I have received an email titled "Letter from 2070". Leaving aside the fact that this "letter" is written in PowerPoint (perhaps people in the future forgot about plain text) I found the content of the letter more annoying than moving. It paints an over-simplified and deliberately shocking picture of the future where water is more scarce and valuable than gold and diamonds. It speaks of decreased life expectancy and widespread disease. It blames all of this on each individual reader for using too much water and cutting down all the trees.
I'll let you in on a little secret: I don't drive the bulldozers that are destroying our rainforests. I don't play with the hose for fun. I don't even have a dog to wash, and my daily bathing for showers takes less than four minutes. Am I personally to blame for the destruction of rainforests and our dwindling water supplies? I submit that I am no longer part of the problem.
Feeling bad about environmental issues is clearly not enough. Most of us do that already. We need to start having a positive effect on the environment, not just a neutral one. If we're already feeling bad and urging each other to save water, save power and eliminate landfill, then where is the problem? I'd say it's because the effect of reducing our environmental impact just slows the decay. We can't fill up the dams again by using the remaining water more slowly.
Mokalus of Borg
PS - I don't have a water tank at home.
PPS - That would be the next step.
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