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i was struck by the stories of people in the cancer ward where my aunt is a radiologist and their battle with cancer.
she said to me that many of them are there with lung cancer and are quite old and that of these, almost all of them had on file that they had recently given up smoking. they would typically have given up for between one and three months, around the length of time their cancer had become serious but before they had been diagnosed.
she said it was so common as to be thought of as a symptom by some of her colleagues.
these were mostly older people, people who had kept smoking for twenty or thirty years despite the warnings of a lifetime of tobacco abuse.
in addition to scaring the shit out of me(every time i try to quit i wonder if that's me done for), it made me think about our attitude towards climate change.
working as i was for greenpeace at the time, i was familiar with much of the evidence for climate change and our part in it, and was puzzled as to why we havent yet done something more concrete.
my aunt's story made me think of humanity as a smoker; ze knows ze has a bad habit, but denial and dependance stop hir from confronting the reality.
are we addicted?
will we only quit once we have cancer?
from media lens:
September 1, 2005
MEDIA ALERT: CHEERLEADING THE CLIMATE CRIMINALS - PART 1
A Raging Debate in Nowhere Land
Earlier this month, New Scientist reported the astonishing news that the world's largest frozen peat bog, comprising an area the size of France and Germany combined, was melting. According to researchers who have been studying the permafrost of western Serbia, the bog could unleash billions of tonnes of methane, a greenhouse gas twenty times as potent as carbon dioxide, into the atmosphere. If this were to happen, the consequences for the climate system, and for humanity, would be appalling. (Fred Pearce, 'Climate warning as Siberia melts,' New Scientist, August 13, 2005)
One of the researchers involved warned of an "irreversible ecological landslide." Another concerned scientist said: "When you start messing around with these natural systems, you can end up in situations where it's unstoppable. There are no brakes you can apply." (Ian Sample, 'Warming hits "tipping point",' The Guardian, August 11, 2005)
In response, Tony Juniper, director of Friends of the Earth, said: "If we don't take action very soon, we could unleash runaway global warming that will be beyond our control and it will lead to social, economic and environmental devastation worldwide." (Sample, ibid.)
But within just a couple of days, a surreal silence had descended. Where were the declarations by governments of radical action on energy, trade, transport and food production? Where were the impassioned newspaper editorials? Where were the urgent television and radio debates? Nowhere. One can only conclude that our society is, quite literally, insane.
it would seem that we as a planet already have the wierd weather, our morning lungs and susceptibility to chest infections.
(coral bleaching, increased flooding, more frequent storms)
like the smoker, we can place the majority of the blame for the ill effects on other sources or claim that said effects prove nothing conclusively, but are we kidding ourselves?
i have to admit a certain amount of pessimism on my part; i feel that we are heading towards a fairly bleak future ecologically, one in which the world has to satisfy itself with palliative maintenance, having left it too late.
do you feel we'll do someting about it before it is too late?
have you seen anything that suggests the problem is lesser or greater than i am sure it is?
some info from greenpeace
and some from the city of vancouver |
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