Every second of every day animal- and plant-forms are being eradicated, each hour and each day our habitats are further destroyed. But is it permissible to speak of a "Catastrophe"? In fact, we know exactly what is happening; thus the question is only: Why do we remain passive and allow it to progress?
War against Terrorism
On September 11, 2001 in N.Y. the often suppressed presence of death showed its face to our civilisation-spoiled society. The crash of the jets, the collapse of the twin towers, the victims buried under the rubble and the spectre of terrorism have thoroughly shaken us for a few months. In the meantime, the USA have bombed the alleged culprit and his aides out of Afghanistan. What exactly happened in the Hindukush we do not know but, hampered by a simplistic view of world affairs, President George W. Bush promised us to eliminate "The Evil", using massive armoury, if necessary even mini nuclear weapons. The tragedy of September 11 lies foremost in the loss of any relative proportions. Instead of mobilising all available energy to save our endangered bases for life, they are further endangered by a new war.
War against Nature
This is a fatal error, because the immune system of the living being we call earth is at present threateningly impaired. Nobody knows for how long it will continue to function and grant our existence. Everything essential to life is threatened to disappear: Clear water, pure air, fertile soil. The rain forests, the ice worlds, the protective ozone layer. The last indigenous people with their traditional know-how. Known and unknown animals and plants, biological cycles, natural sounds, odours and flavours. An incomprehensible universe of interrelations and processes that have developed in the course of an eternity disappears irreversibly.
All this is being lost, except we ourselves. We, the beneficiaries and destroyers of these roots of life. We, the creators of an ersatz world , meant to compensate for each and every thing we waste unscrupulously or eradicate from the face of the earth. We are the one item that grows exponentially.
Another Symbol Disappears
One of the most engaged activists against the destruction of natural habitats has also disappeared: Bruno Manser of Basel. He, who fought -body and soul- against the ruthless destruction of nature. Since May 2000 there has been no life sign of him. His footsteps are lost in the pitiful remains of the Sarawak rainforest.
He disappeared without trace in those parts of the world for which he laboured.
Manser lived what he preached, he focused on what others long since had looked away from. He was capable to distinguish between the essential and the nonessential. Still, like myself, he was part of that generation of Europeans, born shortly after 1950. According to Christian Pfister we were raised with the "Fifties Syndrome". By that, the Swiss Ecology Historian means an incisive turnabout in our association with nature in the 1950ies. From then on the destruction of our habitats has accelerated at a rate never before seen, mainly because of the prodigal use of the cheap resource mineral oil.
Thus the "Fifties-Syndrome" was a creation of that generation of parents who tried to master their world war trauma by means of hard work, security and affluence.
We were influenced by events like de-colonialisation, moon landings, cold war, the '68 movement, sexual liberation, nuclear missile threat, economic boom, population explosion, "oil crisis", atomic bomb tests, Seveso, Chernobyl, AIDS, sick forests, fall of the Berlin wall, runaway technical progress, substitute wars, famines, mass tourism, equal opportunity, internet, genetic technology, globalisation and destruction of habitats.
