Thanks all for those helpful replies. I also had a couple of personal
replies, one useful, the other one saying what I had written was b.s, with
no further explanation. I hope what I had written wasn't b.s, and also I
don't want to write long messages to this board because we are all busy
people, so I have had to simplify a great deal. Thus I concur about problems
of approaching our way of being in the world as a lifestyle choice, whilst
recognising that what constitutes 'freedom' in industrial society extends
only as far as lifestyle/consumer choices. Further, I have just finished a
Masters dissertation which refutes the idea that we have very much choice
about our impacts on the climate, despite the discourses coming from
government and NGO's which assume such choice exists. And so, I have long
since given up trying to impose my opinions on others, because the problem
seems structural.

And yet, I believe the climate situation to be a genuine crisis of 
unprecedented proportions and am shocked to see how industrial society has 
so crippled humanity that it is unable to reimagine the present or the 
future in the face of this situation.


P.S. The Mark Twain quote is, like so much of what he wrote, very astute and 
witty, but doesn't really work for me in this scenario. Sometimes it is 
plain right
to try and do something and talk to people in order to raise awareness.

Chris
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Jonathan Ward" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Tuesday, September 12, 2006 5:37 PM
Subject: Re: Me, my wife and climate change


> whilst changing your own lifestyle to minimise damage to the environment
> and fellow humans in all ways might only make a small difference, and can
> be quite hard to maintain in a sea of questioning faces and a society that
> is geared up for consumerism, nevertheless i have found that when people
> observe your behaviour (rather than preaching to them), they ask about it,
> and often then want to know or do more. there is a psychological and
> mental effect to this process. in some areas it is becoming a trend to be
> 'green' (although trends are fickle). but above all else, if what you do
> is reducing your impact upon the world and improving the situation for
> others, AND occasionally inspires someone to at least start considering
> the environment or challenging the problems that lie behind the majority
> of global emissions and pollution, then it is a success. people generally
> relate best to big problems when they see how it affects, or is affected
> by, every day life.