Ineffective Symbolism

It’s again been a while since I posted some stuff here. These days, I read a lot of interesting stuff, yet am not able to express my views or add on something to it. Partly, I need to blame twitter, which is super short and convenient way to express opinions or make comments. Yet, the fun of writing an article is unparalleled.

Here, I have written about two of the latest trends that caught a lot of attention in neoteric media. One, about the ‘Earth Hour’ and two, about the ongoing debate about ‘bottled water’.

For beginners, ‘Earth Hour’ began in 2007, in Sydney where in most businesses and homes turned off lights for an hour. This was initiated by World Wide Fund for Nature. Well, now the question arises on why it’s done and how does it help our planet earth? A partial information from Internet about it reads out like this “Earth Hour is known to result in drop of energy consumption. But not one power generating station has reported lowered production of energy. Statistically, this relates to a zero effect on change of carbon emissions.” In Indian context, we don’t really need to participate in ‘Earth Hour’ as such. Our cities consume negligible amount of energy as opposed to cities like New York, Sydney or San Francisco. This is mere symbolic gesture which creates some media sensation, but is of no real use. We all were taught that drops of water makes the mighty ocean. So, instead of displaying this symbolism, why can’t these major cities do something on a regular basis to curtail the energy consumption? My point is simple… By doing one good deed per year, you are not going address any issues. Do it on a regular basis and work effectively. This holds good for everyone at every juncture.

After ‘Earth Hour’ drama, the ‘bottled water’ saga is making rounds. It does have some substance. Like facts such as just one in every five bottle is recycled, millions of barrels of fuel is burnt in producing bottled water, et al. That accepted, but unsubstantial claims like drinking bottled water would make your bones brittle, would make you more vulnerable to diseases are again media sensationalism. Bottled water is one such thing, which cannot be done away with. In our country, the tap water is definitely not safe. In such a case, how can we stop drinking bottled water? Just because Shekhar Kapur is making a movie called ‘Paani’ and has made some interesting observation, we cannot buy everything he wishes to sell. For that matter, driving cars is a big evil as so much fuel is burnt and so much pollution is caused. So, have we given up driving cars and instead prefer bullock-carts as a more environment friendly mode of transport. We require modernization. If modernization brings in some negative impact, we cannot stop it. Instead we need to find smarter solutions to such problem.

Any solution that is offered to address such issues should not be mere symbolic or too impractical to implement. The trick lies in our understanding of the issue and resolving it in such a way that we not only make progress, but also don’t harm our planet.