Eduardo
Galeano
ho gets to keep himself had no option but to admit, for the
An SOS
W
the water? The first time, that disasters would occur if
monkey with global warming continued to damage the
from
the big stick. planet. Even the Vatican acknowledges
The unarmed that Galileo was not wrong, commented
monkey dies of the journalist Bill McKibben. Nobody's
the south thirst. This is
the lesson
from prehistory that opens Stanley
Kubrick’s film 2001, a Space Odyssey.
perfect, though.
At the same time, Mr Bush announced
that the US production of greenhouse
gases will rise 43% by the year 2020. But
For the 2003 odyssey, President Bush then he is president of a country of cars
has announced a defence budget of $1bn that guzzle petrol and vomit poison —
a day. The arms industry is the only more than 200m cars, and thank goodness
trustworthy form of investment, it gives babies don't drive. In a speech at the end of
irrefutable arguments at Johannesburg or last year, Mr Bush called for solidarity and
at any other international conference. had the gall to define it thus: “Let your
children wash the neighbour's car."
The powers that dominate the planet
reason by dropping bombs. They are the The energy policy of the world's richest
force, a genetically modified Frankenforce, country is dictated by terrestrial business,
a gigantic power that lays nature low. It but it claims to obey the heavens. The now-
exercises the freedom to turn the air into defunct Enron company, deceased by
grime and the right to leave humanity fraud, which was the principal adviser to
homeless; it describes its atrocities as the US government and the main financier
mistakes, is deaf to any warnings and it behind the campaigns of Mr Bush and
crushes anyone who gets in its way. most US senators, used to transmit divine
messages. The Great White Chief of Enron,
The sea level rises and any lowland sinks Kenneth Lay, used to say: “I believe in God
for ever beneath the waves. This would and I believe in the market." The previous
seem to be a metaphor for economic bigshot had a similar catchphrase: “We are
development in the world of today, but it is on the side of the angels.”
not. It is a snapshot of the world that is to The United States practises environ-
come, in the not-too-distant future, based mental terrorism without the slightest
on the forecasts of the scientists consulted remorse, as though the good Lord had
by the United Nations. given it a certificate of immunity for giving
For more than two decades, the up smoking.
ecologists’ prophesies were met with
derision or apathy. Now, the scientists are “Nature is very tired," wrote the Spanish
admitting that the ecologists were right all monk Luis Alfonso de Carvallo. That was
along. On June 3 this year, President Bush in 1695. Would that he could see us now.
The powers that
dominate the
planet reason by
dropping bombs
14 Earth | The Guardian | August 2002
A large proportion of the map of Spain enon. It would seem to be a twist of black But each inhabitant of the north con-
has become landless. The useable land is humour that the UN called the 1990s the sumes, on average, 10 times more petrol,
disappearing, and sooner rather than later international decade for the reduction of gas and coal, while in the south only one
the sand will be seeping in through the natural disasters. Reduction? It was the in every 100 people owns a car. Gluttony
cracks in the windows. Only 15% of most disastrous of any decade: there were and starvation, the environmental menu:
Mediterranean forest is still standing. A 86 catastrophes that left many times more 75% of the world’s pollution comes from
century ago, forests covered half of people dead than were killed in the wars 25% of the world’s population. This
Ethiopia, which today is a huge desert; the that raged in the same period. Almost all, minority doesn’t include, I suppose, the
Brazilian Amazon has lost an area of forest 96% to be precise, died in the poor nations 1.2 billion people who have to survive
the size of France. Central America will which the experts insist on calling without drinkable water, or the 1.1 billion
soon count its trees like a bald man man “developing countries". who go to sleep every night with nothing
counts the hairs on his head. The greater in their bellies. It is not “humanity" that is
the amount of farmland in the world that With devotion and enthusiasm, the south responsible for devouring natural re-
goes to rack and ruin, the more fertilisers copies and multiplies the worst habits of sources or for putrefying the land, sea
and pesticides have to be used. According the north, such as the US religion of cars, and air.
to the World Health Organisation, these the contempt for public transport and the Frankenpower shrugs his shoulders:
chemical aids kill 3 million farmers a year. mythology of market freedom and con- when this planet ceases to be profitable,
Just like human languages and cultures, sumer society. And the south welcomes the I will move to another.
the plants and animals are dying out. filthy factories with open arms in exchange
Species are disappearing at the rate of for wages worthy of the slavery epoch. Beauty is beautiful if it can be sold and
three every hour, according to the biologist justice is just if it can be bought. The
Edward Wilson. This is not only because planet is being murdered by this way of
of deforestation and pollution. Mass life, just as we are being paralysed by
production, cash crops for export and machines invented to accelerate move-
mass-market consumerism are ment and isolated by the cities originally
annihilating diversity. It is hard to believe created for bringing people together.
that barely a century ago there were more Words lose their meaning. And the
than 500 varieties of lettuce and 287 types green sea and the blue sky lose their
of carrot in the world, and 220 varieties of colour, painted as they were by the algae
potato in Bolivia alone. that kindly wafted oxygen during 3,000
million years.
Forests are being denuded, land is turning
to desert, rivers are being poisoned, and Are these little night-lights spying on us?
the Polar icecaps are melting. In many The stars shake with astonishment and
places, the rain has ceased to fall, while in fear. They are at a loss to understand how
others downpours split the skies asunder. this world of ours, so ardently bent upon
HECTOR ZAMPAGLIONE
The Earth's climate has gone mad. its own annihilation, goes on being alive.
Floods and droughts, cyclones and And they tremble with shock, because
uncontrollable conflagrations are they have seen that this world has begun
becoming less and less a natural phenom- invading other heavenly bodies.
Eduardo Galeano
is a Uruguayan
environmentalist,
historian and one
of South America's
leading social
philosophers
Earth | The Guardian | August 2002 15