Urgent pre-COP26 message to the world
Do the attendees understand 3rd grade arithmetic?
SOS #129 -- J. Morris Hicks -- (10-26-21)
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Even as we humans are grossly over-consuming while adding six million to our population each month -- our leaders and COP26 delegates seem to be totally oblivious to the dilemma in which we find ourselves.
It's as if they somehow believe that we can "beat" climate change without changing much about the way we live -- simply by swapping out our energy sources.
Even if we had the will to reach actual zero (or even net zero) in the use of fossil fuels, it would take decades, if not a half-century to get there and we simply don't have that much time.
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Everyday, I search the news from around the world -- always looking for a glimmer of hope that our world leaders are beginning to grasp the "big picture" of our sustainability dilemma on the only planet in the universe capable of keeping us alive. |
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Normally I am disappointed, but yesterday I happened upon a video from two weeks ago, a 55-minute interview with George Monbiot on Penguin: Capitalism and Climate Change. His "big picture" views expressed in that video inspired me to search his other works.
And that's when I found a two-minute video on YouTube that he recorded earlier this year. In it, Monbiot explains in a very easy-to-understand manner why we must have a completely new score-keeping system on this planet.
He begins with a simple explanation of the origins of Covid-19. As he states in the short video, it was a natural result of the way we are living.
In the video, the graphics make it clear that we should stop eating animals, but his words don't exactly make that clear. I guess you could call it a case of subtle persuasion.
Click on this image to watch the 2-minute video. Its title is: It's time to bail out the planet. (in Monbiot's voice)
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The last few words in the above video were these:
After the financial crisis in 2008, we bailed out the banks. In 2021, we need to bail out the planet.
While watching his longer, 55-minute video, I enjoyed hearing him explain why we must have a totally new kind of global economy -- one that places the needs of the natural world above our own desire for more stuff.
Of course, that reminded me of the chapter in OUTCRY wherein we introduced a vision of a totally new kind of economy that rewards all behaviors that focus on actually "improving" the natural world.
Click on this image to read Chapter 11 free of charge:
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The above chapter begins with this Cree Indian Proverb:
“Only when the last tree has died and the last river been poisoned and the last fish been caught—will we realize we cannot eat money.”
As mentioned earlier, my daily search for good news in the world usually ends in disappointment. According to the global media, it's as if our world leaders have concluded that we only have to worry about one thing:
Reducing our carbon emissions!
For sure, we must reduce our carbon emissions -- but we must do so very much more.
Ironically, the easiest, most powerful and quickest step we could take will very likely not even be mentioned in Glasgow's official meetings:
Stressing the urgent need to totally abolish
animal agriculture all over the world!
As for reducing our carbon emissions, the above step is the quickest and safest way that we can do exactly that. It would also put an end to the rampant deforestation that has been happening for 10,000 years.
It's why we have deserts where there were once forests.
To the casual reader of the global news, it seems that our ability to slow or stop climate change all boils down to what happens in Glasgow during the first ten days of November.
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I wish it were that simple. But it's not.
Because the simple steps that are crucial to our future...are all based on major truths that will not even be discussed at Glasgow.
- The flawed assumption that our global population can continue growing by over six million people per month...
- The flawed assumption that we, in the developed world, can continue to over-consume -- while those in developing nations are steadily moving in the direction of consuming much more on a per-person basis.
How can we change the narrative? How can we help the average citizen of the world understand the severity of the situation in which we find ourselves?
Once average citizens begin to grasp the "big picture" of our dilemma, they will begin to demand much more decisive action from our leaders.
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This powerful film can help when it comes to more people grasping that "big picture." I featured it last week and will continue sharing this link > in my weekly SOS Memos.
Will it make a difference? I doubt that it will -- based on the numbers from last week. Sadly, out of 5,000 people on my mailing list, less than 100 clicked on this video. Who knows how many actually watched the film?
It's the best overall summary of our current situation that I have ever seen. And I bet John Kerry has no idea what kind of horrible mess we are in. I also bet that he will be eating his share of animal-based foods while at the COP26 in Glasgow.
