Conservation

Earth Day is Our Day

April 22, 2008 by Mike 4 Comments

I’d be remiss if I didn’t wish you all, on behalf of the 10,000 Birds team, a very happy Earth Day. However, I’d also be remiss if I didn’t take the time to point out that Earth Day is not at all about the Earth. Earth Day is about us. George Carlin said it best:

…there is nothing wrong with the planet. Nothing wrong with the planet. The planet is fine. The PEOPLE are f*cked. Difference. Difference. The planet is fine. Compared to the people, the planet is doing great. Been here four and a half billion years. Did you ever think about the arithmetic? The planet has been here four and a half billion years. We’ve been here, what, a hundred thousand? Maybe two hundred thousand? And we’ve only been engaged in heavy industry for a little over two hundred years. Two hundred years versus four and a half billion. And we have the CONCEIT to think that somehow we’re a threat? That somehow we’re gonna put in jeopardy this beautiful little blue-green ball that’s just a-floatin’ around the sun?

The planet has been through a lot worse than us. Been through all kinds of things worse than us. Been through earthquakes, volcanoes, plate tectonics, continental drift, solar flares, sun spots, magnetic storms, the magnetic reversal of the poles…hundreds of thousands of years of bombardment by comets and asteroids and meteors, worldwide floods, tidal waves, worldwide fires, erosion, cosmic rays, recurring ice ages…And we think some plastic bags, and some aluminum cans are going to make a difference? The planet…the planet…the planet isn’t going anywhere. WE ARE!

As I said, Earth Day is about us. It is about us along with the countless organisms that have the misfortune of existing during our debauched ruination of environmental and ecological integrity. The Earth doesn’t need us. If worse comes to worse, the planet will, as George Carlin so eloquently put it, “shake us off like a bad case of fleas.” But we need the Earth in pretty much the state it’s in right now.  Are you doing anything right now towards that end?

Happy Earth Day!

Written by Mike
Mike is a leading authority in the field of standardized test preparation, but he's also a traveler who fully expects to see every bird in the world. Besides founding 10,000 Birds in 2003, Mike has also created a number of other entertaining but now extirpated nature blog resources, particularly the Nature Blog Network and I and the Bird.