Live Earth

[UFO over easy]

Not to mention her pet African, sorry, adopted son.

aahahhaahahahaahahahahaa.aa..a.ageh..aga..

sorry carry on everyone

 

[nomadologist]

The earth will be fine. That's not the real worry. People are worried about *humans* not surviving.

The earth will obliterate humans before we can obliterate it. Case in point: now.

If the earth didn't obliterate humans for upsetting every other ecosystem on the planet, it would be microorganisms that did us in within a few decades anyway.

Do we really matter?

No.

 

[nomadologist]

i agree, it's obscene. they spend whole careers contaminating the world with their private jets and idiotic music, saving africa over their diamond encrusted phones, and now having thousands of people inhaling and exhaling for the environment, excelent idea. i think we should get used to the idea that it's too late, particularly with china in full throttle. there are too many people on the planet as it is, in a few years time there will be lots more, no amount of cutting back will stop the path to oblivion.

ressentiment much?

 

[bruno]

not at all, i like diamonds, but you have to admit these artists are not the best choice for the cause.

 

[nomadologist]

just kidding. i agree. terrible figureheads for this "cause"--the problem, for me, lies in the fact that it's now the same people who insisted for so long that there would never be climate crisis who are now pushing the agenda. who are these people? the top 1% of wealth-holders in the world.

should we ever believe what those people tell us? should we ever at least be so naive as to believe what they are saying is not ENTIRELY self-interested?

such are the depths of my own cynicism.

 

[Mr. Tea]

You know, I can see a time in the not-too-distant future when huge, media-hyped rock concerts are seens a universal panacea, with literally *nothing* they can't achieve. Rising sea levels effectively submerge Bangladesh? Hold a rock concert. Impending nuclear war between America and China? Hold a rock concert.

I'm almost surprised there hasn't been a Rock For Maddie concert yet. If only we could just rock hard enough, she's bound to turn up!

 

[nomadologist]

Maybe Paris Hilton can have a blood diamonds awareness "Camp David" of sorts, broadcast direct from the summit, a VIP table set up at her release party at Hyde.

 

[Mr. Tea]

just kidding. i agree. terrible figureheads for this "cause"--the problem, for me, lies in the fact that it's now the same people who insisted for so long that there would never be climate crisis who are now pushing the agenda. who are these people? the top 1% of wealth-holders in the world.

Hmm...I see where you're coming from, but it's the nature of the beast that these are the only people who are in any real position to do anything - negative or positive - about it.

 

[nomadologist]

They are the apparatus, but we are the ghost in the machine, so to speak. (yes i mixed metaphors on purpose)

 

[Mr. Tea]

Sure, but if I can just take the cynicsim bat from you for a moment: it's only a pretty small percentage of any country's population that are prepared to make the necessary changes to their lifestyle, purely of their own volition, that'll really make a big difference to overall levels of pollution and non-renewable resource use.
Which is why I think it's good that at least some governments are doing more to help in this respect, eg. taking recycling collections as well as normal rubbish, paying for people to have their roofs insulated, that sort of thing.
It may look a bit piecemeal, but it's a start.

 

[nomadologist]

First of all, recycling might be the biggest joke of all. At least in the U.S. it is. I remember this came up when I worked at the university--one scientist defied all the others to prove that recycling actually SAVES energy. Of course no one could. It costs a TREMENDOUS amount of energy to recycle materials, probably much more than it would to replace the same materials with replicas. I'm all for sustainability and the efforts made to get there, or at least, the SINCERE ONES, not the ones like "recycling" that the government cooks up for psychological value with very little significant net effect.

Second, it's mostly the richest of the rich whose lifestyles are HUGE drains on the world's power grid. Who else has private jets? Several cars? Several houses (all several thousand square feet) all with central air conditioning in Miami and LA? Whose children take 3 showers a day and blow dry their hair everytime? Who wash dozens of loads of laundry per week? Who have multiple TVs per household. Who have HUUGE industrial appliances in their kitchens (my boyfriend's sister is dating a British guy who came to their house and was AMAZED by the size of their fridge.)

Think about it. Has anyone at the top really changed their lifestyle? Will they? No. But suddenly they are all GUNG HO about making sure the lower middle class unplug their one TV per household at night? Come on.

 

[nomadologist]

You know, I can see a time in the not-too-distant future when huge, media-hyped rock concerts are seens a universal panacea, with literally *nothing* they can't achieve. Rising sea levels effectively submerge Bangladesh? Hold a rock concert. Impending nuclear war between America and China? Hold a rock concert.

