(aka Bike, est. 2007) Part 2488 by Angharad Copyright© 2014 Angharad
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“I thought that went rather well,” said Tom patting me on the shoulder.
“I’m just pleased I won’t have to another for some time.”
“The pile of forms you put out for enquiries to do courses here has practically disappeared, Professor,” said Delia scooping up the remainder. She chose to come to assist, unpaid, because she said she wanted to hear me teach.
“I hope it was worth giving up your evening.”
“Oh yes, I really enjoyed it, made me wish I was one of your students if all your lectures are like that.”
“They’re not, unfortunately—and these days I spend more time chasing funding than students for their project work.”
“Shame, I think you’re a good teacher.”
“You can’t possibly know from one show piece lecture, which is light on data and science, heavy on entertainment and propaganda.”
“But you kept it interesting, Professor, and that’s quite difficult to do.”
“We’ll see. If one person thinks about what was said tonight and either complains to their MP or changes their lifestyle to help green issues, then it was worthwhile. But I doubt it, they’ve chucked a couple of quid in the basket and salved their consciences instead.”
“Doesn’t all that help anyway?”
“Delia, it’s already too late, the planet is doomed. We can’t reverse the warming or undo the pollution. As we speak big business is dumping billions of tons of toxins into the environment.”
“We need to stop them, then.”
“We can’t. Most governments are made up of people who are either sponsored by the polluters or in bed with them. As long as they make huge profits, they don’t care. They’ve sold us out.”
“Why aren’t the papers reporting this?”
“They either know it’s a waste of time or they’re owned by the people they’d be reporting. The climate change deniers will tell you all sorts of lies about bad science on the green lobby, and it’s true there have been mistakes made, but the lies told are mainly by the polluters, and those are deliberate and backed by some very cynical governments.”
“The Chinese, you mean?”
“They’re one of the big polluters but so are the US and even the UK isn’t as green as they said it would be. They talk big while it suits them then renege on their promises almost as soon as they make them. They’re all liars.”
Tom nodded.
“Oh dear, I feel quite depressed now.”
“Defra, the ministry responsible for the environment doesn’t have a legal department anymore, so who’s going to prosecute companies or shoots who break the law?”
“I don’t know.”
“Natural England are useless, run by someone who has vested interests in conflict with protecting the environment, so it’s left to charities like the RSPCA or RSPB to bring prosecutions if they can get the police to do anything—often they don’t have anyone with the knowhow to investigate, and if they do, the courts slap them on the wrists instead of swingeing fines and prison sentences. It’s pathetic. Enjoy the countryside while you can, because by the time your grandchildren are able to, much of it will be gone under houses or monoculture crops.”
“Oh now I feel really depressed.”
“Thanks for helping this evening, take the afternoon off tomorrow.”
“What about your letters and calls, Professor?”
“They’ll keep.”
“See you in the morning, bye.” She left and Tom shook his head.
“Did ye hae tae tell her sae bluntly?”
“I’m sick of pussyfooting round, the bastards who control this planet need removing.”
“Jest hoo d’ye plan tae dae that?”
“Education. If we can produce enough people who are environmentally aware, they might just see who’s responsible for the mess and cause them to be prosecuted or dealt with in other ways.”
“Revolution, ye mean?”
“I teach people to think for themselves, the conclusions they reach are their business.”
“Isnae that whit religion does?”
“Good grief no. I’m trying to teach rational thought, they teach anything but. Religion is the practice of delusional optimism over critical thought.”
“Sae hoo are ye gang tae teach a’ these people tae think?”
“I’m going to run distance learning courses in ecology and environmental science.”
“Oh are ye noo, since when?”
“It’s an idea I’ve had for months. It will need to be self financing within two years.”
“I thocht ye were already overstretched?”
“We are, but I’m writing a business plan to recruit at least two staff, possibly more depending upon uptake.”
“Sae are ye gang tae teach on these courses?”
