A platform worth considering

We're in federal election mode here in Canada, and have been for most of the summer, with more than a month to go. It drives me a bit crazy that the election was called so early, because the former ruling party has the most money to advertise and seems intent on emptying the smaller election chests of everyone else by forcing a lengthy election campaign (and frankly, their attack adds make me queasy). What's worse, though, is that there are four parties in most ridings, and only three party leaders are in the news coverage most days.

Unfortunately, it's the fourth leader who gets the least press and who has the best plan for our environment. Elizabeth May leads the Green Party, whose candidates understand that we can't continue exploiting our resources and polluting our air, soil and water the way we have been and expect to thrive. But the Greens are about more than the environment -- they have ideas about running the country in a manner that protects the environment, yes, but also looks after people, provides jobs and supports business, health, education, families and seniors.

The Green Party released its platform yesterday. Click here to read it. I'm not saying that everyone should vote Green -- that might cause vote splitting that could give us the same government for another four years and I'm not sure there are Green candidates in every riding -- but it can't hurt to read some new election ideas, especially since we've arrived at a time when the earth is counting on us to make choices that preserve its health. Bottom line, if the planet becomes too polluted to sustain life, we have nowhere else to go, and our most recent government seems to be in denial of that basic fact. We can't eat money, and we can't drink oil. As for breathing... well, the work of scientists that could tell us about Alberta's lousy air quality has been suppressed for who knows how long. Time for a change!

I have no idea what that change will look like, but let's all do ourselves a favour and imagine a healthy planet, a robust country, a compassionate society. Then, let's find a way to move toward them by letting our politicians know that they are what we want! If you're Canadian, quiz your local candidates about his or her plans for defending the environment, and don't forget to consider it when you vote on October 19th.

I last moodled about this video of Penelope four years ago, and can't resist sharing it again. It's an ad from Ontario that should apply to every election. Enjoy!

Today's the day to Speak Out!

Today in my country, many environmental and other organizations such as the Canadian Association of Physicians for the Environment and the Pembina Institute are acting as one in calling on our government leaders to rethink Bill C-38, a budget bill which will weaken many of our country's most important environmental protection measures and silence Canadians who seek to defend our beautiful natural heritage from over-development. So it's time to get involved. For the past week, my inbox has received a few reminders from the David Suzuki Foundation about doing my part to act for our environment by signing a petition and contacting government officials.

If you're reading this in Canada and this is the first you've heard of BlackOutSpeakOut, you can find a short list of their list of concerns here. You'll find the homepage here. If you love nature and democracy, now's your chance to prove it by getting involved. If you're not the type to endorse the political activities of environmental activist groups, why not at least write a letter to your government official and let them know that you love nature and want to see it protected? Even if you're not Canadian... our world leaders need to be reminded more often that we all depend on our environment for life!

I'm a radical. How about you?

The Honourable Minister of Natural Resources, Joe Oliver, called me a radical on Monday in an open letter he had printed in the Toronto Globe and Mail. If you missed it, you can find it here. Here's the part where he refers to folks like me who oppose the building of the Gateway Pipeline to carry Oilsands bitumen through the forests of British Columbia to a port located on a pristine coast where our First Nations brothers and sisters fish for their food:

Unfortunately, there are environmental and other radical groups that would seek to block this opportunity to diversify our trade. Their goal is to stop any major project no matter what the cost to Canadian families in lost jobs and economic growth. 

No forestry. No mining. No oil. No gas. No more hydro-electric dams. 

These groups threaten to hijack our regulatory system to achieve their radical ideological agenda.

Minister Oliver, I'm very disappointed in you. As the Minister of Natural Resources, you, of all people, should be able to see the forest for the trees. I would think you would know that ordinary Canadians are concerned with more than just the building of a pipeline for the sake of Canada's wealth. I would think you would know that the word radical can also refer to roots, as in grassroots... and that there are a lot of ordinary, grassroots Canadians who can see that calling people names and accusing them of ulterior motives is just another reason for them to protest against the unsustainable choices your government is making.
 
