I was deeply troubled to read about Esmin Green, an Afro-Jamaican immigrant that was mentally ill and seeking help in Kings County hospital. She fell while waiting for help in the emergency room and died after laying on the ground for 45 minutes while numerous individuals including patients, security personnel, and nurses passed by without giving aid. Esmin Green died right there in Kings County Hospital in-front of staff members that were trained, able, and obligated to observe harmful situations and deliver assistance. Several individuals passed by Esmin Green as if she were out on the corner asking for change, despite her seeking the correct establishment that was supposed to bring humane and swift aid in her time of need.
The establishments that are set up to balance and observe when an individual, a community, or a nation is in need can be paralleled to the disappointing reaction and lack of human compassion that was present in Esmin Green’s death. I do not want to seem trite in drawing these connections, but it is hard not to see the silk thread in these events. There are politicians that have been elected to serve as official checks and balances who have responded to environmental policy change and legislation as the Kings County Hospital to Esmin Green: Cumbersome, delayed, and in the shadiest manner possible. The events that are predicted to intensify weather conditions of droughts, floods, and hurricanes have been ignored while the same dangerous and painstakingly incorrect course of action is taken. The desensitization to the awareness of our surroundings and its calls of help from all over the globe has yet to spur changes that would be unprecedented and beneficial for all that inhabit the world.
The benefits are out there, and in more ways than a monetary report from the Dow Jones can express. Yet, until we are collectively willing to move forward and honor the networks of communities that we are inseparable from and utterly reliant upon we cannot receive these benefits. Instead, a disregard of natural cycles and growth has caused for some of the most dangerous and dense decisions to be made. How is it that Indonesia has moved up to be a competitor for the third largest carbon emitting country? Indonesia behind the US, China, and India has trailed closely with regard to carbon emissions due to the dredging of peat land to plant and grow Palm trees in order to produce oils which have been marketed as an “environmentally friendly” diesel alternative.
We continue to be disillusioned with the ways in which we fit into these natural systems and as a result bypass simple methods of creating change. Simple, albeit smaller solutions, such as the replacement of plastic with corn-based products (which there is hardly a shortage) for packaging has earned USPS the coveted “Cradle to Cradle” certificate from MBDC. Another wedge is taken from the pie to safely get that $300 iPod to your door.
These intricate relationships from one person to the next and also from each person to our extended environment is in need of deep therapeutic repair and solid evaluation if we are to begin this colossal battle that is being waged against our dependency on carbon.
Other links:
Peat land dredging
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/31/business/worldbusiness/31biofuel.html
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/12/071206235448.htm
http://www.climateark.org/shared/reader/welcome.aspx?linkid=90243&keybold=rainforest%20oil%20palm
Greenland http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/08/science/earth/08gree.html
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/06/080612090919.htm
http://environment.newscientist.com/article/dn14251-greenland-ice-sheet-slams-the-brakes-on.html
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