceptance of global warming become a litmus test to decide if one was truly "green" or not? How did the belief take on the characteristics of a religion? Polarization is a deadly thing to the thinking process.
I have been interested in ecology since the early fifties, and even then, I was tuned in to climate change. The competing scenarios then, were between those who thought we were at the end of an interglacial period, and those who thought the climate was heating up from ocean currents, fueled by underwater volcanoes. I chose to accept the latter. I live in Minnesota, after all, I couldn't stand it getting colder.
When the greenhouse effect became the popular belief, I accepted it as most of us did. Something was causing those glaciers to melt. When Al Gore's film came out, that appeared to finalize any argument.
All of us "Greens" wanted to end polluting our environment, now it it was imperative. The solution was simple; force industry to clean up its act.
The proposals for doing so were absurd. Cap and Trade? Carbon credits? An extremely cumbersome system that allows industry to very slowly clean up its act [if at all] and allows them to trade pollution rights, back and forth, all at taxpayers expense. Taxpayers end up paying for the industry clean-up without any guarantee that it will work.
People seemed to stop thinking about solutions. Polarization became so extreme that if you questioned the proposed solutions, you were a "denier". All of a sudden discussion ground to a halt and you were forced to be on one side or another. One could no longer make the statement, "I think global warming is probably a fact but our proposed solutions are nonsense." At least I never get a chance to make that statement.
I know, personally, only one individual who has the credentials of a climate scientist. Like most of the rest of you, I have to rely on people I trust and tune my B.S. detector as finely as I can. This one person, a close relative, believes that the data, as presented, indicates that global warming is real but we are way to late to stop the effects.
How did this polarization happen? Were groups pitted against each other, purposely, in a way, to assure that nothing would get done? Is that possible? I know that when the tea party folks came out against global warming; then I was sure global warming must be a fact.
What do we know? While the debate continues, pollution gets worse. Does it matter if we drown or just can't breathe? We need to rise up and demand that pollution end. We don't need to believe in global warming to do this, and we must do this, if we are to survive {or at least thrive} as a species.
We don't need a corporate/friendly solution. I don't think that is possible. We need to enact laws against pollution and be willing to shut down non-compliant industries.
Of course, readers of this blog know, that I believe, the consciousness of man is rapidly expanding to the degree, that pollution, as we now experience it, will not be a possibility in the new world.
I will be able to point to evidence of this soon.
Love and Peace, Gregg
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