Reblogged by Thomas Peace…
Source: richardcodor.com
The Supreme Court and Republicans are destroying the Clean Air Act at a time we need EPA to regulate more than ever. — kenne
Cartoon du Jour — Make America Gross Again
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All Posts Tagged ‘environmentalism’
Safe in the Crimson Spread of Things…
Maybe humans could learn a thing or two from some simple, natural creatures. What humans are doing to the earth is unnatural and cruel. We need to change.
(Please consider going green more, and please consider donating often to such places as the Environmental Defense Fund and The Sierra Club. I donate to these monthly.)
Safe in the crimson spread of things
the foliage is my home and my guardian
I will eat it little by little
but will not eat too much of its purply protection
It will guard me, protect me, and feed me
It will become me
It is my world, my universe, my abode
It is not what i will merely destroy and abuse
“Stop poisoning the air, water and topsoil” – Kurt Vonnegut’s letter to the future —
I met Kurt Vonnegut many years ago when my wife and i had gone to a book signing event in Chicago. I do not agree with everything that he says, but i am appreciative of the seven very sagacious terms which he seriously provides below. Will the people of our planet change to substantially improve the health of the earth as a whole? That is not likely (in substantial enough numbers). However, at least some of us are trying. Meanwhile, with the Covid situation improving, oodles of people are once again flying around in polluting jets and are long-distance traveling in fossil fuel vehicles to get vacations that they feel they are owed. The blue sky will be getting smoggy again and the crazy winds will continue to get even crazier.
Letter to the Future, From Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.:
“Ladies & Gentlemen of A.D. 2088:
It has been suggested that you might welcome words of wisdom from the past, and that several of us in the twentieth century should send you some. Do you know this advice from Polonius in Shakespeare’s Hamlet: ‘This above all: to thine own self be true’? Or what about these instructions from St. John the Divine: ‘Fear God, and give glory to Him; for the hour of His judgment has come’? The best advice from my own era for you or for just about anybody anytime, I guess, is a prayer first used by alcoholics who hoped to never take a drink again: ‘God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and wisdom to know the difference.’
Our century hasn’t been as free with words of wisdom as some others, I think, because we were the first to get reliable information about the human situation: how many of us there were, how much food we could raise or gather, how fast we were reproducing, what made us sick, what made us die, how much damage we were doing to the air and water and topsoil on which most life forms depended, how violent and heartless nature can be, and on and on. Who could wax wise with so much bad news pouring in?
For me, the most paralyzing news was that Nature was no conservationist. It needed no help from us in taking the planet apart and putting it back together some different way, not necessarily improving it from the viewpoint of living things. It set fire to forests with lightning bolts. It paved vast tracts of arable land with lava, which could no more support life than big-city parking lots. It had in the past sent glaciers down from the North Pole to grind up major portions of Asia, Europe, and North America. Nor was there any reason to think that it wouldn’t do that again someday. At this very moment it is turning African farms to deserts, and can be expected to heave up tidal waves or shower down white-hot boulders from outer space at any time. It has not only exterminated exquisitely evolved species in a twinkling, but drained oceans and drowned continents as well. If people think Nature is their friend, then they sure don’t need an enemy.
Yes, and as you people a hundred years from now must know full well, and as your grandchildren will know even better: Nature is ruthless when it comes to matching the quantity of life in any given place at any given time to the quantity of nourishment available. So what have you and Nature done about overpopulation? Back here in 1988, we were seeing ourselves as a new sort of glacier, warm-blooded and clever, unstoppable, about to gobble up everything and then make love—and then double in size again.
On second thought, I am not sure I could bear to hear what you and Nature may have done about too many people for too small a food supply.
And here is a crazy idea I would like to try on you: Is it possible that we aimed rockets with hydrogen bomb warheads at each other, all set to go, in order to take our minds off the deeper problem—how cruelly Nature can be expected to treat us, Nature being Nature, in the by-and-by?
Now that we can discuss the mess we are in with some precision, I hope you have stopped choosing abysmally ignorant optimists for positions of leadership. They were useful only so long as nobody had a clue as to what was really going on—during the past seven million years or so. In my time they have been catastrophic as heads of sophisticated institutions with real work to do.
The sort of leaders we need now are not those who promise ultimate victory over Nature through perseverance in living as we do right now, but those with the courage and intelligence to present to the world what appears to be Nature’s stern but reasonable surrender terms:
- Reduce and stabilize your population.
