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Oceans of worry, concern for our planet – dan
I love nature; the wilderness, untamed creatures, wild places and things that could eat me. There’s a powerful spiritual aspect to nature that I feel is vital, self-evident and necessary for our wellbeing. Sadly, our planet’s wild places are diminishing at an alarming rate. It’s one of the drivers of this trip for me, a kind of perverse, see-it-before-it’s-gone mentality. There’s a headline on CNN’s news site today; “oceans filling up fast”. It’s an article about “ocean sprawl”. CNN says the oceans “have gotten crowed” and how, until very recently, we thought our oceans were “limitless resources”. Fisheries are collapsing all around the world and wild fish could disappear by mid-century. Over development of the land is killing our oceans as 20,000 acres of estuaries and coastal fish habitat are destroyed each year. There is eleven million gallons of oil runoff from our driveways and streets into the waters of our planet every year to make matters worse. The list of stress and abuse goes on and on…
President Obama has launched a task force devoted to ocean planning with a mandate to recommend a national policy that will protect our oceans, address climate change and promote sustainable ocean economies. But will that be enough? Global warming, excess hydrocarbons, pollution, energy shortage, war, famine and overcrowding are all direct symptoms of the overpopulation of our planet. I believe that until we address and correct the “root cause” (overpopulation) we’re just shoveling sand against the tide or taking aspirin for a brain tumor. But what to do? The solution is so obvious and easy that it’s a crime that we’re not affecting it; stop reproducing at such an alarming, unstainable rate. Our world population growth curve is a runaway train speeding off a cliff. We are out of control. The definition of cancer is “an abnormal proliferation of cells in an uncontrolled way”. That’s us, the human race; we are a cancer upon our own planet. And just like cancer, we will kill our host (and ourselves) if allowed to grow unchecked.
What can we do about it? Two important things – First; we must stop ignoring it and start talking about the issue openly. Historically human reproduction has been a sensitive and taboo subject. We must change that attitude, openly discuss it amongst ourselves and urge our leaders to do the same. We have to stop pretending that this is something that might go away or somehow be ok if we buy cars with better fuel-efficiency or purchase more carbon offsets. Those actions in an of themselves, although good, just forestall inevitable collapse to our earth’s eco systems. The root cause must be addressed and corrected. Second, we’ve got to stop acting like greedy bandits trying to outdo one another as we squeeze the last drops of life out of our planet and start acting like united caretakers who consider the long term implications of our actions. We must come together as a planet and a people united in pursuit of our common threat; unchecked population growth.
This isn’t a problem we’re going to be able to buy or bargain our way out of and it’s not going away by itself. Once we can openly address this issue we will surely be able to resolve it, it’s not rocket science, or the cure for cancer; we don’t have to split the atom, or fly to the moon. We just have to get control of our own birth rate. Ah, but sometimes it’s the simplest of things that can prove so had to do. I just hope that we can come to our senses before the earth’s life support systems collapse from the demand of billions of people.
I will be monitoring the world’s waters closely (and talking about the root cause) as we traverse the world’s oceans on our circumnavigation of this precious planet. Sometimes I feel like the dance band on the Titanic. Then my eternal optimist kicks in and I know we can truly lick this problem once we, the residents & caretakers of our planet, work together to solve this, our most pressing issue.
I love nature; the wilderness, untamed creatures, wild places and things that could eat me. There’s a powerful spiritual aspect to nature that I feel is vital, self-evident and necessary for our wellbeing. Sadly, our planet’s wild places are diminishing at an alarming rate. It’s one of the drivers of this trip for me, a kind of perverse, see-it-before-it’s-gone mentality. There’s a headline on CNN’s news site today; “oceans filling up fast”. It’s an article about “ocean sprawl”. CNN says the oceans “have gotten crowed” and how, until very recently, we thought our oceans were “limitless resources”. Fisheries are collapsing all around the world and wild fish could disappear by mid-century. Over development of the land is killing our oceans as 20,000 acres of estuaries and coastal fish habitat are destroyed each year. There is eleven million gallons of oil runoff from our driveways and streets into the waters of our planet every year to make matters worse. The list of stress and abuse goes on and on…
President Obama has launched a task force devoted to ocean planning with a mandate to recommend a national policy that will protect our oceans, address climate change and promote sustainable ocean economies. But will that be enough? Global warming, excess hydrocarbons, pollution, energy shortage, war, famine and overcrowding are all direct symptoms of the overpopulation of our planet. I believe that until we address and correct the “root cause” (overpopulation) we’re just shoveling sand against the tide or taking aspirin for a brain tumor. But what to do? The solution is so obvious and easy that it’s a crime that we’re not affecting it; stop reproducing at such an alarming, unstainable rate. Our world population growth curve is a runaway train speeding off a cliff. We are out of control. The definition of cancer is “an abnormal proliferation of cells in an uncontrolled way”. That’s us, the human race; we are a cancer upon our own planet. And just like cancer, we will kill our host (and ourselves) if allowed to grow unchecked. 
What can we do about it? Two important things – First; we must stop ignoring it and start talking about the issue openly. Historically human reproduction has been a sensitive and taboo subject. We must change that attitude, openly discuss it amongst ourselves and urge our leaders to do the same. We have to stop pretending that this is something that might go away or somehow be ok if we buy cars with better fuel-efficiency or purchase more carbon offsets. Those actions in an of themselves, although good, just forestall inevitable collapse to our earth’s eco systems. The root cause must be addressed and corrected. Second, we’ve got to stop acting like greedy bandits trying to outdo one another as we squeeze the last drops of life out of our planet and start acting like united caretakers who consider the long term implications of our actions. We must come together as a planet and a people united in pursuit of our common threat; unchecked population growth.
This isn’t a problem we’re going to be able to buy or bargain our way out of and it’s not going away by itself. Once we can openly address this issue we will surely be able to resolve it, it’s not rocket science, or the cure for cancer; we don’t have to split the atom, or fly to the moon. We just have to get control of our own birth rate. Ah, but sometimes it’s the simplest of things that can prove so had to do. I just hope that we can come to our senses before the earth’s life support systems collapse from the demand of billions of people.
I will be monitoring the world’s waters closely (and talking about the root cause) as we traverse the world’s oceans on our circumnavigation of this precious planet. Sometimes I feel like the dance band on the Titanic. Then my eternal optimist kicks in and I know we can truly lick this problem once we, the residents & caretakers of our planet, work together to solve this, our most pressing issue.
