IT'S ABOUT TIME WE GIVE A DAMN

The Webster Dictionary defines change as: “To make a different in some particular or to replace with another” Why is this relevant? I have no effing clue, I just felt like I was writing an essay and isn’t that how they all start?

When I signed up to blog about Climate Change for Blog Action Day 2009 http://www.blogactionday.org/ to join in worldwide efforts toward awareness I had no idea writing it would be so hard. Usually writing is easy and fun for me when I am invested in the topic, but this was a lot harder than I thought. Even thought the subject is one close to my heart I was reduced after a few minutes of research to Googling for info. I was immediately bombarded by mind-numbingly boring facts and mind-numbingly boring people who actually denied the facts.

My tip for raising awareness would be to make the topic more easily understandable for us regular folks.

I don’t know much but I do know one thing, Climate Change may be a boring topic when one peruses the facts, it might not fun to talk about, it is not glamorous and sometimes overwhelming, but sadly all that doesn’t make it any less real.

In the past century industrialized nations have expanded and new ones have come to life, the use of coal and other forms of fossil fuel has increased exponentially (in that fact at least we can ALL agree). Being a Climate Change believer or skeptic doesn’t change those simply facts:

Sea levels are rising, glaciers are melting, hurricanes have changed in frequency and strength (oh Joy! And I live in Florida), heat waves are more common and animal’s habitats are shrinking.

I am a 26-year old college dropout with a passion for writing, reading, animals, gay rights advocacy and shoes; I don’t know in numbers, cold facts and figures why the things I just mentioned are happening and how it directly relates to Climate Change or Global Warming.

I do know, however, that preemptive measures to defend and protect our home planet cannot be a bad idea. Even if every effect on the world blamed on Climate Change was a lie manufactured by us bleeding liberals and tree huggers, the fact remains that we cannot continue to selfishly, unconsciously and indiscriminately abuse the planet we live in.

We have the technology, the ability, the brain power, the capacity to change NOW. We can change how people think, how things are done, how cars are built, how we dispose of our trash, what we consume. We have every resource to do the right thing in our hands, all we need now is the will do it, the will to make it real, the will to make it happen.

This is not US vs. Them, Liberals vs. Conservative, is not Right vs. Wrong, it’s simply about trying to improve what may or may not be broken before is too late. If we do not take our Planet’s changing face as a warning sign then let’s see it a plea, nay an invitation to change what has been in place for long enough, let’s see is as an opportunity to change the world.

So I invite you all to hug a tree, wear some hemp, pick up trash in the street (even if is not yours) drive only when absolutely necessary, turn off the lights, recycle. Do something, anything! Just don’t do NOTHING. Doing nothing is unacceptable; action is fundamental and required from each and every one of us.

“Unless someone like you cares a whole awful lot, nothing to going to get better” Dr. Seuss’s The Lorax.