- Stop poisoning the air, the water, and the topsoil.
- Stop preparing for war and start dealing with your real problems.
- Teach your kids, and yourselves, too, while you’re at it, how to inhabit a small planet without helping to kill it.
- Stop thinking science can fix anything if you give it a trillion dollars.
- Stop thinking your grandchildren will be OK no matter how wasteful or destructive you may be, since they can go to a nice new planet on a spaceship. That is really mean, and stupid.
- And so on. Or else.
Am I too pessimistic about life a hundred years from now? Maybe I have spent too much time with scientists and not enough time with speechwriters for politicians. For all I know, even bag ladies and bag gentlemen will have their own personal helicopters or rocket belts in A.D. 2088. Nobody will have to leave home to go to work or school, or even stop watching television. Everybody will sit around all day punching the keys of computer terminals connected to everything there is, and sip orange drink through straws like the astronauts.
Cheers,
Kurt Vonnegut”
Song Poem about The Future (unless we change)…
Once there was a twice
and then three times
Twice there was a once
and then three times
Once there was great green earth
and no crazy endless raging fires
Once there was clear ocean
with everything freshly alive
with everything freshly alive…
Once fossil-fuel cars and trucks
and redgreenyellow stop lights
Now there’s empty rust and black smog
while nothing much is alive
while nothing much is alive
Once we made dead plastic
we mindlessly tossed it all around
Now it’s a veryonceuponatimeplace
where life used to be
Once there was heaven
fresh air butterflies soaring sweetly in sun
Now a lot of toxic dead ocean smell
and large bipedal mammals there are none
there are none
Once there was a twice
and then three times
Twice there was a once
and then three times
Latest Sierra Club News as of October 2019
(Please “like” this post if you perceive the seriousness of it, not because you like what is happening.)
The remote Cocos Islands in the Indian Ocean are covered by 413.6 million pieces of plastic debris weighing 262 tons.
People around the world could be ingesting five grams of microplastic each week, the equivalent of eating a credit card.
July 2019 surpasses July 2016 as the hottest month in recorded history.
Emissions of the powerful greenhouse gas methane from ammonia-fertilizer plants are 100 times greater than what’s reported by the industry.
So far this year, 182 dead gray whales have washed up along the Pacific Coast, many likely having starved to death because of changing fish populations in warming waters.
In April 2019, for the first time ever, more US electricity generation came from renewables than from coal.
Human activity threatens 1 million species of plants and animals with extinction.
A heatwave bakes India. Temperatures in Rajasthan reach 123 degrees F, and the four reservoirs that supply Chennai (population 9.1 million) go dry.
Republican lawmakers in 18 states want to criminalize protests against fossil fuel infrastructure, like pipelines.
By the end of 2018, 11 million people were employed in renewable energy worldwide.
Current White House officials suppress State Department testimony that human-caused climate change will be “possibly catastrophic.”
More than 1.8 million people object to a Trump proposal to strip gray wolves of endangered species protections.
The Precarious Times We Live In…
We live in extremely precarious times. We need to go beyond mere depression about things; we need to act and not merely “go along indifferently.” The planet is getting more and more overcrowded with people (and people are still cranking out more and more babies); there is less and less space (especially for animals and plants). Extinctions in nature are occurring at an unprecedented rate (with over a million species going extinct lately). There is much less healthy agricultural land (as pollution is creeping in everywhere imaginable). Carbon emissions and plastics are ruining the globe, while the Amazon and Western U.S. forests (and other world forests) burn rampantly, while some flat-earth political groups deny global warming and heavily contribute to the deterioration of the environment. There is less viable fresh water. Guns and weapons of mass destruction are on the rise; unfortunately, with many not realizing it, germ warfare is a very real possibility. Automated robots will soon be replacing millions of people in the workplace. The over-use of unnatural, made-made food products and the over-usage of synthetic medicines is making the human population more and more unnaturally sick and corrupt, with immune function diseases, Alzheimer’s disease, autism, cancer, depression, mental problems, and such things as diabetes becoming all too common, with increasing frequencies of occurrence. We are rapidly losing what little freedom we had; political figures are becoming more and more dictatorial and propaganda news channels (much like what Nazi movies did in the past) are making crass people believe very crazy/hateful things.
