Rio+20: The Future We Want? WE’RE GOING TO HAVE TO GET IT OURSELVES.
The Rio+20 United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development has turned out to be a major disappointment.
Why are our leaders unable to step up and act in favour of universal interest on our behalf? Economy over environment, it seems. The Guardian’s Liz Ford expresses the disgust shared by NGO’s in their claims that OUR politicians have delivered a new definition of hypocrisy.
Is democratic governance and electorate accountability clouding the judgement of our politicians and negotiators when it comes to planet and people over people and profit (e.g. career perpetuity and personal success)? Is the future welfare of our species and our planet really worth the short term gain of a smooth term of office, of pleasing your voters, not rocking the boat, risking backbench revolt?
Has the NIMTOO mindset prevailed against strong character and ethics?
Or is it more a case of environmental ignorance or indifference of the greater electorate? Is concern with the environment still primarily the concern of the middle classes, where the poor are desperately trying to feed themselves and survive the harsh conditions of this existence into which they were born, and the rich too are desperately trying to feed themselves (e.g. their greed for more money and stuff, and their lust for power and fame) and survive the harsh conditions in which they find themselves (e.g. not enough ROI, faltering economy, increasing taxes on the wealthy (yeah right!) and those greedy, leaching charities and good causes always trying to weasel out more of their dosh for important causes like cancer research, environmental protection, poverty alleviation, education programmes, clean tech, renewables, alternative energy and carbon reduction – bad activists, bad – down, sit).
Dammit we’ve moved on from the philosophy of nature-for-man and we must recognise that there may soon enough be no nature and no man (or a vastly diminished shell of what they used to be and could have become).
From this disgusting lack of backbone and shortsightedness we must develop what’s been called INSPIRATIONAL DISSATISFACTION and encourage everyone to think about their impacts and what we can be doing to limit any future harmfulness.
Greenpeace writers have penned this offering as a summary / assessment (against their agendas, of course).
Also see Third World Network summaries of the verbal wranglings over text edits… http://www.thirdworldnetwork.net/
Image courtesy of and with thanks to
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Thanks Shane – we’ve just reposted more commentary based on a few recent literature reviews.
All the best,
OPSR