When I was growing up, we had a ghost living in our house. This entity’s name was “Not me.” The perpetual question would be asked, “Who left the bowl of chips on the floor?” “Who made the mess?” “Who’s responsible for that?” The answer would usually be, “Not me.” Quite often, “Not me” did a lot around my house.
Now, it seems, “Not me” has expanded its horizons and moved on to a larger target. Now, it seems, “Not me” is responsible for the health of the environment and taking solid steps in moving toward alternative energy sources.
The “Renewable Energy: The Deceptive Global Consensus” reading discusses a speech made by Al Gore in Italy in 2004, in which he named the top threats to the climate health as being the Earth’s population explosion, scientific and technological developments, and the lifestyle of rich countries. The article point out that by assigning such broad causes, everyone, and therefore no one, is responsible for the condition of global health. The blame isn’t pinned on one person or country, so everyone can point fingers at their neighbors and say, “It’s not our fault. They do higher pollution rates, so they’re the ones who need to take action. It’s not me, it’s them.”
There have been efforts made by some countries, especially in Europe, to turn toward renewable energy sources, but it hasn’t been on the level that it needs to be to truly turn the tide toward alternative energy sources. The “Why Alternative Energy and Fuels” reading reveals that the United States consumes about 25% of the world’s crude petroleum supply annually. The U.S. needs to be one of the countries taking a leading position in the movement toward alternative energy sources, and so far, it hasn’t gone as far as it needs to.
Thus comes the idea of urban gardens. They’re not the ultimate answer for saving the world, but they can’t hurt, and they’d bring communities together. They’ve already started to take hold in Detroit. Corporations like Hantz Farms are turning vacant lots into community gardens to provide local, homegrown food, jobs, and a common tie to bring people together to work for something greater than the individual.
This is an example of why it’s important to cultivate “social capital” (people power, community engagement) as well as “physical capital” ( buildings, sidewalks, etc). As discussed in “Community Development Through Gardening: State and Local Policies Transforming Urban Open Space” by Jane Schukoske, the attempt in the 1950’s and 1960’s to improve physical capital in cities may have resulted in a nicer-looking cityscape, but it also desolated the social capital in some areas. One example right here in Detroit is the destruction of Black Bottom in the 1960’s. A once vibrant community was destroyed as the freeways cut right down its middle in the name of progress.
Basically, what we’ve been seeing is that not everything valuable in this world can have a price tag on it. The “natural capital” described by “The Next Industrial Revolution” is invaluable. Natural capital entails the normal resources that usually come to mind - water, minerals, oil, trees, soil, air, etc – but also includes ecosystems like coral reefs, savannas, and rainforests. Yet too often, we take those ecosystems for granted because although they’re pretty, they don’t in and of themselves have a tangible monetary value, and we let them be destroyed so that other resources like wood and oil can be removed and used by consumers all over the world.
Social capital and neighborhood commitments are valuable, and so are ecosystems like the rainforest. The rainforest holds the potential for millions of medical cures, but if we keep destroying it, we’ll lose them forever. I don’t mean to go all Pocahontas “Paint with all the colors of the wind” here, but we really need to step back and re-evaluate how we value the resources of this world, not just according to the price they could bring on the world market.
This time, it can’t be left to “Not me.” This time, it’s everyone’s problem, and instead of being no one’s problem, everyone needs to take a direct step, whether that be on an individual level (using reusable canvas bags for shopping instead of plastic bags), a community level (starting an eco-friendly garden to strengthen community ties), or a governmental level (standing behind environmental sanctions and not backing down to the demands of big fossil fuel businesses).
We can’t stand around pointing fingers; everyone made the mess, so everyone needs to clean it up. “Not me” just isn’t good enough anymore.
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