Wednesday, September 06, 2006

The State of the World

It may be that people won't figure all this out in my lifetime. But one of my main concerns is the link between the pollution/toxins/whatever and Autism and related disorders.

There have always been people who didn't fit in so much - perhaps who had mild neurological differences. I think that that is on the rise and that people who would have had a milder version in the past now are having children who are being more seriously affected. I think that people are going to have to come to grips with the fact that we are poisoning ourselves.

It may be that people with certain genes are more susceptible (or maybe it's the pollutants that are causing mutations) - maybe everyone else will go along their merry way - blind to the fact that some people's systems are stressed from the environment. As long as they don't see it affecting them or their family - what's to worry?

I think it's time for everyone to be worried.

For a long time, I think people figured that people in certain areas were being polluted and that if you had the money and resources you could escape to greener pastures. Now - it's everywhere. People who thought they could just drink bottled water - when the tap water was bad - now are faced with bottles that leach out cancer-causing toxins. People who thought they were eating the best that money could buy in tuna steaks find out that those steaks were laden with mercury.

Health was always of premium importance in my family. But when the environment is messed up - there is only so much you can do. Too bad we have a government who isn't taking this seriously - who doesn't even do the tests or try to regulate that which should be regulated for all of our health. Or that sees the world as something that we all share - that we all affect and are affected by. I don't know what planet those people plan on living on. I could sell them one - but my planets are about big enough for a flea - and the ecosystems are pretty sparse.

The idea to take a lot of the resources that we have here on earth and use them to start a place to live on another planet - should only be seen as a threat to everyone living here. I don't think it's realistic or reasonable or anything else. It's that kind of thinking - that one place can be trashed and people can move on to another (or that it makes no difference what people do to their environment) - that has us in this situation to begin with.
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1 comment:

Anonymous said...

While I don't completely condemn the idea that we should try to settle other planets, that is certainly not a short-term solution to our environmental problems. Its really not even remotely reasonable from a technological standpoint. I mean, what sound easier, converting a lifeless rock into a habitable environment, or fixing our chemically imbalanced but naturally self-sustaining ecosystem?