I'm almost surprised there hasn't been a Rock For Maddie concert yet. If only we could just rock hard enough, she's bound to turn up!

In possibly even more depressing news, I have a theory about how we are in fact creating pedophiles now in our culture (of the type who capture, rape, and kill people like Maddie). It would take a while to elaborate but if you really want to feel like life isn't worth living, I'd be happy to do so.

 

[Mr. Tea]

Well I don't know any super-rich people, but I suppose it goes without saying that many of them are bound to have very profligate lifestyles. Again, it's one of those things where ideally everyone could and should make some contribution - the rich because they use so much more per person, and ordinary people because, well, there's far more of us. Although I take your point about the hipocrisy thing, which is obviously not going to help get people 'on message' if they think they're being told what to do by people who don't personally give a shit.

I've heard the recycling-uses-more energy argument before, but I think it depends strongly on what kind of recycling we're talking about, and how it's organised.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Recycling_criticism
Also, it's worth remembering that saving energy isn't the only thing to be considered: recycling paper doesn't necessitate cutting down trees (an all-too-often forgotten factor in the CO2 argument) and less waste means less need for landfills, which makes it very attractive for a small crowded country like the UK, where space for landfills is rapidly running out.

Edit: your one-TV-per-household thing is quite funny to me - in the UK, the lower down the social ladder you are, the more TVs you have...

 

[nomadologist]

If the rich really cared, they'd fund studies to develop biodegradable materials to use as containers that would disintegrate in landfills within weeks and leave no toxins or otherwise harmful material in their wake. They would also pay to fund studies to develop materials like cleaning solutions that are non-toxic. They would fund studies into how to keep medications from seeping into the groundwater through sewage. They would fund studies into cleaner production methods for materials and cleaner energy sources.

Wouldn't they? If they really cared?

 

[nomadologist]

they would also use their clout to lean on corporations so they'd develop more energy efficient appliances and use more clean and efficient production methods

 

[Mr. Tea]

In possibly even more depressing news, I have a theory about how we are in fact creating pedophiles now in our culture (of the type who capture, rape, and kill people like Maddie). It would take a while to elaborate but if you really want to feel like life isn't worth living, I'd be happy to do so.

Yikes.

I saw something on TV a while ago - a documentary of some kind, I think - that featured footage of a baby, and they'd pixellated out its genitals. I couldn't believe it: I mean, way to go about sexualising a child! And there's a mineral water advert on at the moment that features weird androgynous semi-CGI babies of no identifiable sex at all. I'm reminded of the naked boy on the front of Nirvana's Nevermind - Geffen Records had wanted to airbrush his willy out, but Kurt Cobain insisted it would better to put a sticker over the it saying "If you're offended by this, you must be a closet paedophile".

 

[Mr. Tea]

If the rich really cared, they'd fund studies to develop biodegradable materials to use as containers that would disintegrate in landfills within weeks and leave no toxins or otherwise harmful material in their wake. They would also pay to fund studies to develop materials like cleaning solutions that are non-toxic. They would fund studies into how to keep medications from seeping into the groundwater through sewage. They would fund studies into cleaner production methods for materials and cleaner energy sources.

Wouldn't they? If they really cared?

I'm sure a lot of people *are* developing technologies like this. It's fallacious to just say "If only there was more money available, problem X would have been solved by now". I mean, how much is spent on AIDS research annually - hundreds of millions? Billions? The fact there's no cure or vaccine yet isn't for want of money or effort, it's obviously just an extremely tough nut to crack.

 

[nomadologist]

Yup, you're getting there--my theory involves my psychoanalysis, but i like your examples.

I'm not saying "if there were more money available, it would be solved." I'm saying that if those with money (remember: money=power) used their POWER and their money to get things going from the bottom up, if they funded the basic research real progress would entail, then we'd have a fighting chance. But people with money and power aren't doing this! They're putting on concerts so they can pocket more money.

 

[nomadologist]

I mean, how much is spent on AIDS research annually - hundreds of millions? Billions? The fact there's no cure or vaccine yet isn't for want of money or effort, it's obviously just an extremely tough nut to crack.

AIDS is a completely different animal. There will never be a vaccine against "AIDS" in general, since AIDS mutates into a different strain or strains in each infected person. Even if you got vaccinated against one strain, you'd still be vulnerable to contracting any other of the billions of strains out there.

They're in phase II in China testing out some prototype, but all the real hope for AIDS right now is in anti-microbial gels.

 

[nomadologist]

I'm sure a lot of people *are* developing technologies like this.

They are? Who? Where? Because I've seen big science, I work for big science, and these technologies are not being developed.