Kiss the Earth goodbye

[salinen]

Way, way beyond repair. The next few years will be chaotic. Water will become the new oil, with wars over its control. Millions will die. The dead will not be buried fast enough to stop the spread of disease. More millions dead. The center of the planet will be unlivable. Movement will be towards the poles where there will be water. Those not able to relocate will die.

I know, shut up.

[Ron Green]

1. The earth will be fine. It is we who have to go.

We can't destroy the earth, but we can make it so we can't live here. And that's probably our just reward.

[Atman]

2. Thank you!

I'm a little tired of people saying we need to save the planet. The planet has been here for a brazillion years, and it will be here a brazillion years from now. As with previous epochs, species will die. New ones will evolve (excuse me...for the Republicans...God will create some new species). Maybe earth will become all tropical with monkeys and palm trees in the Dakotas. But no way in hell is the earth in danger.

Humans are.

.

[lvx35]

6. Yeah, maybe the earth just has a fever.

Like when a human gets a nasty bug that throws the body out of equalibrium, bringing on a fever so the bug can no longer live.

[kimmerspixelated]

9. The Earth is trying to purge us from its immune system

or so Vonnegut said.

[Atman]

12. I really think we're just part of huge organism.

It is too weird, when you get down to really contemplating it. Like smoking a bone and staring at the night sky.

But really, next time you drive into the city...look around. Just as in the human body, the main "nerve centers" are fed by "arteries" and all our little cells are rushing to and fro to feed the vital organs (the cities/commerce). We're freakin' atoms in the cosmic realm. Earth is just another big organism, and we're the cells, or whatever. Hey, I'm not a biologist. All I know is that the earth seems to act suspicously like a giant organism. And right now, the host has a serious cancer it is fighting...US.

[G_j]

20. who is we?

in my book this includes all the other life forms that are being extinguished and threatened (and there are plenty!)

No, it is not just us. As a button I used to have said: "endangered species are not born again"

[Ron Green]

24. It's unfortunate, and criminal, that we humans took out so many species

in our own rush to extinction, but if the apposable-thumbs crowd were to disappear, Mother Earth could take a well-deserved break to support some new wilderness and new creatures.

[salinen]

27. I hope simians

and sloths survive.

[Arugula Latte]

53. I'm rooting for the Koalas to survive and take over.

Koalas ruling the Earth -- ahhhhhh. What a gentle, happy thought.

[G_j]

29. a sad, grim consolation at best

do you imagine that this earth would ever see another Polar Bear for example?

[maveric]

42. Read George Carlin's take on this.

"The planet will shake us off like a bad case of the fleas."

[SammyWinstonJack]

60. Yep! This planet will shake us off like a bad case of fleas.

And will better for it.

[EstimatedProphet]

3. The center of the planet is unliveable anyway

It's really hot down there.

[JitterbugPerfume]

4. we are an endangered species

sad but true

[Ian David]

5. Soylent Green is people! It's made from people! n/t

[opihimoimoi]

7. Cannabilism will be made into a Fashionable entree

"Thigh Under Glass, Madam?"

[Atman]

13. Eat at The Y!

Ooh...sorry.

[Hubert Flottz]

57. Eat more possum!

[opihimoimoi]

59. YIKES....The poor thang...I hope it pisses on her...

[OPERATIONMINDCRIME]

8. Oh This Will Do Wonders Towards Our Community's Image As Being A Sane One

Here's a request for you. If you are going to engage in fear mongering and over the top alarmism then maybe the least you can do is substantiate it with well thought out arguments, reasons for your position, links to factual resources and scientific and social evidence that leads you to the conclusion.

Just saying some ridiculously absurd statement while providing no insight, fact, basis or substance whatsoever, does absolutely nothing but open itself up to sheer mockery.

[salinen]

17. These are just words

I don't represent anything. Although there are examples on smaller scales. Think Easter Island.

[OPERATIONMINDCRIME]

True. Empty, Unsubstantiated, Rooted In Lunacy Words. You Are Correct.

[salinen]

32. Who can substantiate the future?

This could happen. Or not. It might be worse. I never shut my mind off to possibilities, however horrible or wonderful they may be. I think it's normal to be afraid because of the slaughter that is happening to the environment. You may limit yourself to only optimistic scenarios for the future. "Kiss the Earth goodbye" is not a thread for you.

[OPERATIONMINDCRIME]

46. Neither Is"Aliens Are Coming From Planet Gamma To Destroy Us! Take Cover!"

But since you can't substantiate the future, and you don't want to shut your mind off to the possibility, feel free to start a thread on it for people to discuss...

[salinen]

52. You're being ridiculous

Everyone knows that Gammarians are peaceloving.