Minister Oliver, you're letting me down. Honestly, I could care less about the name calling, but I expect you to think about ALL our natural resources, not just the ones that stimulate our economy. I would hope you would give first consideration to the environment on which we all depend for clean air, water, food and housing. I would like you to ensure that the appropriate development of the Oilsands (including dealing with increasing carbon emissions and those nasty tailings ponds) take place before any further thought be given to building pipelines. I would appreciate knowing that if Canadians allow the Oilsands to continue to develop, we won't be paying for them with the very atmosphere our children and grandchildren will inherit. 

Minister Oliver, I am not against forestry, or mining, or oil, or gas, or hydroelectric dams. I rely on all those things (except the dams -- we buy windpower) to live in a chilly northern Canadian city. What I am against is the exploitation of those resources by politicians and businessmen who are more concerned with an unsustainable economy's bottom line than with the environment that we all depend upon in order to live. I don't want to live in a world whose climate change becomes a constant threat to our very existence. I don't want my First Nations brothers and sisters' fishing grounds to become any more polluted than they already are, or to be endangered by the possibility of oil spills. I don't want forestry to decimate old growth rain forests that help to balance ecosystems that are tied to other ecosystems in ways that we will only discover when those ecosystems are dying. I don't want mining to lead to the erosion or pollution of important watersheds. If I have to use less oil, gas or electricity, I will find ways to adapt, because I am willing to make personal sacrifices for a healthier future. 

In other words, I just want the planet Earth and all its life forms to continue, whole and well, for many generations. I'm not convinced that you or your government cronies really understand how a pipeline will change things for the worse. So for the sake of your children and grandchildren, I write my own open letter to you. 


If my attitude makes me a radical, I wear the t-shirt proudly. And I'll mail my commentary/rant to you, and invite all the other radicals I know to write you their own letters

Minister of Natural Resources, Joe Oliver, can be reached at Joe.Oliver@parl.gc.ca. Even better, send a snail mail (no stamp required): 

Hon. Joe Oliver, House of Commons

Ottawa, Ontario

K1A 0A6

(t-shirt picture from Surropa.com).

The Law of Mother Earth

Great news from Bolivia: for the first time in recorded human history, a country is attempting to pass legislation that will grant nature rights equal to those enjoyed by human beings. These rights include:

• the right to life and existence
• the right to continuing life cycles and processes free from human interference
• the right to pure water
• the right to clean air
• the right to balance
• the right to be unpolluted
• the right to be free from genetic modification

The Bolivian people are leading the way because their culture has a strong sensitivity about its interdependence with nature, even as many developed nations move further away from that kind of awareness. Much of Bolivia is dependent upon glaciers for water... and we all know what's happening to our planet's glaciers. The people of Bolivia have also seen their share of bizarre weather because of global climate change -- floods, droughts, mudslides and untimely frosts. They see, more clearly than those of us disconnected from nature, that everything, living and non-living, forms an interconnected web that suffers when one thing is given precedence over another. That Bolivians would decide to pass laws declaring that humans are equal to all other entities, and as such, need to stop taking advantage of less vocal parts of creation, is not a surprise when you consider that Pachamama, or Earth Mother, is part of their indigenous belief system. They believe that it's important to respect Earth Mother and work with her to keep things in balance.

It's a good start, but how do these laws play out in reality? Bolivia needs mining capital to keep its economy going, and I imagine there are other less-than-environmentally-friendly practices occurring in the country. But at least they've got the chutzpah to bring forth an attempt to provide safeguards for their environment somehow. It might take them a while to give the laws teeth, but even getting the laws on the books is a sign of the kind of radical change it takes to get the ball rolling in the environment's favour.