“If we’re giving degrees or diplomas, there’ll need to be summer schools, I’ll have some input then, but I’m going to make more films to stimulate the desire to know more about the environment and thus protect it.”
“Carefu’ Cathy, ye’ll be steppin’ on some big toes, with long arms and even longer memories.”
“I believe I’m right.”
“Isnae that whit fanatics a’ways say?” He went off to speak with someone else and I was unable to muse upon what he’d said until later. Was I becoming a fanatic? Arguably, I’d always acted upon what I believed to be true. The difference was then tried to prove my ideas were correct, religion doesn’t it just builds lies upon lies, myths become gospel truths without evidence or experiment. I wanted to change people, but to make them think for themselves critically, not just follow blindly. If we were to save our planet, which is possibly beyond saving as we know it now, we need to change the ordinary people to see what is going on, we need to educate them and open their eyes. The only ones who would want to stop that are the vested interests, but if we educate enough, they won’t be able to stop it. I hoped I lived long enough to see things change for the better.
“You’re quiet tonight?” observed Simon as we lay cuddling in bed.
“I’m tired, I guess.”
“You do too much.”
“I have lots to do.”
“Don’t we all?”
“I think I might finally have understood my purpose.”
“I thought that was to be a wife and mother to countless children.”
“That’s the payback.”
“Payback?”
“Yeah, like a hobby.”
“Oh so I’m a hobby, am I?”
“No, you’re a hubby, a hobby is a bird—Falco subuteo.”
“You’re talking in riddles.”
“Okay, I’m here to save us from ourselves.”
“Didn’t Jesus try doing that?”
“He didn’t have a university education.”
“So that’s why he failed, arrived twelve hundred years too early?”
“Something like that.”
“And how are you going to save us all?”
“Education.”
“Right—would you care to elaborate?”
“I’m going to open the eyes of as many as I can to what is happening around us. How the vested interests are destroying the planet for personal gain...”
“Haven’t we always done that?”
“Yes, but it’s getting worse. Did you know that the richest eighty five people in the world own the same amount of wealth as the three and a half billion poorest?”
“No I didn’t, but I see my job as trying to help the three and a half billion become a bit richer.”
“Without the eighty five losing anything?”
“I’m still working out the method, it’s kinda complicated.”
“You’re a good man Simon Cameron, I hope we stay on the same side over this.”
“So do I, Cathy, so do I.”
Comments
Pollution and Big Companies
Over the last couple of days I have been commenting posts on facebook that some people we need to drill for more oil even in areas that are currently pristine. But what we need to do is take that money and put it into researching new fuel technologies. Companies want to exploit the amazon for its resources such as trees, minerals and oil but the Amazon produces much of the world's oxygen supply and the trees clean the air. All people care about is lowering the cost of gas which can be done by the companies themselves by cutting their profits instead. Money will mean nothing if you die from lack of oxygen.
Hugs,
Jenna From FL
Moderator/Editor
TopShelf BigCloset
It is a long road ahead but I will finally become who I should be.
I'm not disputing or disagreeing.....
But I believe that the vast majority of the free oxygen in our atmosphere is produced by marine algae, not by the Amazon rain forest.
A more important aspect to the loss of that rain forest is the loss of so many species we have not even discovered yet. Many of those species are plant life that may very likely have medicinal uses among others. We may in fact be destroying the very plant species that could provide the cure for cancer or other fatal illnesses, or perhaps contain the secret to longer or vastly improved lifespans.
That is perhaps the most important aspect to the loss of the rain forests.
Dallas
D. Eden
Dum Vivimus, Vivamus
Cathy always
does like a challenge, And that is certainly what faces her , Its true public opinion can go a long towards changing what seemed immovable, You only need to think of the uprisings and overthrow of communism in Central and Eastern Europe to see that if you believe enough what once seemed an impossible dream can happen
I do wish i could be optimistic about Cathy's chances of progress in her quest to wake up the world, Sadly though i fear that those 85 people will not take kindly to any threat to their wealth, There is little doubt they will fight dirty if they have too, Cathy and by definition her family will need to watch out, Those sort of people if they find a problem deal with it in the most expedient way .... If you have a problem the answer is simple, Get rid of the problem and it ceases to exist.
