The Tragic Irony of Earth Day:

What was once a fringe, bare, grassroots effort to promote awareness about our impact on the biosphere, Earth Day is now, at least topically, an international phenomenon. The growth of this generalized movement speaks to the strength of educators, the power of media, the emergence of young people, and a growing/broad understanding that on some level our waste and rampant consumerism is crushing our fragile ecosystems.

But all of this effort is still little more than pastiche: a pseudo organized, largely ineffective message driven by the best of intentions, but still not a mainstream component of domestic or foreign policy. Although America and the developed world are at present the worst offenders to our environment (America ranks first in per capita pollution/trash/waste and 1st/2nd w/ China in total emissions), we have neither addressed domestic pollutants through public policy/private behavior, nor foreign development aide structures to the developing world/foreign policy to the developed world. More than 60% of the Earth's population lives in the developing world and barely contributes to the problem of climate change compared to developed countries. We have no right to demand that development slow, or to prevent life style improvements from reaching these people, so how do we reconcile the fact that we have radically changed the face of our planet, for worse, and did so with participation of a minority of the globe's citizens?

In short, Earth Day is all well and good, but domestic and global population is quickly escalating, the demand for modernity and development is escalating,  and the facts on the ground indicate that NO significant players are taking substantive action to address the rapid deterioration of our environment. 

This crisis can not be completely addressed by signatories at the Copenhagen conference in December. It can best be effected by changes in consumer behavior, and outcry for greater action by voters to legislators and executives. That means making decision with your wallet that reflect this reality: Everyday is Earth Day. Every decision you make affects our world, and future generations. We need to stop our active laziness, stop our blissful ignorance, and wake up to the reality of the impact of our choices.

This is our only home, and we are destroying it now, to the effect of our own quality of life and the opportunities for successive generations. As global citizens, increasingly connected, we are behind the tipping point where we will be able to stop climate change. Now we can only try to mitigate it's effects, and try to diminish further impacts. This is a critical time in the momentum of that effort, for if we do not act unilaterally (as one voice) and soon, events could well escalate beyond our ability to recover.

Back to Earth Day: We are throwing the catch phrases and marketing schemes of Earth Day around in the hope of changing awareness, without pressing (collectively) hard for real change to our economy, real planning for future generations, and a thorough greening revitalization/metamorphosis of the existing economy- trade systems- development architecture etc. The greatest long term existential threat to humanity is from climate change and the progress of our machinery of state in addressing it been woefully negligent. (a special mention needs to be given to nuclear proliferation, and bio-warfare but that's a separate posting).  

It's well past time we took matters into our own hands (every single American) and forced the public sector and private enterprise to tackle this issue with science based, thoughtful, well conducted action. And although the Earth Day message has spread and grown rapidly, it is not enough.. too little, and maybe too late. Substantive changes in our behavior should be the number one priority, but Earth Day suggests, instead, that it's just another honorable mention in our yearly affairs.