Saving a Planet

Anit Singh
There’s no use listing the endless number of ways in which we could fail. We probably won’t be able to decide on a proper course on climate change, we probably won’t stop consuming way above our needs, we probably wouldn’t be able to stop themarch of MNCs seeking to increase profits at the cost of ravaging earth. No, we aren’t going to talk of all that.
It’s long been known in scientific circles that the long term probability of extreme events increases as the globe warms up. Further, ecosystems are destroyed, diseases increase and the people of poorer nations are disproportionally affected. However the responsibility for the same is laid on the ‘others’; the polluting industries, the corrupt leaders and on the necessity of producing jobs.
A Bloody Trail of Consumption
There needs to be a radical change in the thought process.First of all, we have to realise that the blame for depletion of earths resources and environment has to lay squarely on the consumers, who being the ultimate users of all the polluting processes are also ultimately responsible for it. The new dresses, the zaniest gadgets, the most energy efficient cars and the cooling air conditioners are all based on a long assembly line, each step of which is doing us in.
Secondly the way it works is that for every product that we buy, (especially those that we don’t need) make us laden with a carbon footprint. Even the smallest pencil ( carved from the wood that had been cut from Brazils rainforest, that was processed with electricity from coal fired plants, the coal in which was derived from a mine that ruined the ecology of wherever it was located and finally the millions of litres of diesel that went in every transport process) is streaked with culpability, every pencil shared in some fraction all of these processes and by buying and using it, so do we.
Generalised in this manner, our households are sinkholes of our green future and if we could visualise the amount of destruction that is necessary for producing every product, we would see a massacre. The very air that we claim to have been dirtied by ‘others’ has a component released by every consumer whose product passed through the land. The oft quoted retort about how this process creates jobs, livelihoods and progress becomes hollow when we realise that had we, the consumers shunned carbon extensive products, none of them would’ve been manufactured.
Industrialisation of our Hearts
In the novel Middlesex, the author says that we stopped being human the day Ford invented the assembly line. It must be true, for we’ve stopped feeling the same way about our environment and nature in general. A man whose job in making a car is merely to screw in the wheel, wouldn’t understand where the minerals were extracted from, how the coal was obtained, how much effluents were released by transportation and never a hint about the intensive mind numbing advertisements that makes the users buy it.
For sure, we the consumers have had our mind warped by the virtual reality created by the advertisement world. From the giant ad banners in your face to the subtle use of certain products in movies, we are bombarded by pleas to buy or made to feel inferior if we don’t. We do buy and that too in excess, thus becoming a cog in the machinery of climate change.
When we hear ofextreme weather related disasters like intense heat waves, cyclones, droughts and deterioration of crop outputs; the climate change process is blamed. It is done on an intellectual level, without realising the role of our own self. Maybe, it was the giant air conditioning system that you operated overtime in your house that tipped over the system and caused droughts in Africa, maybe it was your demand for exotic products that led to deforestation in America, who knows?
What is sure however, that there definitely was a negative effect, the cumulative of which ultimately determined the making of the disaster.
Saving a Planet
The only question that remains is that what actions should one take? To that, I can only say that it is a matter of social responsibility. Every society has evolved with a certain set of ethos and what is important to one set of people may not be for the other. It might be difficult to ask a farmer in Bangladesh to stop lighting fires, for his meals are cooked on it and equally difficult to ask a rich businessman in Norway to clamp down on his frequent private jet trips but it seems only logical that the needs of the poor should be prioritised over the luxuries of the rich.
The ethical responsibility of climate change is difficult to assign. Should the rich be asked to stop all of their emissions before we start with the poor? Is it ethical to take away resources from people in the name of halting climate change? Would people even agree to alternatives that decrease the quality of their life? None of these questions have a definitive answer.
Thus, it is time to go back to our initial statement. There’s no use listing the number of ways in which we can fail. A strategy that can take us out of this limbo is, making the individual responsible. Every one of us can contribute according to our individual understanding, needs and willingness. Not all of us would want to plant acres of trees or to live without modern amenities, but even then, there’s some scope.
While giving up a luxury smartphone update might be a big sacrifice if done by a well to do teenager, giving up on alcohol would be big for another. The thing to realise is that all of us can contribute in our own unique ways, in small bits and pieces, to what I hope can be a big change over a period of time.
One Step At A Time
We can’t go on consuming forever and hope that nothing will happen to us. Identifying things that you absolutely need in your life and buying only those can go a long way in making a change.
Even while buying, we can’t ignore how the product was made and where. Prefer local products made with minimal processing. It might be futile to resist the propaganda of ads that bombard our senses, but instead of becoming ideal consumers for the companies, if we share and produce our own needs, lots of our other issues would also be solved. (Visualising a blood trail of emissions behind every product helps!)
It goes without saying that every trickle of energy saved is akin to avoiding the release of a proportional amount of effluent. Green buildings, with natural heat regulating mechanism can perhaps save several tonnes of carbon emissions over a lifetime. Travelling on foot and bikes isn’t only for climate change enthusiasts, but also for those who value their health.
Even a few simple diet changes such as avoiding meat can have a huge cumulative impact. Growing your own vegetables in your garden can save the fuel required for their transport or planting a tree on your birthday every year would allow you to leave the earth a tad bit greener than you found it.
While all of these might sound tiny actions against the giant global problem to be faced by world leaders, the truth is exactly the opposite. Global leaders are hemmed by considerations of polity, of lobbying and what not, but if we, out of our self efforts can even make even the tiniest difference each, we would be able to save a planet, our planet.

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