[OPERATIONMINDCRIME]

54. For Now, Friend.... But What May Come Tomorrow? I Shudder To Think It.

:scared:

[ComerPerro]

10. I am reminded of a bumper sticker I saw yesterday in KC

Big Letters: Freedom is on the March!

Smaller letters, under it: Wave Goodbye!

[Warren DeMontague]

11. Global warming is a real, serious problem.

Spastic hyperbole like yours doesn't help the situation any. Oh, sure, it may feel good- or maybe you think it will prod otherwise apathetic people into action- but people make these crazy predictions all the time, and when they don't come true, it gives the naysayers the opportunity to dismiss wholesale the very real issues which have been ridiculously overinflated.

For instance, I was active in the Rainforest Action Network in the 80s. On more than one occasion, I remember people repeating things like "It is a scientific fact that the Earth will be uninhabitable for any life form higher than insects by the year 2000".

Um, okay.

I think it's the same wiring that causes fundamentalists to wet their shorts about "the rapture" every few months. Sorry, we're going to be here for a while... and so are our problems.

[deaniac21]

19. Insects get high?

[Warren DeMontague]

28. Apparently. nt

[Cleita]

14. Well, aren't you a little ray of sunshine.

Please, if you keep thinking that way, it could happen. Try to be positive in your thoughts about the future.

[Atman]

15. That is a very "republican" response.

Just THINK HAPPY! Be optimistic! Things will be good, quit being a "naysayer!" You only look at the negative, not the positive!

Look where THAT kind of think has gotten us.

[Cleita]

30. If you say so. You seem to know about that more than I do.

Actually, I was being sarcastic about the "ray of sunshine" thing. However, thinking positive thoughts comes from my dabbling in paganism that posits that you can think things into happening so it's better to image the good things you want to happen rather than wring your hands about the bad things.

In this type of spiritualism, it is believed that we are all connected and that our thoughts will influence the thoughts of others. So flame away. It's what I believe.

[Atman]

39. You didn't offer that explanation before

Hey, sorry.

If you base our comments on some spiritual level, but we don't know it...well, we don't know it. I'm more into Eastern philosophy than Paganism, so Karma is pretty high on my list. Sounds very similar to what you're saying, only different.

But the fact remains...any republican I've ever met/heard has spouted the same crapola..."Democrats are too negative! They never look at the positive aspect of things! Like, the coat of paint we put on the schoolhouse in Iraq (which was bombed into oblivion the next day)."

Rush and Hannity do it all the time. Just "THINK HAPPY!" If we're all happy and optimistic and stop questioning the president, then we'll all be happy and opitimistic, and the president will not be under such pressure.

Fuck that. Reality has a place in reality, too.

[Cleita]

44. Well, happy, happy in Repuke speak is just propaganda.

They don't believe it themselves but they have to keep serving the kool-aid.

[salinen]

21. I'll try

The Earth will heal completely. Humans will live in lushness, surrounded by formerly endangered species. Everyone will have their own clean water source overflowing with fish. We will be at peace.

[Cleita]

31. Isn't it better imagining that future than the one you originally

posted?

[salinen]

34. Yeah

That feels better. Thanks.

[Subdivisions]

40. That is a ridiculous statement.

I would rather imagine the future the OP illustrates and know I've got to do something about it than to do nothing at all about it and just watch it happen.

This is a LIVING planet. Humans are a virus. This planet WILL eventually exterminate the virus.

[Cleita]

47. Well, isn't imagining a better future part of doing something about

it? First comes the idea and then the action. If you dwell on the hopelessness then you are more inclined to do nothing because you feel hopeless.

[deaniac21]

16. Every time I try to kiss the earth I get a mouth full of dirt.

[jus_the_facts]

22. ~Tasting The Earth~

~Tasting The Earth~

In a dark hour, tasting the Earth.
As I lay on my couch in the muffled night, and the rain lashed my window,
And my forsaken heart would give me no rest, no pause and no peace,
Though I turned my face far from the wailing of my bereavement....
Then I said: I will eat of this sorrow to its last shred,
I will take it unto me utterly,
I will see if I be not strong enough to contain it....
What do I fear? Discomfort?
How can it hurt me, this bitterness?

The miracle, then!
Turning toward it, and giving up to it,
I found it deeper than my own self....
O dark great mother-globe so close beneath me...

It was she with her inexhaustible grief,
Ages of blood-drenched jungles, and the smoking of craters, and the roar of tempests,
And moan of the forsaken seas,
It was she with the hills beginning to walk in the shapes of the dark-hearted animals,

It was she risen, dashing away tears and praying to dumb skies, in the pomp-crumbling tragedy of man...
It was she, container of all griefs, and the buried dust of broken hearts,

Cry of the christs and the lovers and the child-stripped mothers,
And ambition gone down to defeat, and the battle overborne,
And the dreams that have no waking....