I live in a country where all that a lot of our politicians seem to care about is the economy. The people in power refuse to believe in climate change or the need to do anything to protect our environment from further degradation. I wish they would realize, as the Bolivians do, that everything on earth forms a big family, and that they need to treat more than just large corporations with respect. We're heading toward an election, and the head of the only political party that makes the environment a priority wasn't even invited to the national leaders' debates, when she should have been front and center because she understands that, without a healthy environment, there is no economy. Her party may not be organized enough to run a country, but their ideas still deserve to be heard.

Go, President Evo Morales; go people of Bolivia! Maybe you'll wake up the rest of the world's leaders. I hope so.

Being sisters and brothers of nature

Have you noticed that the weather is getting to be less and less predictable? Sometimes I get the feeling that our sciences, maths, probabilities and meteorological indicators are stories we tell to convince ourselves that everything is "normal." I keep wondering... if our polar icecaps are melting, where is all that water going to go? We've sure got a lot of snow this season... and people in Brisbane and Brazil aren't doing so hot with their homes destroyed by water or mud. Freak occurrences, or part of what's now called Global Climate Change?

We'll never really know because so many variables are at play, but I have my suspicions. And my suspicions lead me to believe that it's time human beings woke up and paid more attention to things that are happening, rather than trying to explain them away. The calendar on my wall this month quotes Ekhard Tolle: "To awaken within the dream is our purpose now." In North America, we've been dreaming that the earth will always be able to supply our every need and satisfy our every whim. We've dreamed until a lot of Earth's species and resources have disappeared because of us, and now it's starting to look as if Nature is about to revolt. Who can blame her? We certainly haven't been very good stewards in our twin quests for luxury and convenience. Personally, I could handle a lot less of both if it would mean fewer disruptions in the health of our planet.

For too long, we've been taking the easy way out. We've lost touch with so many of the processes that allow us to live. It wasn't that long ago that we grew our own food, built our own homes, and worked with our hands to provide for ourselves and our communities, and we were much healthier for it. We didn't have to worry about diets or exercise because both were balanced and integral parts of our daily lives. We knew how to make do, and we lived in solidarity with each other, rather than in competition to see who had the most or best of everything.

We can't go back in time, but we can return to our roots. It's high time we start to consider ourselves to be sisters and brothers of nature and forget all that biblical bosh about "filling the earth and subduing it." We need to wake from the dream that we are in charge and that every homeowner must have their own fill-in-the-blank. We need to get on with living lightly, with using as few of Earth's resources as possible, and remembering that we aren't the pinnacle of God's creation, but just a small part of it. I expect that God loves everything created, right down to the tiniest amoeba, and our challenge is to live in harmony with it all.  Henri Nouwen hits the nail on the head when he says:

When we think of oceans and mountains, forests and deserts, trees, plants and animals, the sun, the moon, the stars, and all the galaxies, as God's creation, waiting eagerly to be "brought into the same glorious freedom as the children of God" (Roman 8:21), we can only stand in awe of God's majesty and God's all- embracing plan of salvation. It is not just we, human beings, who wait for salvation in the midst of our suffering; all of creation groans and moans with us longing to reach its full freedom.

In this way we are indeed brothers and sisters not only of all other men and women in the world but also of all that surrounds us. Yes, we have to love the fields full of wheat, the snowcapped mountains, the roaring seas, the wild and tame animals, the huge redwoods, and the little daisies. Everything in creation belongs, with us, to the large family of God.      Henri Nouwen, Bread for the Journey, December 9th

God's dream is so much bigger than ours. It's time to wake and live God's dream. My seed catalogue arrived last week. I'm going to cooperate with God's dream today by ordering seeds to grow this year's vegetables to help feed my family.

What's your plan to live God's dream today?

Coffee and me

I have a love-hate relationship with coffee. I guess that's probably not unusual -- many people tend to come down on one side or the other when it comes to the strongly flavoured beverage, though with more recent developments in flavoured and iced coffees, even coffee haters have made exceptions.

