To Future Generations,
Earth Needs No Earth Days, Keep the Key to the Future Earth
This message for you, the young generations of Earth.
Earth is dying, and it is because of us. I bet you already knew that, and you might have also heard a lot about climate change. This message was written in 2016. Believe it or not, humans did not believe they had caused climate change. Even in the epoch of the Anthropocene and the Sixth Extinction, many of us still do not care a dime about Earth. And yes, I said dime, deliberately. We just elected the 45th president of the USA, who is the perfect example of someone that said he needed some global warming to cheer him up while bragging about how he hated others and loved money. But, despite all of that, in the recent Earth Summit events, people around the world have finally sat down and agreed to protect our planet as much as they can. We are trying really hard. So, I have hope. And I hope you do too. Because you are right in the middle of not only the devastating scene caused by man’s destruction, but also our best, and probably final, effort to undo that destruction. You are not yet the future, but you are the key to it.
Breathe in & Reconnect
You’ve just owed Earth some “more” oxygen. Now think of all other debts you owe. Did you pay all your debts? Did you pay your rent? Did you say to your best friends how much it meant to be with them during difficult time? Did you tell your partner how much you love him/her? Did you tell your parents you owe them your life? In our time, ironic as it may seem, the more money our debts are worth and the less vital it is, the more we care. We pay our rent every month, but we never say how much we love our friends, our partners, our families until it’s too late to do so. And especially, we never say thank-you to Earth – our home, our place to live, to love, and to pay rent. So, learn from that. Go out for a walk, hug a tree, kiss the sky and say thank you!
Breathe Out: We Are Sorry
There is a saying used to empathize losers: if you suddenly feel useless, know that the carbon dioxide you exhale keeps plants alive. Guess what: it does not! Plants never need human breath to survive. Plus, how can plants even make it another decade if millions of them are cut down every year? Some day in your life, you will be surfing the webs, reading articles and watching movies about the past, and I want to say that we are sorry. You will see pictures of Earth bleeding, voices of Earth screaming. And standing on stacks of money, on carcasses of innocent animals, on the burning grounds of once-called rainforests, on the concrete fortresses that were once rivers is us, humans, Homo sapiens or wise mans as we like to call ourselves. We think we are beyond Mother Nature and we think it is a victory without knowing that we are tearing down our only home, killing our own species, and leaving you, our children and grandchildren with fear, disgust, and a wounded world. We are sorry. But you must not be sorry. We were the killers. It is time for you to be the healers.
Feel Smart vs Be Smart
We have something called “smartphone” – it is not really smart, we just add “smart” to the phone, and many other things, to feel smart about ourselves. A smartphone is made from more than 70 elements on the periodic table, many of which are rare ones, meaning we are mining the whole world to make little rectangles that can fit in our hands. Yet, many feel smart enough to hold a rectangle rather than to care about their planet. All we could have done is use that rectangle, type the world “climate change” and read all the facts about how much Earth has been suffering, but we didn’t. Now you undoubtedly have something similar, which will probably have even more elements and more high-end technology. However, a machine is still the same without us, or you. Don’t feel smart holding it. Be smart using it. Make use of technology to protect Earth, not destroying it.
It Is All About the Fight
We asked a lot of why. Why does Earth matter? Why does Climate Change matter? Why do we have to use green energy while coal is cheap? Why do we have to reduce carbon emission, stop deforestation, reconstruct agriculture, protect animals, rivers, and the oceans? Why can’t we just enjoy the time of our lives? Here is a fact: we will not live 200 years to watch Earth dies, but our children will. And most importantly, it is about evolution: we fight – that’s how we learn, how we become stronger. We fought for human rights. We fought for women’s rights. We fought for our races, our nations, our families, and our marriages. We fought for peace, equality, and justice. Now, we have to fight for animals, for forests, for rivers, for the oceans. Fight for the future.
Fight for Earth
My brother once said, when you want something, you will come up with methods; when you don’t want it, you think of reasons. There is no time left to ask why. Start asking yourselves how. How can you help?
Know Earth. Live Earth. Love Earth
Expose yourself to Nature. Feel it, fall in love with it. A wise man named Alexander Pope once said: “A little learning is a dangerous thing.” Never stop learning, but also never stop at learning. Learn about Earth and understand it. Then go out and do something. No matter who you are and what you do, know that you can make a difference.
Now if you are reading this from Mars, I am not asking you to go back. But keep in mind, you can dump Earth, you will probably dump Mars when it dies, but eventually man will come to realize that he cannot run forever.
The Fourth Second
If you condense the Earth lifespan into 24 hours, or one full day, then we have been here on this planet for roughly 3 seconds. We know, only with 3 seconds, we have left you with a not so wonderful story and a lot to fix. But we also left you with the book of knowledge, of foolish mistakes that you never want to repeat. Only if you learn from our mistakes and take action now can we together make it to the fourth second. Right now, Earth needs you, not another 2016, not another Earth song, Earth summit, or Earth day. “The only thing necessary for the triumph of evils is for good men to do nothing,” said Edmund Burke.
