Forgive me, Blogger, for I have sinned. I have made the Earth unlivable for my children and my children's children. I contribute to global warming with the electricity I use, the car I drive, the furnace I run constantly to keep my poorly-insulated apartment from dropping below freezing temperatures. (I've also contributed to global warming by adding to the Earth's massive overpopulation with my own offspring, but I can't in good conscience apologize for that.)
FoxyJ and I watched An Inconvenient Truth last night. If you haven't, you really should. It's a well-made documentary with some amazing visuals that will hopefully give all of us the slap in the face we need to wake up and actually do something about this problem. Just the statistics shown, comparing the astronomical jumps in atmospheric carbon dioxide, human population, and average temperatures of the past fifty years to the relative stability of the preceding hundreds of thousands of years is enough to make me realize how much bigger the problem is than I thought. If nothing else, it's convinced me of an argument I've heard many times before--that all the talk of gay marriage and abortion in presidential elections is stupid, because (a) presidents have little to do with those issues and (b) as important as those issues are, it won't matter if we don't have a planet to debate them on.
As my penance, then, I'm going to vote for elected officials who recognize the threat of global warming and intend to do something about it. I'm going to be as efficient as I can with the energy I use--something helped by the fact that energy-saving light bulbs were on sale for supercheap this week at Bartell, so I replaced all the energy-wasting bulbs in our apartment (with the added advantage of brightening up the place and presumably lowering our electric bill). If at all possible, the next car I buy will be a hybrid (Foxy is not quite so convinced on this one, purely for financial reasons; even I'm not idealistic enough to believe we could afford a fuel cell vehicle in the next year or two, so I consider the hybrid a compromise). I'll think twice before adding another child to the Earth's population (but I don't make any promises, since this is another one Foxy has a pretty significant say in, though I think we're agreed in that we won't be reproducing again in the next couple years). And I'll blog about An Inconvenient Truth and encourage people to watch it (hey! I can check that one off the list now).
I am sorry for this and many other sins of my past and present life.
Good for you ! We should all pick new ways each year to get just a bit better with our efforts :)
ReplyDeleteFYI, hybrids are all hype and don't actually help the environment a bit. They sound good, but the math doesn't actually work out to saved energy when all's said and done.
ReplyDeleteThe lightbulbs, on the other hand, are a fantastic choice. When I move in a few weeks, I'm switching over to the energy savers. Good for you.
I didn't know that about hybrids. How is it that the math doesn't work out? And is saying that they don't save energy the same as saying that they don't emit less bad stuff into the atmosphere?
ReplyDelete(By which I mean does it translate to the same effect.)
ReplyDeleteI've heard the same thing about hybrids, but I don't know the specifics. I did hear something about how it's much less energy efficient to make them (thereby releasing crap into the atmosphere). I really don't know if that's true, though. Also, eating less (or no!) meat and fewer animal byproducts is a great way to help! I know you and FoxyJ eat a lot of vegetarian meals anyway, but here's a link just in case you want to feel GREAT about that: http://www.goveg.com/environment.asp
ReplyDeleteI will find my sources and get back to you with the details.
ReplyDeleteThanks, Janci. I'd appreciate that.
ReplyDeleteRebecca: Woo hoo! Something else we can feel smug about! And for that matter, reason for us to eat less meat. Thanks for the link.