What is one to do regarding all of this obvious insecurity? Too many of us are looking at the problems fragmentarily. The problems are not isolated; one problem is related to another problem. There is a bigger picture that is more holistic, more comprehensive, insightful, and caring. We must look beyond the $-oriented opportunistic greed that is contagiously expanding as if it (i.e., such greed) is an accepted disease (that is OK). A holistic, truly compassionate, non-indifferent mind of wisdom and insight would not be a huge contributing factor (to the above terrible situations) and would even seriously try to help change things. A mind that operates in the old, traditional patterns, staying fragmentary, staying comfortable and barbaric (full of bias, indifference, and callousness) would not significantly help with the earth’s present very serious problems and with the problems that human beings face; such an indifferent/crass mind would merely continue to make the earth a living hell. We can be stable and holistic or we can be fragmented and uncaring. We can, (in all of this danger, fragmentation, and disorder), be order, wholeness, compassion, and largely be freedom from fear.
No matter how terrible or disorderly things may seem on the outside, wisdom would primarily be stability and joyous harmony on the inside, in consciousness; it’s wisdom’s responsibility. It’s wisdom’s responsibility not to be sad in a sad world; it’s wisdom’s responsibility not to be nuts in a nutty world. Empathy would still exist; we wouldn’t look away from the suffering of those (supposedly) at a distance, and we would act to help; it’s wisdom’s responsibily.
Wordless Wednesday … Not!… Halloween Toad
Don’t be a torpid, sluggish mind, indifferent about the environment, about others, and about goodness. We’ve been donating a lot, over the years, to all of the Hurricane victims (both to charities for humans and for dogs), including (recently) Dorian. These hurricanes are worsening over the years due to global warming. I see some bloggers who claim to love nature, yet they travel — in jets and planes that spew out tons of pollutants — to distant countries or far distant places to get “great nature photos.” I’ve been unfollowing such hypocritical behavior blogs. I’m not afraid of devils or goblins around Halloween. I’m more concerned about people who treat the earth wrongly, indifferently. We all can do more to help nature; we all could do less harmful things. Please watch the following Greta Thunberg video. I feel very sorry for kids these days; if things do not change, they — because of the increase in carbon dioxide — will not be able to breathe properly in a few short decades. 30% of all birds in North America (alone) have gone extinct in the last 50 years; they are the canaries in the coal mine, but most adults just don’t see it enough.
The Sensitivity of Living Creatures
Each living creature of life has a sensitive vibration of feeling, and many have a cherished awareness. We human beings somehow think that ours is “superior,” better, and magnificent. However, with much of our fancy ideas and thinking, we are destroying the ecological balance of the whole… of the globe. We perceive and think in the ways that we were taught to perceive and think… primarily in parts, fragmentarily. We see the so-called “outer environment” fragmentally, as what can be used piecemeal, to be exploited, manipulated, and used.
However, the so-called outer is really not separate from the inner. The observer is not separate from the observed. Similarly, space and matter are not separate from what time is. We are of matter’s (thought’s) doings; we are thought, time, and the movement of time. The intelligence of meditation takes place when thought is not merely habitual and endless. Thought/thinking is always partial, always fragmentary, and sequential. Real meditation is consciousness beyond the stirrings of its content; it is an effortless, unplanned, holistic quietness beyond mere fragmentation and sequential patterns. The timeless can only reveal itself when the mind intelligently perceives beyond the fragmentary movement of its content.
Wordless Wednesday … Not!
A true love of nature stays local as much as possible and avoids using deadly fossil-fuel jet planes and fossil-fuel road vehicles to travel world-wide to go to “exotic” nature places; such worldwide-sight-seeing (and picture-taking) is not loving nature; nature is not a Disney Amusement Park. Our globe is very delicate, fragile, and we have been brainwashed and conditioned to think nothing of traveling long distances for mere amusement purposes. Aircraft emit staggering amounts of CO2, the most prevalent manmade greenhouse gas. If you love nature, stay local.
Perfect symbiosis … Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2019
The Very Wise ToadMaster
The very wise ToadMaster perched near the toadstool,
and with his croaky voice, he summoned all of the little tadpoles to swim up to the riverbank
to hear another lesson.
He, in his sagely way, bellowed, “Unfortunately, many of the upright, large apes — that we have mentioned in the past — foolishly refuse to judiciously see that they too evolved from swimming fish, even as you here, as swimming tadpoles (through a long passage of time), will soon be leaving your aquatic existence to join our terrestrial lot. What is even more unfortunate is that the upright apes continue to mindlessly throw toxic debris into our water habitats and also
onto the beautiful terrestrial domain that you will all soon be graduating to.