Why would I make those bets? Because I have never heard him mention a single word about the crucial relationship between our food choices and climate change.
But there is a glimmer of hope in the news. I noticed this piece in Bloomberg News reporting that a "plant-forward menu" would be featured at COP26.
Greta marching and speaking. Click on the COP image below to hear her latest 2-minute message to the world.
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Back to the 2015 film. It runs 83 minutes, can be viewed for free and can easily be understood by all adults 18+ in the world. Just click the link at left.
This film can help all adults quickly come to grips with the fragile nature of our situation on this planet.
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The more people who understand it, the greater our chances of accelerating the process of moving ourselves in the direction of a way of life that can be sustained indefinitely. The children of the world deserve no less.
Speaking of the children, one of my readers (Richard Stearns from Colorado) sent me a message last week that ended with a sobering tale that I have labeled...
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The Sad Saga of the Burgers and the Spinach |
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Recently, I was at the grocery store when I saw a sale price for 10 frozen burgers that was cheaper than the bag of spinach I was holding in my hand. |
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As I looked at the sign, I thought about the several billion people in emerging nations.
If they had to choose the bag of spinach or the ten frozen burgers, which one will they pick?
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Economics says the burgers win -- and as a result, we all lose. It seems everywhere you look, the systems in place are designed specifically to make the hard choices that we as a society must make -- even harder.
I wish I could say I am still optimistic that we can and will find a way to turn this around -- but I would be lying. How do I explain to my grandkids how our generation let them down? Do we just tell them the truth, saying...
"Yeah kids, we knew a long time ago we were in trouble, but we chose the burgers anyway"
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It certainly might help us all make better choices if we had leadership that showed us the way. But we don't. |
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During my final edit of this SOS earlier today, I saw an article on the NAS website that featured an interview with the current president of the National Academy of Sciences, Marcia McNutt.
Toward the end of that piece, I was extremely disappointed to see her lame summary of our situation. To read the entire interview, just click on the link above.
It's as if she is saying, don't worry about having to make any drastic changes in your lives; we're all going to be just fine. For example...
I think there is this fear out there that acknowledgement of climate change means that people will have to wildly change their quality of life. But the truth is, we have solutions in hand that will continue to provide the energy we need without releasing the CO2.
We just need to get that message out. We’re not talking about taking away the things that bring you joy in life. We’re just talking about substitutions. They’re not necessarily all easy, but they are becoming more available.
For example, to make [hybrid or electric vehicles] truly practical on a massive scale, we need … a whole network of charging stations. The speed for recharging is getting faster and faster while the miles traveled are getting farther before you have to recharge.
So solutions like that are on the horizon. And the transportation sector is the No. 1 largest contributor to greenhouse gas emissions.
Not only is her last sentence not true, it begs the question: With this kind of nonchalant leadership, how can we expect to successfully deal aggressively with the single largest threat to our future as a species?
Our food choices.
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The Bottom Line. We desperately need to be crystal clear with the public relative to our absolute best plan of action to help us minimize the effects of climate change on our future.
Oftentimes, I am criticized for my continued emphasis on the urgent need to totally abolish animal agriculture all over the world. Let me explain my rigidity on this topic.
It's because, after nineteen years of study, I am near 100% certain that if we don't aggressively go after the lowest hanging fruit ASAP -- our species will not survive this century.
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And that lowest hanging fruit is simply this: We must urgently begin taking all steps possible to move the entire world toward a 100% plant-based way of eating. We may not survive anyway, but I can go to my grave knowing that I gave it my best shot.
At least my eight grandchildren will know that GranBuddy (GB) did not choose the burgers over the spinach.
For the latest information on this key topic, click on the above book by my friend, Glen Merzer. Along with Dr. Sailesh Rao, Glen and I participated in this half-hour video discussion with Dale Walkonen of Facing Future. It was aired last week and is entitled: Animal Agriculture is Killing the Planet.
