Waking The Dead 1

How do we wake ourselves, and each other, up? I have already explored this them in the previous series, The Walking Dead. Some of us are becoming more aware and alert to the issues at hand but, as always, it looks like it's going to be too few, too little and too late. But isn't that the way it's always been, Gentle Reader? Most of us don't want to wake up and you can see this by how many of us still obstinately drive our cars across the city, creating gridlock while remaining criminally obtuse about the role we are playing in pushing up the global temperature and thus shortening the number of days we all have left. You can see it in how many are still glued to their phones every waking minute of their lives, staying in touch with their family and social networks, updating their Facebook, sending nasty and abusive tweets about people they do not like, looking at porn, looking at GPS to locate the beer and wine store just across the street, checking Hey Cupid or whatever to find that perfect god or goddess who will save them from their devastating sense of loneliness and isolation. And last I noticed, those of us who eat vegetarian and plant-based diets are still a minority. Red meat is still getting bought, cooked and eaten before the poor newborn calf or pig has a chance to even drop to the ground. We're not all like that, but too many of us still are. I wonder what would happen if someone were to kick those drivers out of their cars and tell them that from now on it's public transit, bicycles or walking; and what if all those little sidewalk zombies were suddenly deprived of their precious dear little phones? There would be chaos, pandemonium, panic and mass angst on such a grand scale that the city would shut down in minutes. I have sometimes toyed with the idea of massive re-education camps. Sure that is very totalitarian and oppressive and simply reeks of the excesses of Stalin, Chairman Mao, the Kim dynasty, and the Khmer Rouge, but really, what else is going to do it, but by the same token, who is going to reeducate all those pathetic imbeciles? There do seem to be at least a few more sounding the alarm and trying to reduce the waste in their lifestyles, which has really turned minimalism into quite the ironic fashion statement for the privileged. The UN and the secretary-general are sounding the alarm, as they ought, but some of the most delinquent nations for polluting and raising the greenhouse gas level are also among the most powerful and the most populous: the USA, China, Russia and India. And the rest of us? Well, there will always be that odd scattering of low income Jeremiahs and trailer park Cassandras such as myself, and really, who is going to listen to us? I have always, basically been awake. I have never had the creature comforts or enjoyed the kind of social status that makes people selfish and comatose. I have never owned a car, been vegetarian for two and a half decades, and have always left a small carbon footprint. In my early twenties, following some very inspiring broadcasts I heard on the Ideas program on the CBC, I dedicated myself to living simply, sustainably and with integrity. I have never veered from this path. Others, when they see my lifestyle, often think, oh, how poor, tragic and austere. Some, as they get to know me, think that I am a person full of joy, gratitude and integrity, if otherwise a righteous pain in the ass to be around. But who really wants to be like that. We have been so brainwashed by global capitalism, advertising and the American Way, that I really fear that for many of us it's just too late. I hope I'm wrong. I still hope and have faith that more of us will hear the call, even if we go to the grave refusing to believe, and will respond to this call of God to learn the joy of repentance and the blessing of simplicity. If we really want to save this earth, we are all going to have to become a lot less selfish and more loving of one another and of the other species we share this planet with. It is about trashing altogether this garbage of consumerism and learning how to give and love from our deepest hearts. Hello? Anyone awake?