I saw an article recently about last spring’s oil spill in Arkansas this morning with photos of oil covered birds in it. Every time I see oil covered birds, I think of the Exxon Valdez. Pictures of oil soaked, choking birds from that spill turned me into an environmentalist. At age 13. And I never turned back.
Last year, there were 364 oil pipeline spills in the US alone. One a day, and that’s only the reported ones. It’s been normalized, the destruction of the planet in the name of profit and human fuel “needs.” We’re awash in plastics made from petrochemicals, unable to pressure the corporate world to even make the switch to any number of more eco-friendly approaches to running vehicles or electrical grids.
Most of us don’t even blink anymore at photos like the one above. Oh, the poor birds. A twinge of pain before you get into your car to drive somewhere, anywhere away from thinking too hard about what photos like this really mean.
People who have lived through the devastating effects of oils spills tend to be more awake. Perhaps the only thing to hope for is a doubling or tripling of these kinds of events. It seems humanity only changes collectively when backed into a corner, with no room left to spare. Maybe then there will be a mass ready to break the cycles of addiction and greed that have driven us to this place we call modern, American life.
This blip in the historical record that has done more damage than anything else humans have done since our beginning. It’s time to move on. To reintegrate our lives with the very planet that gives us life.
Photo Credit
“GulfOiledPelicans” @ Wikimedia
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Hi Kat,
I’ve heard stories like this about “big oil” management types before. They seem to have convinced themselves that it’s all a game, and that none of the suffering – human, animal, or the earth itself – matters. I can be pretty outspoken, but honestly, find myself at a loss as well when faced with extremes like this. Hard to know how to connect, or if it even matters.
Nathan
Hello Nathan, thank you for the reply.
It matters not one iota to such ilk-for their minds are powered by greed et al.
Besides, I am of the mindset that all animals are best observed from a safe distance – as contagious as foot-and-mouth is I would not wish to fall in a trough of any kind(!)
Kat.
Hello Nathan.
I dislike suffering of any kind. I will never forget a conversation that took place some 15years ago whilst I was out having a meal. The table mostly consisted of a group of management of whom worked for a well known oil company. Being fairly quiet and shy I found myself just absorbing the personalities and listening to the various conversations. One extremely loud personality took great pride in announcing how he had just recently been trained to lie to the press. He followed on to tell of how the plant was in ill repair from a safety perspective he mocked operators as they struggled on a daily basis to keep the plant running! What fun they say as they shared their stories of incompetence, power, greed and corruption! I must have resembled a mannequin as my mind just simply switched off. I felt totally out of place within the group – ever felt lost?
Thank you for sharing.