The upright, large apes continue to make things that destroy things. The upright apes can be downright
destructive and dangerous, though some of them are very kind and considerate. Overall, the whole world’s
life forms are all rapidly disappearing due to what these, large bipedal creatures are mindlessly doing. Even as they claim that one of their kind is a God, they endlessly continue to pour cement and plastic over living things and spew out much toxic debris, killing our planet. They often do what is called “mowing their lawn,” which they think is very beautiful (though such activity callously cuts and kills many precious creatures, including us amphibians.) When you hop on land — which you all will be doing soon — do so with extreme caution, and avoid these large, bipedal creatures at all costs… and please
do your best to survive in the excessive heat (due to the climate rapidly changing).”
_____________________________________________________________________________________
If you have time, please watch the following 60 Minutes video on ocean plastic and pollution…
The Very Wise ToadMaster … Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2019
Wordless Wednesday … Not!
Looking beyond the darkness … Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2019
9/11 was an extraordinarily tragic thing. Far worse than 9/11 is losing the ecological balance of the earth. The earth is currently collapsing, nature-wise, because of our shortsightedness. Heartless political forces, so-called big business, and indifferent so-called humans are zealously steering many of us in the wrong direction. We all need to do much more. A collapsing earth is a most terrible thing. Stay local, use alternative energy, recycle, and vote green.
Latest Sierra Club News
Earth’s glaciers are shrinking five times faster than they were in the 1960s.
The United States used more energy in 2018 than ever before, partly because Americans drove more: 3.225 trillion miles, 12.2 billion more than 2017.
Wolves return to the Netherlands after an absence of 140 years.
A suspected rhino poacher in South Africa is trampled to death by an elephant, then eaten by lions.
The last time Earth’s atmosphere had as much carbon dioxide as it does today, there were trees growing near the South Pole.
Thawing ice on Alaska’s Denali is exposing the 66 tons of feces left by generations of mountain climbers.
Sea level rise has cost property owners on the East and Gulf Coasts more than $16 billion since 2005.
Senator Mike Lee of Utah says that the solution to climate change is to “fall in love, get married, and have some kids.”
Greta Thunberg, the 16-year-old Swede who inspired the Youth Climate Strike, is nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize.
The stomachs of dead whales found in the Philippines and Italy are full of plastic trash.
Scientists discover a new species of orca of southern Chile — “The largest undescribed animal left on the planet.”
Trump’s proposed federal budget would cut funding for the Environmental Protection Agency by 31 percent.
Composite photographer Nick Brandt, whose profound works show how nature in the world is quickly dying away due to man’s indifference, says, “My motivation is my anger and despair at what we are losing, that the human race is sleepwalking its way to oblivion.”
Lacewing Insect … Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2019
Not too many tears, dear
Not too many tears
dear
be ever shed for Nature
that dies
Not too many tears
dear
trickle down from faces
not sky
Not too many tears
ever flood away
from smiling faces
in stores shopping
Not too many dry eyes see
there be fewer bees and
honey
in the ending of the begin
They say not enough concrete
to cover all da prairie fields
but Mr.
Progress be working on it
Prairie Trillium Wildflower, Illinois. These low-ground plants grow very slowly and they take around 10 years to mature enough to flower. Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2019
Short Story about the Best Wooden Thing
Once, there was a burly man who carved things out of wood.
Many people in his village would each ask him to carve something special for them, and he usually would, with great pride.
The man would often boast about what he could expertly carve.
Then, one day, a little girl — who had never asked the man to carve anything whatsoever — asked him what the best wooden thing is.
“I am not sure,” said the man, perplexedly, “Maybe it is the large horse that I once carved for Mr. Hayes.”
“No,” said the girl, confidently, “It is that large, beautiful, living Oak tree that grows in our yard.”
Very young Oak tree sapling just beginning to get there. Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2019
The Stuffy Politicians…
Many stuffy politicians can pull many
into their stupefaction
pull many into their (paid-for-by-
the-fossil-fuel-industries)
raisons d’etre
(which include bona fide lies)
but as for a rogue like me,
well, the cheese in their trap
is made of distorted
(though expensive and smelly)
cardboard
Apolitical photo … Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2019
We need to change our ways but many won’t… and the weather is getting more and more erratic…
It’s a shame that
others species also
have to suffer
the dire consequences
of global warming and man’s pollution.