As I explained last week in SOS #128, It all goes back to human rights vs human responsibilities. As adults who have learned the truth about the extreme importance of our food choices -- It is our responsibility to urgently promote that truth around the world. Indefinitely!
Oh, by the way, this way of eating costs a lot less money AND prevents or reverses most chronic disease.
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Rights vs. Responsibilities. In SOS #128, I referred to a 2020 piece in the British press in which Dr. Stephen Emmott offered his opinion on this topic in these three sentences:
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“Personally speaking, I think there should be no such thing as human rights.
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There should be a charter of human responsibilities, and if we were focused on human responsibilities rather than human rights, we would be in a totally different place to where we are now.
- The root of this is about our collective responsibilities to each other and to other species we share the planet with.”
Can you imagine where we would be now had we begun taking our responsibility as planet stewards seriously -- two hundred years ago?
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In case you want to refer back to some of the data in the past few SOS Memos, here are four links that you might want to keep handy in case anyone questions you about the source of your numbers.
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What can you do? For starters, you can buy the new documentary -- Eating our way to Extinction for $6 on Netflix -- and watch it often with your friends and family.
Also, you can:
- Share this SOS Memo with everyone you know.
- Inform all the young people in your world that you are deadly serious about this topic.
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- Completely stop eating meat, dairy, eggs and fish today and tell everyone why you are taking such a "radical" step. You're doing it for the innocent children of the world.
- As noted above, do yourself a favor and make sure that your plant-based meals of the future consist of whole plants -- the kinds of foods that prevent or reverse most chronic diseases AND enable your body to effortlessly seek its optimal weight.
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A final word. Hopefully, the kind of crucially serious "conversations" expressed in this SOS Memo will soon replace the trivial topics that dominate a ridiculously large percentage of all of the conversations in the world.
We must all start talking much more about what's really important: doing everything possible to maximize the chances of a meaningful and pleasant life ahead for the young people of the world.
I volunteer to help you do that. For Free. Invite me to collaborate with you and your friends via Zoom. To help you jump-start that all-important conversation with your group, I will be happy to present and discuss this topic. Here's an advance link to my 62 slides.
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The image above is a clue regarding the essence of my "family game plan" that is revealed only in my talks. I do not put that in writing.
Want to share some of my SOS Memos with others? Visit my SOS Memos page where the most recent ones are listed first.
Finally, I am confident that if a few million people carefully read and digested OUTCRY, that there might at least be a more robust conversation taking place about our grossly unsustainable way of living in the developed world -- and what it will take to get us focused on maximizing our chances of survival as a species.
To be sure, we must do a lot more than change what we eat -- and OUTCRY helps explain the "why" and the "how" of that proposition.
To my knowledge, OUTCRY remains the only book ever published that features an envisioned, totally-green, ultra-sustainable, super-desirable, future way of living for humans -- along with ideas for how we might get there as quickly as possible.
J. Morris (Jim) Hicks
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PS: Regarding the free Zoom conferences with your group, Send me an email and let's get started.
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Our book, for a host of environmental reasons, is only available as an e-book on Amazon. As such, it contains hyperlinks to hundreds of references and videos, is less expensive, does not kill any trees and does not have to be manufactured and delivered.
The links below to earlier SOS Memos will help you understand how these ideas unfolded since 2018.
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As always, I am just trying to help spark the all-important "conversation" about what is needed. By sharing a vision of what I believe is possible, I hope to influence others to think bigger, faster, better and bolder.
You will find that there aren't many books that cover both the health of your body and the health of your planet. This is one of them -- a book that my son Jason assisted me in writing. It was published ten years ago this month.
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What else can you do to help? Two things:
1. Live as greenly as possible while doing all that you can to raise the awareness of "big picture" solutions that are crucially necessary for saving our civilization.
2. Share this BSB and my "Mama Ain't Happy" BSB with prominent journalists, thought leaders and/or elected officials whom you respect. They need to learn a lot more about the many reasons why Mama ain't happy.
Promoting health, hope and harmony on planet Earth
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