I was very inspired after attending the Bioneers conference in Bozeman for my second year. I was recently asked some questions for an interview in Montana Magazine and took that opportunity to preach the good word about societies dangerous trends. Here it is:

What's the best thing about living in Montana?
I love our proximity to nature. I also like it here because people are more likely to listen to the following advice I have for them.

I am worried that the bitterness over changes to laws that affected our timber industry will slow people’s acceptance of a much bigger issue. I’m not talking about climate change. That is only a warning and only one result of a world wide trend to destroy our life support system.

You can make a difference simply by creating less garbage and asking yourself often if the short term convenience provided by the product you are about to buy is not only worth your money but also worth, for example, the soldiers who die for the oil that is in all plastic products from polyester clothes and nylon bags to water bottles and Styrofoam.

Ask yourself also if the product is worth the pollution created to manufacture, transport (usually thousands of miles) and even recycle it. Pollution is made up of toxic chemicals that cause cancer and birth defects. Ask also if it is worth the poisoning of our air and water caused by the leaching of chemicals and breakdown of garbage.

To me, the big picture is simple. Converting nature to toxic chemicals with exponentially increasing speed is leading us towards a catastrophic tipping point. We need all the time we can get to figure out how to stop our approach to this point and to reverse our direction because the affects of our actions in the present will continue long after we decide that it’s time for a change. The food we fish out of the ocean is increasingly scarce and our solution is to develop ways to remove it faster even if that involves removing and killing things we don’t want while adding enormous amounts of life killing waste.

There is a misconception that things are getting better because we are learning how to better contain the unnatural things we create but the facts are that we can’t keep up with the destructive power of global corporations, destruction is profitable and we are responsible because we are funding it with every small purchase we make. That is why one person’s daily choices can make a difference.

I’m not claiming to be perfect, I know that I can do a lot better but I am becoming aware and making an effort to leave a smaller mess behind when I am gone. My hope is that we stop to think about where something came from and where it is going before buying it, accepting it (a plastic bag we don’t need) or wasting it. Leaving your car running while not using it wastes gas while poisoning our air, as does accelerating towards a red light only to slam on your brakes. Besides feeling good about it, I am entertained by challenging myself to coast as much as practical while driving. This also reduces the frequency of necessary repairs which saves materials like brake pads and reduces the pollution produced during the manufacturing and even the installation of these materials.

Rep. Louise M. Slaughter (D-NY-28), ranking Democrat on the House Rules Committee and the only microbiologist in Congress, today (July 14, 2005) joined researchers from the Environmental Working Group (EWG) and Dr. Alan Greene of drgreene.com to publicize a shocking new study documenting the degree of chemical pollution present in the bodies of newborn infants. The EWG investigation tested blood from ten newborn infants for a range of chemical pollutants, many of which are associated with abnormal development and poor health. On average, the infants had over 200 industrial chemicals in their blood. Ms. Slaughter’s blood was also tested, and was revealed to contain 271 harmful substances. “If ever this country had a wake-up call, it’s the blood test results of these newborns,” Rep. Slaughter said. “If we ever had proof that our nation’s pollution laws aren’t working, it’s reading the list of industrial chemicals in the bodies of babies who have not yet lived outside the womb.”

Everything that’s been thrown away is starting to come back to us. We live in a closed system with 6.6 billion other people. Our world is not as big as you might think and dilution is not a solution.

–Eric Bergoust
Four-time Olympian
www.airbergy.com