I probably would have been a militant coffee hater if it weren't for the fact that I ended up with Type 1 (Juvenile) Diabetes at age 17. Suddenly, juices and soft drinks were taboo, and even milk had to be factored into my caloric intake. No- and low-cal alternatives in the fluid realm were required. Water? Too boring for a teen aged palate. Diet soft drinks? A person can take only so much aspartame, ugh. Tea? Too old-ladyish. Coffee? Too predictable, too bitter... or so I thought.

I started university seven months after my diabetes diagnosis, and discovered the world of flavoured coffees at Second Cup and Java Jive. Rare was the day that my best friend and I didn't end up at one counter or the other for a morning coffee... and the flavours were enough to tempt my taste buds. Butter Pecan, Hazelnut Creme, Columbian Supremo, Dark Roasts, Light Roasts, and Roasts in-between. It wasn't long and I was hooked.

After four years of coffee addiction at the U of A, I was fortunate to spend a year with a travelling performing troupe. The coffee was pretty dismal in the US, but our cast spent a lot of time in Eastern Canada that fall, and I introduced my cast mates to the joys of Second Cup, where, the Europeans said, cappuccinos were almost as good as the ones they had at home. They weren't much into flavoured coffees, but espresso passed muster in Canada. When our cast got to Europe, there wasn't any flavoured coffee to be found, so I delved into the espressos and cappuccinos that my European friends enjoyed... and loved them! What's not to love when you're sitting on the piazza overlooking Firenze with a frothy cappuccino in hand after a day of checking out Michelangelo's David and wandering the winding ways of the old city? Cappuccino is still my favourite caffeinated beverage.

But my love affair with coffee of any variety is coming to an end. I feel it with every cup. Caffeine affects me now in ways that I can't control. My hands have a perpetual shake due to a hereditary condition known as Essential Tremor, and the shake is even worse with coffee. I could take medication to eliminate it, but that means taking a relaxant that might make for driving drowsiness. (I could give up driving entirely, but that's another moodling for another day.) Besides, I'm not much for taking any more medication than I already do (six shots a day).

What's worse than my shakes or the meds to control them is that it's hard to justify the drinking of coffee when there's so much wrong with the coffee industry. True, Fair Trade sorted out some of the inequities in some places -- and made me feel better about my morning habit when I changed from Maxwell House to Kicking Horse -- but now that Fair Trade coffee has become an industry unto itself (with even Starbucks and McDonald's serving "ethical" coffee, and Walmart jumping on the Fair Trade bandwagon because it's a profitable enterprise), if a large retailer chooses to support a particular Fair Trade cooperative, it can freeze smaller, morally driven coops out of the market altogether. I'm scratching my head and wondering. How fair is my Fair Trade beverage?

As strong as these issues have become in pressing me to find another beverage of choice, there is one more that holds more weight than personal health or ethics. It's that the earth's atmosphere can only take so much pollution before things get extremely messy for all its inhabitants. I'm already contributing to that pollution enough by heating my house. I can't get through our Canadian winters without creating some fossil fuel emissions, but guess what? I can get by without coffee that has to be transported halfway around the world by fossil fuel-inefficient cargo ships.

I don't have to drink coffee. I grew and dried a lot of wonderful French mint this summer, and my best friend introduced me to homemade lemon balm tea (and gave me a plant) so there are alternatives from my backyard. Old ladyish teas, maybe, but I'm getting there. Backyard tea mixes are healthier for the planet, and for me. I know this is true. I know I should want this if I'm living simply. Honestly, though, I don't really want to give up coffee. I love its aroma. I plain old like it. Maybe I need to wean myself off it by halves, cutting back from my 14 oz mug first thing in the morning, to seven oz. Then from seven to three? Three to 1.5? The first sip is always the best, so maybe I could get by with 0.75 oz? And heck, if I cut it back that far, I can probably live without it, right? But not without a healthy planet.