Putting the "Mental" into environMENTAL
Introduction
Let's kick off with a rant and then look at the world of 'green' and those annoying environmentalists and what they are trying to tell us.
Rant
Man, what is it with these environment freaks? You can't drive down to your local hardware store in your 8 litre gas guzzler while smoking a whole pack of smokes while wearing a nice fur coat made out of a hundred rare, orange huppa-thumpa qwango-nark-flibble skins... Tsh.. these greenies ruin all my fun.. Next they will be saying I can't shoot endangered spieces or start vast fires in the rain forest..
Why do these people keep complaining about the rain forests being cut down to make wood and paper and yet are happy to stand on a street corner handing out pieces of paper and sticking posters to every shop window on the planet?
Superhighway-robbery
As the internet now, supposively, connects the entire world together. We are all connected, on-line, surfing the web and paying vast sums of money to huge telecommunication corps for doing exactly the same thing that our forefathers (and foremothers, lets not be sexist) did for centuries before, talk to each other. But even this activity will soon come under attack from the environmental protesters. They will complain that our 21 inch monitors and overloaded 10000 watt power supplies are causing too much pollution. Oh, so instead of talking to people on the opposite side of the planet using a phone line, let's take an old taxi to the airport, jump on a plane then onto a train at the other end before another taxi to take us to our destination.
Hmmm... perhaps the tiny pollution from the power station caused by our modem/PC wasn't too bad after all.
Hey, get with the program!
I am concerned about the environment too. And before anyone says it, I am NOT a tree loving hippy (although I find some branches and oak leaves very attractive. heheh). You don't have to live in a tent in the car park of a huge corporation to make a small difference in the world. Simply turn off (or use stand-by mode on) your monitors, televisions and lights.
Protesters are the media loving members of the green movement (hmmm.. this sounds like a illness). Not everyone wants to climb a tree or live underground for 3 months to prevent a motorway from being built. Most people want to make a difference, but are restricted by lack of time and energy. Teenagers (or the 'youths') of any generation are usually the first to embrace a new technology, a new way of thinking partly because they wish to rebel against their parents/surroundings/society and partly because they need to find an outlet for their energy and feelings.
Why bother?
Well, not everyone wants to live in a tree-hugging communitity. You could simply slump into a state of appathy, the "who cares?" generation, but one day you will realise that having clean water, fresh air, an ozone layer and no genetic hybrid cattle is probably a very good thing. If you think AIDS is bad, wait until you start seeing the effects of trans-spieces genetic diseases and plagues. All the current illnesses are nothing compared to what is on the horizon, even now we have some really, really nasty little bugs that makes the black death look like a slight cold and can spread the globe destroying everything in its path. Cities will crumble, civilisations will fall, panic and violence will spread everywhere and new drug resistance superbugs will appear (but enough about Windows 2000 heheh).
The shiny new tomorrow.
The bliss filled utopia of Star-Trek looks decidedly doubtful. Gone are the hygenic surrounding of 1970's sci-fi. There will never be a Zen inspired period in history where everyone persues intellectural past-times free from starvation, disease and war. Those dark sci-fi films like BladeRunner, Logan's Run, The Terminator and Escape from New York are starting to look far more realistic. The new and shiny has gone, so too has our ability to dream of something better. It has been replaced with me, me, me. We crave for faster things and more of them. Who cares how the electricity is being generated and what the pollution effects are?
Well no-one is, until it affects you.
You may like to have lots of cheap electricity, but would you like to live next to a nuclear power-plant?
Selling the green dream.
Look at the number of oil tankers polluting the seas, the toxic waste and discarded biological materials which fill our planet. Do you really think switching from a 100 watt light blub down to a 40 watt will really make that much difference?
Yes.
The advertisement companies are eager to sell new stuff. We don't really need most of it. Sure, it may keep us amused for a few hours until the novelty factor wears off, then it's in the trash can before surfing the on-line shops for some new junk to buy. Most companies have been rather slow to catch on to the 'green' label (until they realised that more money could be made). Basically if we all consumed less then the company would lose money. Do you think the electricity company would be happier if you used a 40 watt light-blub or a 100 watt light-blub?
The computer industry is another culprit in the "consume now, pay later" scheme of things. How many times have you bought a machine only to find out a week later that the price has dropped and a faster processor was released? How many of us have a whole box of old, discarded hardware in a corner collecting dust?
Maybe one day we will have "forward compatible" hardware where your PC can be upgraded without having to throw away half of its interior electronics. Maybe biology has some of the answers. But having something which can evolve could throw up some new dilemmas. Would your bio-hardware have some form of equal rights with other lifeforms? If you kicked your future PC would it be cruelty? If you blew it up would it be hardware murder?
Can you imagine if your hardware suddenly got an attitude problem? or maybe "threw a wobbler", turned itself off and decided to sulk in the corner until you appologied for overclocking it?
(NOTE: the author has painfully resisted the temptation to make a joke about M1cro$oft at this point in time.)
Hmmm.. I wonder what the environmentalists would have to say about this?
I guess being PC (Politically correct) could take on a whole new dimension...
Doing your bit
So please help to save the planet. Kill a hippy. Go on. It doesn't have to be a big hippy, a little mini-hippy will do... Oh... go on, I'll be your best friend in the world forever...
But seriously, please do your little bit to reduce pollution. Recycle the odd bottle, walk to the shops instead of talking your private jet or simply turn off those light which you aren't using...
...like the headlights on your car... so those hippies can't see you coming.. Muauauhahahaha..... SPLAT !!!
Nurse?
Yes?
Is it time for my electro-convulsive therapy?
You know you should have had it an hour ago...
Sorry.
Nurse!
What is it now?
Can I fly away with the magic mouse-mat people to live on Mars?
No! Now put down that keyboard and take your medication.
Sorry.