It’s time each
of us stood up as a “climate champion”.
The heightened moments surrounding Paris have past and
although the climate crisis is just as acute as ever, it seems the sense of
urgency has vanished.
Look around our communities and, yes, it is largely “business
as usual” as our governments had done nought to forestall our energy hunger, to
ease our consumption and within that create a society less dependent on fossil
fuels.
In what is a weird and somewhat inexplicable contradiction, what
we personally do matters little, but it will be the efforts and ideas of
individuals that will see the world community rise to inevitable challenges enveloping
the world because of climate change.
Yes, you and I can make a difference, and we must, but the
real solutions to climate change, the truly applicable answers will be found in
the governance of society.
Individual efforts of course make a difference, but we need
our governments to understand what is happening and so bravely and boldly
restructure society to steer it away from its prolific energy-rich behaviour,
make happiness and contentment the ideal for its decision making rather than
the brute and rather rude measure of profit and growth.
Standing on the cusp of decidedly difficult times, we need
people from all walks of life to stand up, take on the mantle of “climate champion”
and in the name of humanity do all they can to help friends, family and others
in their communities understand that what we are doing is seriously disrupting
earth’s climate system and within that eroding the near perfect “Goldilock’s-like”
conditions that have allowed humanity to thrive for millennia.
The idea of being a “Climate Champion” will be discussed the
next time Beneath the Wisteria supporters
gather at the northern end of Shepparton’s Maude St Mall on Saturday, January
30, at 11:00am.
The event is, of course, free, some public seating is
available, but those intending to attend, should being a folding chair.