Kirri
85
BP is one of those companies that has cut corners and is not paying lawsuit settlements for oil spill in the gulf of america.
Hugs,
Jenna From FL
Moderator/Editor
TopShelf BigCloset
It is a long road ahead but I will finally become who I should be.
Hmmmm.... has Cathy come to realize that
her (temporary) position as head of the department has some advantages? She can create a distance learning program as the chair that she probalby couldn't as a teacher. Nice turn around!
Alas, so cynical
for one so young.
I remember growing up back in the 60s and 70s. Every day on the radio, they would report the murk index. That told us how polluted the air was that we would be breathing that day.
Lake Erie was said to be dead. Pollution was rampant.
Our 1968 AMC Ambassador had no pollution controls. Our 1976 AMX Matador was choked down with them. They were somewhat effective at the cost of the engine's efficiency and performance (and carbon dioxide emission, for that matter.)
Modern engines are more efficient, more powerful, and cleaner than the old ones. That is progress.
When I was stationed in Frankfurt, Germany back in 1980-1982, some of my fellow soldiers complained about the polluted air. I guess the German cars weren't required to have the pollution controls (and safety equipment, for that matter) that we required in America. That caused problems for those who wanted to import their POVs when they moved back.
(Presumably, Europe has gotten better at controlling pollution since then.)
For a while, we had to have pay to have our cars run through a pollution testing procedure every year before getting it licensed.
One day, I went to have it checked, only to find out that it was no longer necessary. The air was clean throughout Michigan, so it was no longer necessary.
That was about twenty years ago, and the air is even cleaner. Sure, people were worried that removing the restriction would cause pollution to return, but that didn't happen.
Meanwhile, we watched Lake Erie clean itself up.
We couldn't see the bottom of the rudder on our boat when we first started sailing around the lake in the early seventies.
Every year, we could see more of the rudder. The lake got cleaner. Fish returned. Fishermen returned.
Later, zebra mussels, an invasive species, was introduced from the ballast water of some eastern European freighters. That caused problems for some native species, and was a boon for others. Since they are filter feeders, the water cleared up even more.
Now, while there are a few cities that suffer from smog, it is the exception rather than the rule. Everything is cleaner than it used to be.
Global warming has even been put on hold. Whether it's due to Kyoto, faulty computer models, or the sun spot cycle, the infamous hockey stick graph never happened.
So we still aren't enjoying the balmy temperatures that they enjoyed in the middle ages. The Maunder Minimum (mini ice age) gave the entire planet a chill pill, and we haven't yet recovered. Maybe in a few hundred years we will. Meanwhile, fossil fuels will go the way of lamp lit London and the horse and buggy.
All around Michigan, I am seeing wind turbines sprout up. I understand that they are springing up all over the world. In fact, didn't England get more power from the turbines than their nukes just recently? I know it was a fluke, but it is indicative of the good things to come. Wind turbines are going up, and conventional power plants will end up being retired.
So, despite the doom sayers, things are getting better. I have seen them with my own eyes.
But it has happened because people have become aware and made their opinions known.
So Cathy, you go girl! But don't lose heart. We're winning the battle, and we will continue to win if we keep on fighting.
We still have the poorer parts of the world to fix up. Mexico city is one of the most polluted in the world. The former Soviet satellite countries were appallingly polluted once they were freed. I honestly don't know how much they have recovered.
It's hard to worry about pollution when your kids are hungry. When we help them feed their kids, we will help them have the resources and time to care.
And as for helping the poorest get a little more of the pie, we need to remember that the size of the pie isn't fixed. Wealth is created by human activity. As we work, the pie gets bigger. We just need to figure out how to get more of that increase to the people who are actually doing the work.