When i was a kid,
i realized that, in the future,
we would — in ignorance —
be fueling our own hell.
Tiny Jewelweed Wildflower … Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2019
Nature Lionizes Trees
Nature lionizes trees
and roars:
“Mankind! Stop
abusing life!”
Nature Personified … Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2018
Recent Environmental News
(From news clippings from the Sierra Club that we belong to and donate to…)
A school groundskeeper who says his non-Hodgkin lymphoma was caused by Monsanto’s Roundup herbicide is awarded $289 million by a San Francisco jury.
Atmospheric CO2 levels are higher than they have been in 800,000 years.
July in Death Valley is the hottest month ever recorded on Earth, with an average Temperature of 108 F. In parts of Japan it was 106 F, a new national record.
Fossil fuel companies have spent nearly $2 billion since the year 2000, lobbying the government not to take action on climate change, outspending climate activists by a factor of 10 to one.
Reductions in air pollution from coal-fired power plants, automobiles, and manufacturing are offset by increased pollution from wildfires.
Russian hackers seek the ability to disrupt the U.S. electrical grid.
Two-thirds of Republicans believe that humans are causing climate change and that we should do something about it but don’t speak out because they assume their GOP peers are climate skeptics.
As the population of rural Japan shrinks, bears move into towns. Drought causes emus to invade a town in Australia’s outback. Goats run wild in Boise.
French crows are being trained to pick up cigarette butts and other litter.
Pleistocene worms that were frozen in Siberia’s permafrost for 42,000 years are brought back to life.
North Atlantic waters are too warm to cool nuclear power plants in Norway and Finland, leading some to shut down.
Fall Splendor … Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2018
Mankind
Mankind must take the kind
in “Mankind” and be a lot kinder
to nature.
Widow Dragonfly … Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2018
U.S. Halloween Fright
(NOTE: The following poem is not against voting; it is opposed to voting by people who are easily duped and who turn their backs on the environment.)
This from the witch
of the stir from the brew
whose Halloween terror
came flying for you
She brings you bloody terror
wrinkled skin and loss of hair
and all the rats and spiders cheer
as she circles the air
But all the ugly terror
that she drapes as the night
doesn’t equal the brainwashed zombies
soon to vote with all their might
Halloween Wolf Spider … Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2018
A Poem of Bits and Pieces
When this poem was being written
we asked for help
from the Gods of Creativity
but they were all on vacation
The only one at home
was the God of Waste and Rubbish
and so this poem reeks like garbage
By the way
the God of Waste and Rubbish
is also the God of environmentally negligent
American politics
Tomenose Burying Beetle in Halloween Colors (These beetles eat rubbish and carrion) … Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2018
I Cried When i Took This Picture… (2nd pic)
There is no way that someone would “like” this heartbreaking blog posting, but please “like it” if you see the seriousness of it, the environmental implications of it.
I, not long ago, posted some information from the Sierra Club, that i belong to, about Monarch Butterfly populations declining in North America since 1997. The Midwestern United States has seen an 88% decline. I also recently sent in a check to a Sierra Club supported drive to get Monarch Butterfly plate decals (which would help fund the Illinois Dept. of Natural Resources to support Monarch habitats). However, nothing prepared me for the dismal discovery that i made while photographing insects in a wildflower field that was across a rural road from a farm cornfield. I knew about how important Milkweed plants are for Monarch caterpillars, and when i’ve been out photographing lately, i’ve been curious about the Milkweed plants. I’ve been seeing Milkweed plants that were eaten and chewed up… but no caterpillars. Then, one day, while in the wildflower field across from a cornfield, i saw some Milkweed plants. One Milkweed Plant was chewed up, and when i lifted a few leaves to get a closer look… a very — and unnaturally — dead caterpillar is what was seen (i.e., the second photograph). When i was young, corn often had a few grubs or insects around the silk end, and that little part was simply chopped off. These days, there are never such “intruders”; heaven forbid! People would vehemently complain! However, the pesticides — these over-kill overly potent pesticides — you can be sure, are residually still there and are far more precarious and unhealthy than the little pests. Little wonder why Europe doesn’t even want to get U.S. pesticide riddled corn/soy. Additionally, another factor: A recent study by Bret Elderd and Matthew Faldyn from Louisiana State University suggest climate change can alter the chemical composition of Milkweed making it poisonous to Monarchs. The increase in temperatures — due to global warming — causes Milkweed plants to be stressed and produce more toxins, toxins which then become deadly to the very Monarch caterpillars that they had protected. There are tons of people out there, unfortunately, who ignorantly deny man’s role in climate change and who do little or nothing to help change things for the better. Sad and immoral!
