Kind Of Forgot About That Whole Wet Thing Over There

(Image from here)


Eh, the ocean. Who cares?

Bizarre coincidence: two oil tankers spilled their toxic guts all over the place in a matter of less than a week: one near San Fransisco on Wednesday, and then one split up in a storm in the Black Sea on Sunday.

How often does this happen, anyway? What are the odds of it happening so close together? The devastation for each of these is tremendous, though it is a little heartening to think that at least in San Francisco there are volunteers trying to help the wildlife recover.

Alright, so now that the world is falling apart and everyone knows it, how is it being covered in the press?

With so many dozens of ecosystems collapsing all around us, which ones receive the blessing of media coverage affects which ones people work to preserve, rescue, or at the very least care about.

And I'd like to propose that these news stories about the spills are going to go off the news' radar very soon. That TV, the internet, and newspapers will treat these two examples of the ocean being completely screwed over with minimal coverage of the environmental effects. That these will be a blip on the radar screen.

And then compare the coverage to the extensive, continuous stories about the melting ice caps right now, from businessmen hoping for a new trade route to everyday people sad about the fate of the polar bears that now live on a sheet of ice fast becoming slush.

Why will we focus so little on the tarnished oceans, comparatively? It's because we are shockingly disconnected from our seas. We just don't tend to pay attention to them.

They take up 71% of our planet's surface and yet we know so little about their biology still- as proved by the new species of whale apparently discovered earlier this year.

We worry about organically grown produce, meat, and milk, but how many times have you heard these concerns raised about seafood? How many times have you heard about the environmental problems caused by pesticides on plants vs. how many times have you heard about overfishing and deforestation issues associated with wild-caught and, respectively, farm-raised fish? Did you know that fish farms have a tendency of destroying tropical mangrove forests? Depressing but true.

Why this disconnect? A lack of empathy. It's tough to feel sad about algae, squids, or fish dying, they're so weird-looking they just confuse us when we try to think about whether or not we care about them dying in mass numbers.

Polar bears on the other hand are rock stars of the environmental conservation world. One news report I watched recently included an interview with someone who said they wanted to reach out and hug one (let's ignore the fact that in reality the bear would eat her face off, just for the moment.) Everybody wants to save them because they have two cute little eyes, an adorable black-button nose and fluffy soft fur. Aaaw!

I mean, look, he's even on two legs- how cute, he thinks he's people! Once people start anthropomorphizing a specie, they care about its fate.

But poor ocean critters. Covered in oil, suffocated by plastic, and no end in sight, no campaigns reaching out to protect plankton, where most of the world's oxygen comes from.

Maybe our species should learn to respect our mother more. She gets mad sometimes and throws angry clouds around.