I don't think there is any hope for the world. Unless scientists can come up with some artificial way to reverse global warming I am almost entirely certain that we won't change our ways in time and the planet will be broken.
The reason for my certainty? Plastic bags. I have already spoken about my
slight obsession with reusing carrier bags and it is something that has been regularly encouraged in the media and concerns about the wastefulness of our consumer society are constantly voiced. Yet each time I am at the supermarket I keep an eye on the other shoppers to see how many, like me (usually - even an obsessive like me can occasionally forget or decide on a spot of impulse shopping), have brought their own bags with them. I am sad to report that I have yet to see another, single person doing it, aside from maybe the occasional old lady with one of those wheelie shopping trolleys (and I saw a couple of elderly ladies on the tube today with some of those cloth bags, that were empty and they were clearly going to use - is it only the aged who care about the world that they probably won't live to see destroyed?). Otherwise everyone else is just peeling off brand new bags, bags that they probably won't reuse and will just end up in bin liners.
I just think that if people haven't got the message about plastic bags yet and can't even be arsed to make this tiny (and probably useless in the grand scheme of things) gesture, then what hope do we have? People have had the warnings and I suppose just either don't care or don't believe them or maybe think God is going to pop in at the last minute and save us all (but to be honest, His farts are just adding to the problem). There's, I imagine, some of the human assumption that if something has always been here then it always will be and that somehow the world will mend itself. Or maybe people don't have time to think about the bigger issues and are just concerned about how they are going to get their dinner home. There's a part of me that wants to say something or even shout something at the people in front of me in the queue - haven't you been told about this? Don't you care about the environment at all? - But I am too polite to do so and know they would turn out to be from Liverpool and attempt to start something.
It's a tiny thing to do and I know that I am making big mistakes in other areas myself - still tending to leave a lot of my electrical equipment on stand-by being the main one - and I know that really we need to be looking at big businesses and air travel and making massive changes there.
But, you know, if we can't even persuade people to reuse bags or to buy ones made out of cloth, then I really don't think there is any hope.
So can I request that you at least make a pointless and useless gesture and always carry a couple of plastic bags in your pocket or handbag (or manbag if you male like me and confident about your sexuality - homosexuality in my case)? At least it's showing the world that you care a bit about it and maybe if the world sees that we care that will be enough and it will magically fix everything for us. To be honest that's our only hope. That the earth is a sentient being and is just in a bit of a sulk cos it thinks we don't like it. Or God could just changed his diet so the massive farts he does (simultaneously everywhere in the world) are a bit less potent.
I don't think I am clutching at straws now.
I am not the only comedian who feels strongly about this. Check out what
Tim Minchin has to say.
I am going to do the draw for the prizes next Tuesday, so that gives you all a bit more time to enter if you haven't done so already,