All the factors involved with this are far too vast for me to go into. For one thing, we need to reduce our human population; in other words, keep it at more reasonable levels, live more environmentally conscious, and grow food in more organic and considerate ways. Too few are talking seriously about any of this and it is unlikely that things will change any time soon. The bees, too, are dwindling, and many realize that when they go, we go.
The poor Monarchs are yet another unfortunate, beautiful species harmed by man.
Monarch Butterfly in a Wildflower Field… Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2018
Monarch Caterpillar dead 40 feet from a nearby cornfield… Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2018
Current News Regarding the Environmental Protection Agency in the U.S.A. (and overcoming real corruption)…
The EPA will roll back the Obama-era auto-fuel-efficiency standards. The agency threatens to revoke California’s waiver under the Clean Air Act, which allows it to require cleaner cars.
Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke denies that his department censors science. A National Park Service report on how it will deal with climate change omits all references to human causation.
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service doesn’t want to give threatened species as much protection as endangered ones.
The Sierra Club’s Environmental Law Program wins multiple court rulings: Now the BLM must disclose the climate impacts of fossil fuel development in the Powder River Basin; the Trump administration can’t overturn the ban on new offshore oil and gas drilling in the Arctic without judicial review; and the administration can’t delay increased penalties for automakers to violate fuel-economy standards.
Energy Secretary Rick Perry calls moving away from fossil fuels “immoral.”
The Bureau of Land Management blames a “breakdown of technology” for its failure to note 42,000 public comments in support of protections for the greater sage-grouse.
“I really don’t know” if humans cause climate change, says the head of the EPA’s scientific advisory board.
(The above information is from the Sierra Club that i belong to.)
************************************************************************************************************
“The world is a dangerous place to live; not because of the people who are evil, but because of the people who don’t do anything about it.” — Albert Einstein
Overcoming Real Corruption… Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2018
Human Overpopulation
It’s supposed to be
pockets of human beings,
not pockets of the whole of nature!
*******************************************************************************************************
I speak from the heart on this. My wife and i do not have any children. I love kids and had worked for my career as a teacher for the multiply handicapped, but this planet has way more than its share of humans. In the past, i have lost a number of girlfriends because of my stance on this. It is very interesting (and tragic) that this most vital subject — that directly impacts the whole earth and all of its creatures including man — is mostly neglected (and not seriously considered) worldwide.
In too limited of a space… Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2018
Hotter than Hell Today Haiku
They cling to guns to feel safe
while callously letting the environment go to hell.
It’s all really starting to smell.
[Note: So sad that the U.S. is a country addicted to guns. Even the children have taken up shooting each other. On another note: So many fly in jets to go on vacations to “beautiful places,” or to take “beautiful” nature photos. The carbon footprint of jet travel, for human beings, is unbelievably high, massively high; there is nothing beautiful about ruining the environment. People who frequently go traveling around the world are admired by others, not by me.]
Our Dying Environment… Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2018
ReBlog: of Francis’ poetry. I too dislike politics. This goes far beyond politics. People who turn their back on the environment are not going to hell; rather, they are a very unfortunate manifestation of hell.
I find that I as time goes by grow weary of politics and all of the dirty tricks that the man in charge who by and large likes to pull because he is a fool a wealthy man in this land a one percenter a climate change hater whose only goal to get others to […]
Today is World Wildlife Day!
On 20 December 2013, at its 68th session, the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) proclaimed 3 March, the day of signature of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES), as UN World Wildlife Day to celebrate and raise awareness of the world’s wild animals and plants. The UNGA resolution also designated the CITES Secretariat as the facilitator for the global observance of this special day for wildlife on the UN calendar. World Wildlife Day has now become the most important global annual event dedicated to wildlife.
It would be a good day to join (or donate to) the Sierra Club or any similar animal/plant loving, environmental organization; additionally, it would be a great time to think about doing more environmentally-friendly action.