My heart became her ancient heart:
On the food of the strong I fed, on dark strange life itself:
Wisdom-giving and sombre with the unremitting love of ages....

There was dank soil in my mouth,
And bitter sea on my lips,
In a dark hour, tasting the Earth.

James Oppenheim 1882

[deaniac21]

26. That is great writing!!

[salinen]

23. Try a less sexual kiss.

The kind you give Gramma.

[bryant69]

18. Avoid the rush - off yourself today.

Bryant
Check it out --> http://politicalcomment.blogspot.com

[salinen]

25. Dennis Preager

Yuck. O.K. now it's my turn. Pull my finger.

[The Jacobin]

33. People have been saying this for years.

This is the other side of the Rapture coin. Instead of the world ending with Jesus destroying the world, the world ends with us destroying the world.

You need to get out more. Get some fresh air.

[salinen]

36. I say no

Rapturism is insane on many levels. If the Earth continues its steep decline, but more likely accelerates, the idea of a toxic planet isn't lunacy. The solar system is full of em. Only this time, humans created the deadly environment.

[Atman]

55. People have been saying it for years...and it is happening! Imagine!

You're right...people have been warning about humans fucking up the earth to the point of no return for years. When I was a kid in the seventies, LAKES caught on fire in Ohio, people routinely tossed entire bags of McDonalds garbage out of car windows as if the earth was just a big trash can. Love Canal. Factories dumped their raw waste right into rivers and streams. That was forty years ago. Remember the commercial of the Indian crying?

For a while, the government launched aggressive anti-litter and anti-pollution campaigns. We had the Clean Water Act (which actually meant "clean water," not "We're going to sell pollution rights to industry." Eventually, over time, people got the message. Air cleaned up, tossing litter from cars became all but unheard of except for the lowest scum losers.

But something happened when the Republicans took over. Deregulation. Relaxations of standards. Then BushCo...virtually NO environmental laws at all, unless they're outlining how to dump a strip-mined mountain top into a fertile stream. And things have gotten exponentially worse.

Bullshit on our Rapture comparison. One is a freakin' fantasy by a bunch of lunatics who think they're going to ascend to the heavens. The other is real and is happening right before our eyes, measured and studied and confirmed by science.

I buy the science over floating-to-heaven bullshit every time.

[Lars39]

35. Our news has been dumbed down so much

that environmental concerns haven't been in the spotlight the way they should have been.
Seems a lot of us need to go hang out in the environmental forum and educate ourselves about the issue.

[G_j]

37. I second that n/t

[Xenotime]

38. You are right. Imagine katrina but at a national level...

and that is what you get when you let people like * run this country. Every year under this dictatorship just gets worse and worse.

[Annces]

41. I am looking forward to a big "I told you so"

just kidding.

I am hoping for some gigantic leveling event in my lifetime, even if it is catastrophic. We need something to knit the human family together again.

[Subdivisions]

43. We need a "correction". I vote for one helluva a BIG

Asteroid. That would be an awesome site.

[salinen]

49. asteroid smashteroid

we'll kill off everything way before the asteroid hits.

[salinen]

48. A global effort to heal

this planet could save our souls.

[roamer65]

45. I live next to the Great Lakes

and it's ours and no one else can have it. Fighting a war to stop water diversion could very well happen and I would support it.

[Cleita]

50. This is why water has to be claimed as a commons. If you

allow the privatization of our lakes and water sources by corporations then they will control the market and water will become a commodity you have to pay for like we do energy. For those who have wells, I found out from a fellow DUer, who is a lawyer, that the well water can be claimed as eminent domain. I'm trying to convince the family to look into this and get involved in getting that law off the books.

[salinen]

51. Do the lakes belong to:

Americans?
Midwesterners?
Upper Midwesterners?
Bordering States only?
Illinois?
Chicago?
You?

[lectrobyte]

56. The Earth will survive. As George Carlin says, maybe we are just

the Earth's way of adding some plastic to its diet.

[Mike03]

58. Sad and Probably True

My empathy is with the poster of this thread because I have had similar fears for about two or three years now. It is hard to shake this pessimism; the only shred of hope I see is for the entire human race to experience some sort of massive leap in collective consciousness, which sadly I don't see on the horizon. I don't know. I struggle with this thought every day. I guess I am just going to work as hard as humanly possible to raise my own consciousness and--to the extent possible--alleviate the suffering of those I am in a position to help. Obsessing on what I cannot fix just adds to my despair. But there are positive aspects of this realization as well: Priorities become obvious, and all that anciliary stuff just fades away.

[Master of Disaster]

61. The earth ain't going anywhere and neither are the cockroaches.