Oh Behave!

Steve Hofmeyr makes a sensible argument for who, why and what on his blog, but the point is: as a celebrity, as someone who courts/or simply attracts a lot of attention, isn't there a responsibility to...well, behave. This is the same assumption made once upon a time about Charles and Diana. So things aren't peachy; isn't the deal that you make a few sacrifices - for volk and vaderland - and at least lead a dignified existence since everyone is watching? Isn't this the cost of a priviledged life - that you sort of give up your whims to an extent, and do your - very public - job.

The Charles-Diana thing demonstrated that selfishness now prevails over the need/requirement to demonstrate good mores.
Obviously the public sets something of a double standard. Is the man in the street an angel? Hardly.

I do think in the future we will begin to hold our celebrities increasingly accountable to their extravagances. We will be far less forgiving. It is already happening. Tom Cruise, Mr Hollywood, is finding his image is rupturing badly. In large part this is due to his antics off screen. But as the world gets serious - and we are, and have to - about the state we are in, over-indulgences, the Paris Hilton lifestyle, the Playboy Mansion - all these things will appear increasingly vulgar and out of place and will be shut down, boarded up, phased out of our public consciousness.

Irony and sarcasm will initially be fun (as the current Eskom jokes attest), but as the economic rot sets in, it will no longer be amusing. It will be a matter of making some painful adjustments. One of these may include more walking. The world's pace will slow down.

The future is unlikely to be as filled with staples of Entertainment E. We are likely to be less focussed on voyeurism and more focussed on economic survival. We will have to get down and dirty in order to deal with the practical matter of making a living in a contracting economic framework. Globalisation always was going to be just a temporary blip in our evolution. It is set for permanent reverse now, starting with the shutdown of whole airline companies for example, meaning the world is about to get a lot bigger.

Our behaviour will necessarily have to include a whole shift in lifestyle and habits. We will become slow food nations once again, with transitions to farming and agriculture and railways - that's if small mobs don't form and run amuck torching and looting whatever they find, hoping to perpetuate the getting something for nothing psychology that is now way past its sell by date.

Humanity at risk (NVDL

The future of humanity has been put at risk by a failure to address environmental problems including climate change, species extinction and a growing human population, according to a new UN report.

In a sweeping audit of the world's environmental wellbeing, the study by the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) warns that governments are still failing to recognise the seriousness of major environmental issues.

The study, involving more than 1,400 scientists, found that human consumption had far outstripped available resources. Each person on Earth now requires a third more land to supply his or her needs than the planet can supply, it finds.

Meanwhile, biodiversity is seriously threatened by the impact of human activities: 30% of amphibians, 23% of mammals and 12% of birds are under threat of extinction, while one in 10 of the world's large rivers runs dry every year before it reaches the sea.

The report - entitled Global Environment Outlook: Environment for Development - reviews progress made since a similar study in 1987 which laid the groundwork for studying environmental issues affecting the planet.

Since the 1987 study, Our Common Future, the global response "has in some cases been courageous and inspiring," said the environment programme's executive director Achim Steiner. The international community has cut ozone-damaging chemicals, negotiated the Kyoto protocol and other international environmental treaties and supported a rise in protected areas which cover 12% of the world.

"But all too often [the response] has been slow and at a pace and scale that fails to respond to or recognise the magnitude of the challenges facing the people and the environment of the planet," Mr Steiner said. "The systematic destruction of the Earth's natural and nature-based resources has reached a point where the economic viability of economies is being challenged - and where the bill we hand to our children may prove impossible to pay," he said.

Climate change is a global priority that demands political leadership, but there has been "a remarkable lack of urgency" in the response, which the report characterised as "woefully inadequate".

For the rest of this Guardian.co.uk article, go here. (Thanks J).

NVDL: What we need is Nature Virtue Decency and Logic. But it starts with Nature, and not Human Nature, getting back to Nature, and remember the concept of Nature as our Mother. Mother Nature. Without her we inhabit a world without beauty, without sense, without love. And such a place and its habitants is doomed. We know this, but we still think delay is okay. In fact, delay matters a great deal. The cover of TIME magazine in SA is also splattered green, and features the world's greenest people.