Jennifer Marohasy

a forum for the discussion of issues concerning the natural environment

Archives for March 8, 2006

Reality TV or Manufactured News?

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Earlier this year, Japanese whalers in the Antarctic were accused of ramming a Greenpeace boat. The evidence suggested it was the other way around, that Greenpeace had rammed the Japanese.

Nevermind, when Greenpeace returned to Australia they were given a pat on the back by the Environment Minister Ian Campbell. He said in Parliament:

“Over summer, we as a nation have witnessed the Greenpeace ship not only visiting the Southern Ocean and running a policy of harassment against the whalers but also, very constructively, sending photographic images of the whale slaughter by the Japanese in the Southern Ocean all around the world. I had the great pleasure of meeting Shane Rattenbury and the Greenpeace team in my office [at Parliament House in Canberra] just before question time. I think other members and senators will have the chance to meet them. I must say that the work they did over the summer was in distinct contrast to the actions of Paul Watson on the Sea Shepherd, who I think set back the cause of whaling by unnecessarily taking potentially illegal action, causing collisions and potentially putting life at risk at sea.”

While the Minister may have preferred the footage from Greenpeace, the Sea Sheperds were also their with cameras rolling.

According to a recent Media Watch program, the Sea Shepherd was paid $70,000 “a decent chunk of money” to send video footage back to Channel Seven. In fact a deal was done before they had even got to the Antarctic.

Media Watch concluded that:

“Whatever you think about cheque book journalism or whaling – it’s not Seven’s job to help Sea Shepherd stage the news events that Seven is buying exclusive access to!”

Perhaps both Greenpeace and the Sea Sheperd were providing us with a form of reality television dressed-up as news?

Impact of Agriculture 10,000 Years Old

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Clark Spencer Larsen form the Department of Anthropology, The Ohio State University, has recenty published a paper in
Quaternary International outlining how agriculture was impacting on the environment, including climate, 10,000 years ago.

Titled, ‘The agricultural revolution as environmental catastrophe: Implications for health and lifestyle in the Holocene’ its conclusions include:

“Most of us are well aware of the dramatic changes in the Earth’s landscapes as forests give way to agricultural land, and the resulting environmental degradation, loss of species, and other disasters. A common misperception is that prior to modern times, humans were much more concerned about managing their environment so as to avoid the problems that have surfaced in such a dramatic fashion in the 20th century. However, study of ancient landscapes in Mesoamerica, North America, and the Middle East
shows evidence that earlier agriculturalists had profound impacts, highly negative in some areas, on the lands they exploited.

In the Mediterranean basin, for example, nearly all landscapes were degraded or otherwise transformed in dramatic ways.

The analysis of the past reveals that the current threats to the landscape have their origins in the period of human history when plant domestication began 10,000 years (or so) ago.

Finally, once the effects on Earth’s climate by industrial-era human activities-the so-called greenhouse effect-were recognized, a number of workers assumed that it related to just the last couple of hundred years. However, new evidence of anamolous trends in CO2 and CH4 possibly owing to agricultural-related deforestation after about 8000 years ago, indicates that the negative impact involving greenhouse gases began soon after the start of agriculture.”

So organic farming is not necessarily the answer?

Giving Thanks to Whales in Nagato, Japan

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There has been much discussion about whaling at his blog and some discussion about why the Japanese continue to hunt whales in the name of research.

It is a very foreign and offensive concept to many of us in countries like Australia even though, we had our own whaling fleets not so many years ago.

Yesterday I was sent a link to a recent story in the Japan Times explaining that despite efforts from surfers and local residents about 50 melon-headed whales were recent stranded and died in Chiba Prefecture.

The newspaper article goes on to explain that some of the dead mammals were examined by experts to try to learn the cause of death, while the remaining were to be buried in the town.

I have heard about whale cemeteries in Japan. And one reader of this blog has told me how he attended a buddhist ceremonies in Nagato where thanks was given to whales that had been killed through whaling, as well as those foetuses that have been found in pregnant females.

The ceremony also included the naming of these foetuses in a book.

Whales and whaling evidently has a deep cultural resonance in at least some parts of modern Japan.

We Will Never Run Out of Oil: Philip Burgess

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I attended the IPA’s annual H.V. McKay Lecture on Technology in Melbourne last night. Philip Burgess from Telstra was the guest speaker on the topic of ‘Future Proofing’.

He gave an interesting and wide ranging talk that included two reasons why we will never run out of oil:

1. As the price of oil increases, we will find more of it.

2. As the price of oil or any other commodity goes up, inventive people will start looking for substitutes.

He suggested there were all kinds of examples of ‘substitutes’ including: plastic for copper tubing, grain for fuel and aluminium studs for wooden studs in home building.

He also said that we should perhaps strive to use more, not less energy, because it is through the use of energy that we create wealth.