I will often tell my literature students that we humans define ourselves in opposition to nature. “Humans hate nature,” I’ll say, employing hyperbole to get them thinking. “Look around,” I spread my arms and gesture around the classroom, “what’s natural in here?” A couple will usually look around at the desks and fluorescent lights, but all remain [...]
Archive | Environmentalism
RSS feed for this section
Cold Day
When will this cold weather end? Spring Break is next week, and it’s still getting into the thirties every night. This Florida boy gets pretty cranky when exposed to the cold for too long. Besides, we want to begin planting our garden. Yesterday, in my New Media seminar, we began talking — perhaps a bit [...]
It’s Earth Day
So do something for the planet that we need, but that doesn’t need us. Put your politics aside for a day, and consider what would not only help the world, but would also help us. Check out Repower America. They want to Repower America with 100% clean electricity within 10 years. This goal means new [...]
Time to Be Serious
Yes, it is. As I’ve been saying, we need to address global warming in a radical way, and maybe Obama is the man to do it. We’ve ignored global warming for too long, doing nothing during the embarrassing administration of George W. Bush — perhaps making the problem worse by not ratifying Kyoto and putting [...]
Don’t Need Anything
I’ve got gardens growing, got quiet days / clothes on my back, food on my plate / got friends to help me if I call for them / don’t need anything I don’t have
Buy Less Crap
Join us in rejecting the ti(red) notion that shopping is a reasonable response to human suffering. The US makes up 5% of the world’s population, but we consume 25% of the world’s natural resources. Our prosperity creates a disparity in the rest of the world. We need to stop buying so much junk. When we [...]
Gore Interview
In a recent issues of Newsweek [via Truthout], Fareed Zakaria interviews Al Gore about environmentalism and the auto industry. Gore supports a “bail out” only so far as it allows GM to stay competitive — i.e., technologically and and economically. This is telling: When I was vice president, I initiated a program called the Partnership [...]
