12 July 2009

147 Days - If Everybody Did a Little Bit...

...no one would have to do it all.


As I watch my favourite up-close climate heroes - my husband (Climate Change Emergency Medical Response), our wonderful ecoSanity.org friend Glenn, and our great young friends who are spending their summer cycling across Canada (it's a vast country!) to raise the alarm on climate change - I must admit that I get peeved.


These people are working tirelessly, day in, day out, long hours, long nights, giving it everything they've got (time, money and energy).


Yet I still don't see that uprising, that bandwagon, the joining in, the crest of wild concern that will turn the tide. Why can't everyone else just do a little bit so that I can have my husband back? So that Glenn can make his life sane again? So that ... well, our young friends are probably having a ton of fun on their Pedal for the Planet trip.


If everybody did a little bit, no one would have to do it all, or give it their all. Practically everyone, practically everywhere (at least certainly in the developed world) can spare an hour a week to learn, talk and write about the global climate change emergency.


Do they? No, they fill their empty hours with television, or video games, or twittering, for heaven's sake! (I would rather they spent that time outside, listening to the real twittering of the real birds. At least then they would feel some connection to what's being lost, and perhaps some compassion for the birds and other gifts from the Earth who are facing the climate change emergency, too!)


Having said that, I think I might just try Twittering (whatever the heck it is). My "accidental environmentalist" friend says it would make sense for what I'm trying to get across to people:

"You can type in 'climate change' on the far right to look up topics and see what people are buzzing about. It's the perfect thing for your messages!"

So, if my friend thinks it will help, I might as well give it a try. Right? Maybe all that twittering (tweeting?) will save the world. Maybe our political leaders are following our twitters. Maybe while people are twittering and tweeting, they're not driving and buying and consuming and eating meat and burning fossil fuels (all those things that turn into greenhouse gas emissions). Maybe, just maybe, Twitter could become a way for everyone to do their little bit.


(Note to self, however: Do not hold breath.)

No comments:

Post a Comment

I would appreciate hearing your thoughts or questions on this post or anything else you've read here. What is your take on courage and compassion being an important part of the solution to the climate change emergency?