It’s Earth Day and I’m struggling with it.
By and large, humans — or at least the ones with the most power and influence — treat the Earth like shit.
Take the news that came out yesterday of federal agents “mistakenly” killing a pregnant Mexican Gray Wolf — the tragic collateral damage from the hunt for an “uncollared” wolf charged with killing livestock grazing on public land.
The wealthy and powerful have no qualms about profiting from our public lands through ranching that is damaging to native plants and disruptive to wildlife. And yet when their profits are marginally disrupted, the government bends to their will and goes out to kill a member of a critically endangered species.
Yes, there’s things we can all do to pitch in to benefit the living things of Earth, but forgive me if I’m a bit jaded here. And it’s really just too easy to go on social media and post “Happy Earth Day” and sing Kumbaya and bask in the vanity of it all.
But when it comes down to it, there’s MUCH to be done to correct our ill-advised paths of climate change and human-caused mass extinction and all these other things, but the people with the real power just care about making a buck.
We can plant trees and make witty signs to take to protests and yadda yadda yadda, but if there’s no changes at the top — and decision making at the top is going the wrong direction right now — it’s all for naught.
Sorry to rain on this Earth Day, but sometimes we need the truth and on this Earth Day, the truth kind of sucks. But anyway, here’s a beautiful photo I took of the Mogollon Rim. It was raining that day so there’s your metaphor, I guess.
Benumbedly yours,
-Jake
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