Save the Planet!
Francis Sedgemore, Tuesday 6 December 2011 at 12:30 UTC
Avaaz.org is in my opinion a jolly good thing, exploiting as it does the global reach of the interwebs, and the increasing laziness of its information overloaded denizens. Real political activism – actually doing stuff – may be a dying art, but in places moral conscience hangs on for dear life. When it comes to individuals subject to state persecution, Avaaz campaigns work.
In the past year or so I’ve signed a fair number of Avaaz petitions, and scoffed at the silliness of a few others. Talking of which, consider the call issued today, which comes complete with the clichéd picture above of polar bears seemingly stranded on a shrinking ice floe,…
“Our oceans are dying, our air changing, and our forests and grasslands turning to deserts. From fish and plants to wildlife to human beings, we are killing the planet that sustains us, and fast. There is one single greatest cause of this destruction of the natural world — climate change, and in the next 4 days, we have a chance to stop it.”
From where I sit, there are two ways in which an educated and critically minded individual might react to such nonsense: join the Jeremy Clarkson fan club, or adopt the misanthropic position that the planet would be better off without Homo sapiens. I tend to the latter.
Feed the writer! 
Tuesday 6 December 2011 at 14:29 UTC
I know the feeling Francis but you ought to meet my other half. Let’s just say one of her favourite tv shows in recent years was Life After Humans on History or Nat Geo. SHe’s probably one of the few people on the planet who wouldn’t mind the Yellowstone megacaldera working its magic again!
Tuesday 6 December 2011 at 14:43 UTC
Life after humans was excellent. I would also recommend a special issue of New Scientist published a few years ago which carried a number of articles looking at how Earth would respond to the demise of humans. I have no doubt that the planet will long outlive this transient species of biped, however smart our mobile phone technology. And I wouldn’t be surprised if the ice bears survive us too.
Tuesday 6 December 2011 at 14:51 UTC
Misanthropic? It’s just optimism. Just imagine the calm, the pure river water, the clean air. Imagine the pictures Nat Geo will be able to publish of unpolluted landscapes, fishes without dioxin and tigers and stuff…
I cannot wait.
Tuesday 6 December 2011 at 14:55 UTC
But Snoopy, neither you nor your descendents would be around to appreciate that calm, the pure river water,… Or do you see yourself as the last man standing?
Tuesday 6 December 2011 at 15:07 UTC
How Earyh would respond? I doubt Mother would notice the difference! (and forgive the anthropomorphic term) Actually I think she would notice for a millisecond that the air is a bit cleaner and there are more fish in the sea…
Friday 23 December 2011 at 12:38 UTC
[...] doesn’t help, though, to see Avaaz get carried away with itself, and not just on a cloud of environmental hot air. Today, Avaaz has emailed subscribers with yet another self-congratulatory screed extolling its [...]