... and I feel fine

You know something is rotten....

2006-11-29T10:07:00.000+11:00

...when your federal environment minister says something like this:

"What we need to do as a world is keep mining coal."

- Ian Campbell - Australian Federal Minister for the Environment

John Howard should give Ian Campbell a new portfolio. Perhaps Minister for Fossil Fuels would be a better title than Minister for the Environment.

Campbell was responding to a recent court decision that ruled that new coal mines would be required to include information in their environmental impact statement about the amount of CO2 released by the coal that they mine, as usual he came out with all guns firing to support big business.

This is me

2006-11-15T16:14:00.000+11:00

I evade my personal responsibility for the things I choose to do. I blame the government, the oil companies, George Bush, the economy, the wealthy and anybody else I can think of for the destruction that my lifestyle causes.

I put my comfort, my convenience and my conformity ahead of the lives and livelihoods of thousands of future generations, and I try not to think too much about my daily contribution to the destruction of the world that was left to me by thousands of past generations. I put myself far, far ahead of my ancestors and decendents and take from them for the most trivial of reasons.

I ignore the real human pain, suffering and death that my behaviour causes. I turn the page, switch the channel, and change the topic of conversation. I pretend that the science isn't definitive yet, or that there's no point in changing before others do, and I convince myself that 'scientists' will come up with a technological solution that will make my lifestyle and me OK.

I avoid, I deny, I justify and rationalise, I pretend, I project, I squirm and squeeze and do whatever I can to maintain my concept of myself as a good person while still doing what I do. I evade my moral responsibility a day at a time in the hope that reality will somehow be different tomorrow morning.

I steal from those who live far away from me, and who I do not know because I see their pain as cartoon pain, and not fully real. I casually destroy what future generations will depend upon to live because they have yet to be born and it is only me, and my time and my normalcy that is important.

I am like those who, sixty years ago, did their jobs and lived their normal lives and didn't ask questions about where their Jewish neighbours had gone. I am like those who participated in slavery and other atrocities, except that the effects of my crimes will outlast all those others.

And it is OK, because today I am normal, and busy, and have other things on my mind and, if what I do is really so bad so many people wouldn't be doing the same, would they?

But when, in the hours before I die, I think back upon my life and what it has meant, I must do one thing. I must hope and hope and pray and pray that there is nothing beyond life and beyond time and beyond myself, that there is no balance, no karma, no morality and no justice.

Because if there is, and I do what I do, knowing what I know....

Well, lets not think about that.

A comment by Rashers101 in George Monbiot's column on The Guardian's website

The best things in life aren't things

2006-11-08T16:01:00.000+11:00

Do we have enough stuff yet? Maybe we need more supermarkets? Maybe we need more roads?

Permapedia - A community resource

2006-10-29T14:32:00.000+11:00

Permapedia is a fantastic new resource for permaculture designers or anyone who wants to create a sustainable lifestyle for themselves. Permapedia aims to become the first Permaculture encyclopedia, it is written collaboratively by its readers.

Permapedia uses the same engine as Wikipedia so it is extremely easy for anyone to add new articles or edit existing pages. The site is still in it's early days so it might seem a little sparse at the moment, but with a little help from people like you it will grow to become invaluable.

Oil God

2006-10-19T18:05:00.001+10:00

Ok you've played the McVideoGame but now you feel like really hurting humanity. Well lucky for you, now you can really cause some global damage with Oil God.

You are an Oil God! Wreak havoc on the world’s oil supplies by unleashing war and disaster. Bend governments and economies to your will to alter trade practices. Your goal? Double consumer gasoline prices in five years using whatever means necessary: start wars, overthrow leaders, spawn natural disasters ? even beckon the assistance of extra-terrestrial overlords. The game explores the relationship between gas prices, geopolitics, and oil profits.

Originally from Grand Text Auto

Nuclear energy is NOT the answer to Climate Change

2006-10-17T15:14:00.000+10:00

Our prime minister is trying to tell us that nuclear power will combat global warming.

John Howard is lying.

He is attempting to justify increased mining in order to export more uranium and turn Australia into an "energy super power".

In the paper "Nuclear Power : the energy balance" by J.W. Storm and P. Smith (2005), the authors calculate that with high quality ores, the CO2 produced by the full nuclear life cycle is about one half to one third of an equivalent sized gas-fired power station. For low quality ores (less than 0.02% of U₃O₈ per tonne of ore), the CO2 produced by the full nuclear life cycle is EQUAL TO that produced by the equivalent sized gas-fired power station.

Futhermore it will take at least 15 years to get a viable nuclear power industry off the ground. We need action NOW.

Nuclear energy is NOT the answer to climate change, it is just another method of increasing development and giving more public money to big business.

The fundamental solution to reducing the effects of climate change is simple.

We need to reduce consumption and increase efficiency... unfortunatley for big corporations there is not alot of money to be made in this process.

If you would like to read more about the false economies of nuclear power please read this article.

Thanks to Dave Kimble for his article that provided most of the links above.

We are all sons and daughters of Abraham

2006-07-05T16:33:00.000+10:00

This will change the way you think about refugees, the Arab/Israeli conflict, indigenous affairs, George Dub-ya and your own great great great grandmother.

"You would have to go back in time only 2,000 to 5,000 years — and probably on the low side of that range — to find somebody who could count every person alive today as a descendant.
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That means everybody on Earth descends from somebody who was around as recently as the reign of Tutankhamen, maybe even during the Golden Age of ancient Greece. There's even a chance that our last shared ancestor lived at the time of Christ.
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It also means that all of us have ancestors of every color and creed. Every Palestinian suicide bomber has Jews in his past. Every Sunni Muslim in Iraq is descended from at least one Shiite. And every Klansman's family has African roots."

The idea that I am the direct descendant of the Mesopotamian potter woman who invented the wheel, Liu Bang, the first emperor of the Han Dynasty, the Aztec priest who held an obsidian blade to the heart of a young human sacrifice and Cleopatra.... fills me with awe.

Saudi oil minister denies peak oil

2006-05-03T16:39:00.000+10:00

Article today in the the Age (via Reuters).. the Saudi oil minister denies we have reached Peak Oil....

This is a striking piece of evidence supporting the importance of the theory. Why on earth would the Saudi oil minister even acknowledge Peak Oil's existence if it was not a credible explanation of what is happening.

Dance monkeys dance

2006-04-22T10:01:00.000+10:00

Sometimes you just have to remember how important your own needs are.

Picked this up reading Steven Lagavulin's deconsumption blog. Made me smile and cry at the same time. Written and spoken by Ernest Cline