Friday, June 24, 2011

Beauty and waste

Lazy waves lack the energy to break with any enthusiasm. Lethargic and purposeless, barely shift minute grains of sand.
They flop to shore and pause as if to survey the scene. Slide, exhausted back down the sandy shore. Too much effort to make a break and stand out from their lacklustre mates gently forming behind.
A shark egg, shiny black and spiky, clung to seaweed.

Sharks, a life form being plundered and slaughtered as if expendable. Fins a delicacy, sliced from living flesh, the bodies still writhing, flung aside, count for naught, to drown and sink.

Mass extinctions closer daily.

***
Link to an article on the frightful impact that humans are having on the oceans here. In a nutshell overfishing and pollution remove the conditions needed for fish to survive in many of our earth's oceans. At all.

We'll be left with algaes and possibly jellyfish.

The seas provide up to a 1/4 of the world's protein - that's a huge amount to kill off in our lifetime. Scientists expected this to happen in the lifetimes of our children or grandchildren (and won't they thank us for this willful destruction) but it's happening now. It's like there's some kind of mass, worldwide amnesia (wrong word, but I can't think of the correct one) happening, or do we as a species want to kill ourselves off?

A drabble is a story told in 100 words. No more. No less.
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9 comments:

E. M. Prokop said...

This is an enormous problem! Thanks for this post Sue! It's very important that we as the dominant species on the planet start to smarten the hell up and take care of our home..If the oceans die, we die, the entire planet is sick...I think people are tired of hearing environmentalists sounding the alarm bells, so they kind of quit listening..they become complacent..the governing force in humanity is still the almighty dollar, people are not going to give up anything that makes them a lot of money even if it is deadly for the environment..we're seeing speicies becoming extinct at a faster rate than ever, due entirely to the influence of human beings..what will happen in the end? We will have plundered and raped this planet to such an extent that it will be suicidal...sorry to ramble on Sue! Fantastic post!
Hope you had a good break, Peace to you!

Grumpy1 said...

Apathy comes to mind, Sue. We see it not only in the area of which your post directs us, but in many other areas, too. "I'm alright, Jack" mentality.

People park cars so no-one else can (selfishness), people stub cigarettes out on seats (thoughtless), litter the world (lazy), kill the animals for profit (desperate) - the list goes on.

It's a painful palette of reality.

Sue said...

Eve, to me it's like we've become anaesthetised. I wonder if some people feel it's too big a problem to tackle and that they feel powerless or that any effort won't make a difference? It's weird that so many people and corporations are prepared to put money ahead of survival. Ramble on all you like, I don't feel so alone.

Bob, apathy is also a good word, and possibly self centredness. This kind of reality I don't like. *big sigh

E. M. Prokop said...

I've heard a lot of people say that, that they don't think that what they do will make any difference...but if everyone thinks that then it will be true! Nothing will make a difference because nobody will be doing anything...I think it's strange too that people put money ahead of everything...even the survival of their own spiecies...it's good to meet a like-minded person!

Hilary Melton-Butcher said...

Hi Sue .. jelly fish are a major hazard now!

The Chinese are on a global take over of everything .. whether that can be sustained because of the way they treat their own population is another matter ..

But Nature = Us ...

Good post - thanks - Hilary

Anonymous said...

Don’t blame me. I’m a veggie. And I’m continually disappointed at the way that we treat both the animal world and our own children’s future world. It saddens me too to know that if the creatures in the world’s oceans (or anywhere else) had an immediate commercial value as live entities then their safety and futures would be assured.
Thanks for the sharks egg photo. I’ve seen similar before and never knew what they were.
It’s nice to see you blogging again. I missed you.

Have a pretty week, Boonie

Sue said...

Eve, there's something about the power of one. Single people have banded together and made massive impacts on policy, the environment, all sorts of things, but if people believe they are powerless they will be - it's a self fulfilling prophesy. They'll be complacent, negative, miserable and defeated. Something there also about silence equalling consent.

Hilary, yes, I've seen a - do you call it a plague of jellyfish? - it's creepy. China is an interesting place. Dissidents put their lives on the line to try to make a difference, gutsy people! Tough regime. but if the regime put their collective minds towards sustainability etc etc, I reckon they'd do it - (which could possibly be good ...i'ts hard to imagine how that would play out)

Boonie, I think we'll look more towards the Buddhists for healthful guidelines of how to live with nature and others. If we get the chance.
Shark eggs are really beautiful, some are a kind of corkscrew shape. I'll try to get a photo for you. I think each type of shark has a different shape egg.
It's good to see you here, thanks for dropping by.

Hart Johnson said...

It's so sad when I think about how thoughtless we can be in the way we live. It reminds me of something I call the 'ignorance of plenty'--until a thing is scarce, we don't even think about a thing, except what it can do for us. After it becomes scarce, it is often too late to reverse the process.

Sue said...

Hart, I like your term for this. We have such a self centered attitude, and have brought so many creatures to extinction that you'd think we'd learn eventually, but it seems not.