The Human Footprint

John Murlis talks about the futility of buying food with a carbon stamp on it and that in reality half the carbon emissions come from cooking the produce anyway so it's useless to buy these foods. While I believe he is right that money spent to try to make the produce's journey from the farm to the store more "green" is ultimately useless and that that money could be spent better elsewhere, I do take issue with his statement that buying organic produce is also futile. Hate to break it to y'all, but carbon emissions aren't the only thing that's killing the Earth. Yeah global warming gets all the hype so it's understandable that some people only freak out about them and overlook the other factors. But if we were to only focus on global warming and ignore the other pollution problems than it won't matter if the Earth is nice and cool because we'll still be in serious trouble. People sell organic produce because it has no pesticides on it, not because less gas is spent on transporting it. And you might be thinking "Oh, well pesticides are okay...much less worse than global warming..." Well you're wrong. While it hasn't been confirmed yet, it is firmly believed that the use of pesticides is starting to kill off the wrong kind of insects, most importantly bees. Bees populations around the world are dying off with terrifying speed. Why are bees so important you ask? Well, they happen to be the only worldwide pollinators, yeah there are other pollinators in the world but plants are pollinated by bees about 99% of the time. Now take a moment to think about this, how many plants on Earth require pollination to survive? What would happen if all the bees died? All I can say is that you'd better like your wheat products...cause without bees that's about all that would be left...

So it bothered me that Murlis simply dismissed the impact of organic produce. I firmly believe that everyone should buy organic produce, maybe it won't stop global warming but it will save the Earth from an equally devastating fate.

Do I believe I am responsible for global warming? Well that's a complicated answer, yes and no...I do everything that I am aware of and find myself capable to do to be more "green" but I do think that the human race, Americans especially, are responsible for global warming, and as a member of both the aforementioned, I am also responsible. A lot of people think that they can't really help by buying "green" products, or investing in renewable energy cause they think, "I'm only one person what impact can I possibly have? Not to mention it's kind of expensive to go "green"..." And so they do nothing...Think of is as investing in the future of the human race. Yeah maybe you won't be around to see things get really bad, but does that mean that you should sit back and let the next generation deal with it? Everyone should be as "green" as they can, there are billions of people so while you might think that your contribution is too small to even count, in reality every little bit does count, if billions of people each do their "little bit" than the collective effect would be huge. So if you're one of those people that just shrugs off your responsibility to do your part to help get our world out of this mess we've made with excuses like "Well, it doesn't really affect me..." or "I wouldn't make a difference..." or if you simply are too comfortable and lazy to sacrifice a little, than I'm sorry for you. No one is going to force you to help, it's your choice, but just don't be surprised when suddenly all these problems become crises and everyone is pointing his/her finger at you and you'll be thinking "If only I had..." Trust me you don't want to be in that position. We've only got one shot at this so let's make it count.