Bad news for humans and other Earth-dwelling beings: Al Gore cannot save you.
It’s true.
The man who won the 2000 popular election and stole all our hearts (and Nobel Peace Prizes) via well-executed slide shows may have slain ManBearPig, but he cannot single-handedly declaw the imminent challenge of man-made climate change.
I think, as you are a friend of Talk Nerdy to Me, you probably know this fact already. In fact, I think Al did the greatest service that someone with his public platform could do and made Americans (and others) aware of the enormity and immediacy of the climate change problem.
If this is the case, then why did we just pass our thirty-first “Earth Day” celebration without much more than the threat of an incandescent light bulb ban and a few extra reusable shopping bags? Where is the urgency? (And yes, fellow nerds, that was an indignant Battlestar Galactica pun; you’re welcome.)
I’m more than a little frustrated. As a former Earth Science and Environmental Science teacher at a Bronx, NY public high school, I tried daily to explain to my students that the Earth was theirs, and that they had a responsibility as American citizens and Earth-dwellers to become scientifically literate so they could become well-informed voters.
Only by grappling with and understanding scientific research can students mature into informed American citizens that can make up their minds on the daily compromises of government and life without having some intermediary (which I hope sounds as despicable as my italics intend it to) interpret the research to its own ends.
Observing Earth Day one day out of 365.25 days in a year or Earth Hour one hour out of 8,766 hours in a year is paltry in comparison to the immense challenge before us.
If you’d like to read some excellent ideas about the teaching of environmental responsibility to youth, I recommend my fellow blogger Michaele Labriole’s recent posts Climate Change: From Scary to Science and What Does Going Green Really Mean?
If you’d like a really nice syntax that parents can use with their young children to introduce the idea of environmental stewardship, I recommend Brian Yanish’s Scrap Kins: they are a totally darling group of cartoon monster friends that live in a recycling center and reuse stuff they find to create toys—with minimal additional crafting material beyond what you’d normally have at home.
However, if what you’d like to know is how we can do a better job at getting the grownup American citizens to behave more urgently and responsibly in the face of climate change, then you and I have something important in common. In my next post, I’ll introduce you to some of the more interesting perspectives I’ve found.
