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A Vicious Circle

Published 17th October 2009 - 2 comments - 1626 views -

Media's been pumping up quite a lot of climate change related international information lately and yet a casual "see no evil, hear no evil, speak no  evil" behavior among my fellow countrymen seems to still be the main policy around here.

If I'd ask my 82 y.o. grandma about climate change, she might tell me it's just another 'mumbo jumbo' politicians use to avoid taking proper care of 'the real problems' of this country.
If I'd ask my 23 y.o. brother about CO2 emissions, he'd send me away to find another lab rat to do my 'questionable' focus group tests on.
If I'd ask my 34 y.o. cousin about global warming, she'd ask me to come back later because she'd be busy helping her son do his kinder garden related project.

So, what's going on? Why no vocal riots from my friends while out for a beer? Why such a local apparent lack of interest in matters of the environment when there are only 50 days left until COP15?

I've unveiled the mystery today, while taking photos of my still beautiful country. 

Almost same landscape caught in 2 different moments

It's a matter of perspectives.

First of all, educated people stopped taking for granted messages they hear from media they don't trust. Eco messages seen on TV or heard on the radio don't plant any action seeds, nor do they touch hearts. On the contrary, most of the persons I know are sick of campaigns that sell some "worthy cause" (and most of the CSR environmental campaigns go here).

Second of all, climate change does not resonate directly with any of the 5 human senses. It is not exactly a cabbage, a crayon or any other touchable thing. It's not something that happens all of a sudden, so we can't see it. Yeah, we see its consequences, but that's another story. It's something that happens in time and, you know, human bodies have been designed to adapt to the environment they live in (thus our different skin colour, height, features, etc). It's not something that we can smell or hear either.

Therefore, it's not so incredible anymore that the average person doesn't believe that some abstract thing is supposed to change their life, oh wait, not necessarily theirs, maybe just the life of their children.

We all act upon immediate worries, we all handle short term issues first, we all have basic needs that must be covered before we can think of some higher goal that needs to be attained.  On the other hand, if we'd all make climate change our main priority, other questions would still occur.

A bit of a vicious circle, huh?

CO2 emissions

Category: Climate Reporting, | Tags: climate change, cop15, climate,



Comments

Daniel Nylin Nilsson on 19th October 2009:

If you’re just to skiing climate change might well resonate with many senses wink

I was a little surprised by this… my impression is that most people have an impression that the climate is changeing since ten or fifteen years back. But I guess it depends on very many different things, what people do, where they live etc.

Adela on 19th October 2009:

Hehe, yeah, you make a point that confirms the theory of different perspectives.

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