Hello to all people who by chance come to this page, and this message. Our planet, and our human family living on this planet, needs to take a closer look at what we are doing to ourselves, and to the environment, and to become aware that we are putting both ourselves and the planet into grave danger.
We are allowing our fellow humans to eliminate all the indigenous people the world over. We are allowing our fellow humans to eliminate the planet's forests. We are allowing others to satisify our conscience when in fact it is our own conscience which we need to address for ourselves.
UN paints grim global picture
Time running out for ecology, report warns; new threat is found By Rosalind Russell, Reuters, 09/22/99AIROBI - It is too late to halt global warming and time is quickly running out to prevent other potential environmental catastrophes, the UN's environment agency said in a major report yesterday.
''Global Environment Outlook 2000'' offers a gloomy view of the planet's condition on the eve of the next millennium. It points to new threats - such as increased levels of nitrogen in the water supply - that the world has not yet tackled.
''The gains made by better management and technology are still being outpaced by the environmental impacts of population and economic growth. We are on an unsustainable course,'' Klaus Toepfer, head of the United Nations Environment Program, said at the launch of the report in Nairobi.
The report says emissions of greenhouse gases that cause global warming have quadrupled since the 1950s, and that ''binding'' targets to reduce emissions, agreed by governments at the summit last year in Kyoto, Japan, may not be met. The rate at which humans are destroying the environment is accelerating, often because of excessive consumption by the rich, and to the detriment of the poor.
About 20 percent of the world's population lack access to safe drinking water, and 50 percent have no access to a sanitation system. This state of affairs will deteriorate as the world's population, set to reach 6 billion next month, will increase by 50 percent in the next 50 years.
Eighty percent of the world's original forest cover has been cleared or degraded, and logging and mining projects threaten 39 percent of what forest remains.
A quarter of mammal species are at risk of extinction, while more than half the world's coral reefs are threatened by human activity.
There were 850 contributors to the report, which took two and a half years to compile, and which highlights some lesser-known environmental problems.
Disasters such as hurricanes and forest fires are increasing in frequency and severity, and have killed 3 million people in the past three decades. Armed conflicts and refugee flows are causing greater damage to the environment than ever before.
There is also mounting evidence that humans are seriously destabilizing the global nitrogen balance. Huge amounts of nitrogen are being deposited on land and in water through intensive agriculture and the burning of fossil fuels. Eventually, this problem could make fresh-water supplies unfit for human consumption, the report says. ''The full extent of the damage is only now becoming apparent as we begin to piece together a comprehensive overview of the extremely complex, interconnected web that is our life support system,'' said Toepfer, a former German environment minister.
Much of the damage is irreparable, but through a huge mobilization of resources and political will, much can be done to prevent further destruction, the report says. A long-term target of a 90 percent reduction in the consumption of raw materials in industrialized countries may seem far-fetched, but without it hundreds of millions of people will be condemned to a life of suffering, the report concludes.
Many of us understand the interconnectedness of all living things on this planet. Many of us are also in the collective electronic mind field with the advent of the internet.These words I use to speak with are for all of us to read, and they also represent a new way to think with. By giving voice to global issues allows an opportunity to participate in our very survival. We can now see that current economic systems, if left unchecked, will kill us all. I am trying to create novelty and newness in the use of words so that change will come about for us all. We, as collective humanity, must pay attention to our actions and words. Collectively we are eliminating life perpetuating life forms. Our very actions are bringing harm to our humanness.
If we want to live, we must consider what it is that we do from day to day.
This is an attempt to voice an idea or an opinion into the world directly using the internet. This is an appeal. This is how I feel. We need to consider our actions for our survival. What we are eliminating in the environment may prevent us from any further understanding of our basic human nature.
Our reasoning abilities have put the planet in jeopardy. Somehow, we must take a look at the way we are collectively doing things. There are too many pockets of humanity that are destroying one another. If this global situation is not corrected, and if environmental ignorance is not prevented we will all die a slow death. An immediate global forum must be organized so every member of this planet knows what we are up against. We are at a very dangerous crossroad in humanities long term survival.
Let us find a way to bring health back to our minds everywhere. Let us use this medium to be innovative, and original with our words. Let us explore our electronic tools to communicate in ways we have never done before. The time is now that we must extract genius from our own beings to curb the unnecessay slaughter that is taking place daily on our planet. We need to stand on the shoulders of our ancestors, but we must reach out in a mighty new way to stop what is in motion on this planet. Our words we read and write must lead to actions that help life on this earth. Earth Portals is trying to offer insights into human consciousness to avert a planetary disaster. Let us find new ways we can help one another. Let us all become "21st Century Messengers" to bring stability, survivability, and divine grace onto this planet. If we do not, I am afraid we will not have a planet to live on.
Willard Van De Bogart
An internet voice
Other important words have been written by:
Dr. Joseph Palmer Roberts
The Ideology of Life: - The Foundation of Political Revolution and 21st Century Sustainability. Click to order.
Book Description:
This book explores the necessity, possibility and means of creating a sustainable 21st century American Society and global community. It focuses on a destructive relationship that is currently manifesting itself between our accepted ideology (a cultural construct existing beyond our normal level of awareness within the confines of the human mind) and the strategic variables of economics, environment and population. It is argued that an unsustainable imbalance exists between our accepted ideology and the strategic variables; that this imbalance is at the heart of our most pressing problems; and that this imbalance can be corrected and the desired condition of 21st century sustainability can be achieved via a political revolution underpinned by fundamental ideological change.