Here’s looking at you! … Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2018
Eyes for you! Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2018
America’s wrong direction…
If we all did more regarding green energy, if we all wrote emails (concerning cleaning up the environment) to the White House and to our Congressmen… then our little planet would have a chance.
*******************************************************************************
Excerpt from E.E.Cummings:
so rah-rah-rah democracy
let’s all be as thankful as hell
and bury the statue of liberty
(because it begins to smell)
*******************************************************************************
On the other side of nowhere
while everyone believes they’re somewhere
they numbly make their children(and nature)waltz completely out of time
and voting to ruin the environment is not a crime
Standing with you. (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2017
Standing with you. (2) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2017
Many want to ignore this and sweep it under the rug…
.
When I was very young, (before I became a vegetarian) I was an avid fisherman. I loved fishing tremendously; being out there, with nature, was a large part of it (and was very special). There was a manmade lake that I would often fish at that was fairly new; adjacent to it, and connected to it by a narrow channel, was a huge, shallow swamp area (that was nearly as big as the lake itself). Most people who fished at the lake didn’t know about the swamp area; it was a superb area that contained many fish, many of which would go there to spawn and lay eggs. All kinds of other wildlife were there. There was a large factory not far from the swamp, however, and each year the swamp would get more and more slime and oily residue floating at the surface, much of which was undoubtedly due to pollution from the factory and from the industrial environment. Each year would be exponentially worse than the next. There would be less and less fish each year and more and more noxious algae and scummy debris. Back then, as a kid, I felt that what was going on in the swamp was a precursor to what would be going on for our entire planet; I deeply felt that often.
Now scientists are saying that we don’t have much time left (before it’s too late) to “get it right” with changing things for the better with regard to the environment. The permafrost of the globe is melting rapidly, and they say it will get exponentially worse each year, which will affect our environment in drastic ways. Our weather is getting more and more erratic and violent and the coral reefs are rapidly dwindling. Please try to do something more green; please try to use fossil fuel planes and automobiles less frequently and please recycle and look into using alternative energy forms that don’t leave as big of a carbon footprint. Our human population, additionally, needs to be regulated more and intelligently diminished; an aquarium with too many fish within it cannot adequately recycle the waste and remain balanced. Each one of us is highly responsible and must do our part.
(This won’t fit under a rug; it’s our planet.)
.
Fly-catching. (1) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2015
Fly-catching. (2) (Digital Crayon). Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2015
Nature and Man…
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Mankind needs to be far more gentle to this small, fragile planet!
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Wild Chicory. Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2015
Staying local and happy…
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One may not like this, but it is true: Instead of taking vacations with polluting cars and planes, it is far wiser — and much more compassionate for nature’s sake — to stay local and not pollute.
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After a shower. (But showers can’t clean up everything.) Photo by Thomas Peace c. 2015
There are other alternatives…
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We won’t ever have a clean, pristine planet if, for instance, fracking is more important for creating jobs and oil than green energy is for world health.
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[Brown Paper Wasp… Polistes metricus. They nourish themselves on nectar and pollen but also seek prey, consisting mostly of caterpillars, to nourish their colonies’ larvae (which reside in “paper-nests.”)]
Getting a little side-snack. Photo by Thomas Peace 2014
Nature doesn’t advertise…
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Nature doesn’t have its own sponsors — in the media — telling us to be less materialistic and to travel less (thereby using less fossil fuels); but big, materialistic corporations have plenty of promoters making earth-damaging practices seem “OK” and “normal.” We truly need to go beyond the advertising propaganda.
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[Honey mushrooms along rocks on the river bank. Honey mushrooms, like most mushrooms, are just the visible fruiting body of the fungus. The main part of the organism is underground and is called the mycelium. Mycelium can spread for many miles… and this accounts for mushrooms being some of the world’s largest organisms. It is estimated that some honey mushrooms (that are very large, over many miles) are over 400 years old. (My photos, by the way, are all taken locally; I don’t travel any appreciable distance to take my photos. For instance, one walked to where these mushrooms were photographed.)]
Fruit of the mycelium. Photo by Thomas Peace 2014
Nature’s Revenge…
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Man may exploit nature, use nature, try to cultivate nature, neglect nature, and even allow nature to be destroyed; but, in the end, nature always prevails.
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[Wild Grapes, using a tractor as an arbor.]
451 Cubes ain’t diddly. Photo by Thomas Peace 2014
Tom's Nature-up-close Photography and Mindfulness Blog 