With all the Ice Caps melting and precipitation patterns becoming more intense and extreme, it became clear that something needed to be done to save us from Climate Change.
"How about stopping burning fossil fuels!" some naive young child said to us, to which we responding with much chuckling at her simple mind.
"It's really not that simple", we explained, "Our entire economy is based on fossil and fuels and has been for over two hundred years. We can't change that now. While fossil fuels may not make us all rich, they make some people very rich indeed and it simply wouldn't be fair to take away their enormous amounts of wealth over something so petty".
"But then what is the solution?", the child continued, "because surely if the fossil fuels carry on being burnt then we'll be flooded for good. Surely whole countries will disappear while people in our own country will continue to see their homes destroyed".
"Aha", we chortled at the child's quaint and dippy approach to the issue. "We have a solution. Rather than stopping burning all the fossil fuels, at massive inconvenience to economic growth, we're going to do something far more convenient!"
"But..." cried to the child.
"No buts", we said, "you must listen to our idea. This idea is the only realistic idea that can save us from Climate Change in a sensible and mature way. We are adults, after all."
"What is the idea?" the girl enquired, finally acknowledging our authority on this issue.
"Simple. We need to build an ark that can hold 7 billion people and then the floods will no longer be an issue."
"But they're expanding airports and burning coal and oil at ever increasing rates, making the sea levels rise drastically quickly. Surely you'll never build an ark on time".
"We need to take risks. We've taken so many in the past, why stop now?"
So we pushed the girl to one side, collected some wood from a skip, and set to work constructing our ark for 7 billion people. We aimed to have it finished by tea time."
"How about stopping burning fossil fuels!" some naive young child said to us, to which we responding with much chuckling at her simple mind.
"It's really not that simple", we explained, "Our entire economy is based on fossil and fuels and has been for over two hundred years. We can't change that now. While fossil fuels may not make us all rich, they make some people very rich indeed and it simply wouldn't be fair to take away their enormous amounts of wealth over something so petty".
"But then what is the solution?", the child continued, "because surely if the fossil fuels carry on being burnt then we'll be flooded for good. Surely whole countries will disappear while people in our own country will continue to see their homes destroyed".
"Aha", we chortled at the child's quaint and dippy approach to the issue. "We have a solution. Rather than stopping burning all the fossil fuels, at massive inconvenience to economic growth, we're going to do something far more convenient!"
"But..." cried to the child.
"No buts", we said, "you must listen to our idea. This idea is the only realistic idea that can save us from Climate Change in a sensible and mature way. We are adults, after all."
"What is the idea?" the girl enquired, finally acknowledging our authority on this issue.
"Simple. We need to build an ark that can hold 7 billion people and then the floods will no longer be an issue."
"But they're expanding airports and burning coal and oil at ever increasing rates, making the sea levels rise drastically quickly. Surely you'll never build an ark on time".
"We need to take risks. We've taken so many in the past, why stop now?"
So we pushed the girl to one side, collected some wood from a skip, and set to work constructing our ark for 7 billion people. We aimed to have it finished by tea time."
Many 'experts' have long maintained that we don't need to make any major changes to our way of life in order to tackle climate change, and that technology would save us. We were going to prove this in the best possible way. We had found a technological solution, which required little more than our GCSE woodwork skills, that was so great it meant we could save ourselves from disaster while not even needing to tackle climate change at all.
We were going to need help though, which is why once we'd gathered our wood we headed straight for Cornmarket Street in Oxford to persuade shoppers and tourists to aid our crusade. They were going to need some persuading, sure, but once they saw how great our idea was they'd surely jump on board.
We started well, but soon support for our ark was not as great as we had planned. Some people simply seemed to doubt our ability to build an ark for seven billion people by tea time. Fortunately, some wiser folk such as gay rights campaign Peter Tatchell saw the good work we were doing and joined us. Yet others merely said unsupportive things such as "you can't use cardboard to build an ark" and "that will never fit seven billion people in". Pessimists!
So on we went building our ark, our vision for the future. But no one would help us. People called us fools as we begged them to gather some wood from the forests, and they seemed offended when we offered them tools to join in. Even an Officer of the Law, who are there to protect us surely, refused to assist when we presented him with a hammer. Instead he merely threatened to arrest us if we didn't move our ark out of the way. It was like our amazing technological fix was not being taken seriously.
We became increasingly depressed as it was fast approaching tea time and our ark would barely fit two people in, let alone float. Some 'climate activists' came up and taunted us, shouting "Rock the Boat!" as they swayed our poor ark from side to side with little respect for its life saving potential. "Don't rock the boat!" we yelled back, "it's bad for economic growth!"
It became tea time. We were tired and in need of food. Our ark was not going to save us after all. We carried the remains of the ark to the skip, shedding a tear as we chucked it in.
The ultimate quick fix solution had failed, which made us wonder whether any quick fix solution could ever work. Biofuels, Clean Coal, Carbon Offsetting, Nuclear Power. All these things sound so tempting, because they offer to put the problem right with a click of the fingers causing minimum inconvenience. Just like our ark was meant to do.
We hated to admit it, but maybe a little inconvenience is just what the world needs. "I'd rather have inconvenience that mass destruction any day" said one of our former ark builders. Plus, everyone in Cornmarket had looked so stressed and unhappy all day. The 'convenience culture' didn't seem to be so convenient. Maybe change would not be so much of a bad thing.
"But everyone seems so set on these damn quick fix solutions!" I cried to the others, "no one will help us bring about the radical change we now realise we need."
"Wrong!", came a voice from the top of Carfax Tower. We looked up and saw a banner unfurled: "NO MORE BULL" it read. We were not alone in our discovery that real change was needed fast. Something big was gaining pace, and that something has a website: http://www.climatecamp.org.uk/ .
Media Reports:
No comments:
Post a Comment