So I've been spending the last few weeks catching up on current affairs, trying to polish my stances and arguments for the various issues present today, just in time for the GAMSAT.
I've listened to a lot of TED talks and watched a few UN conference videos and I'd reached the conclusion that I was so very ignorant and sheltered. I never prided myself as a person who always kept up with current affairs. I read my fair share of news, but even then, I had isolated myself in a little health and medicine bubble and turned a blind eye to other issues which are more prominent to society.
I tried to remain worldly, but the one thing that stuck out the most was climate change. I tried so hard to break away from the scientific field, I know, but then I realised that the issue of climate change has now become a concern for everyone - every person of every country, those who believed in science or not. It is real, and it is happening right now.
It was kind of upsetting, while I was listening to various people talk about climate change I kept thinking about the idea of my kids, and their kids and what their future will be like if we as a humanity failed to make a change, or worse, if it takes us too long to try and having it be too late. Obama said in one of his speeches, we are the first generation to feel the effects of climate change, and we are the last ones who are able to do anything about it.
Now, I'm not going to start going around, telling everyone to change their light bulbs. And its because that won't make much of a difference now. We're that far gone that a small act by each person, although noble and helpful, is simply not enough for the world to combat climate change. I wouldn't even know where to begin because the power is so out of our hands that governments and world leaders must implement plans and create projections to change their nations in order for this threat to subside.
And the whole time I kept thinking, what if I never get to show my kids all my secret spots to swim around Sydney, because the sea levels had risen so much they're just not accessible anymore. What if the shore recedes, or the weather goes haywire and my children and their children can't go outside any day they please and enjoy themselves, just because it may be too dangerous? What if I can't show them all the places I used to wander, because they no longer exist?
Even the notion of this possibility upset me a great deal because a large part of who I am, is what I do and it's in the things that I've done. When I think about the future, I can never picture it. I can't see what my husband looks like or what my kids look like, but I can feel their presence. It's like I know that they'll be there, like that's definite. And if my mind can somehow make me feel as though they will be there, and I know that with the way we as a humanity are exhausting the world, in every sense, my future will not be the same. If I can't show my kids who I am, or who I was, it'll feel like there's this emptiness in my life, and it's not something I look forward to.
If our governments and industries and the people don't jump on board and make a change, none of us will have the future that we want. Obama mentioned something about halting what we're doing for personal gain. Giving up our momentary and immediate desires to hopefully generate a sustainable environment for the future and for the future of man kind. And that although we may not be able to reap the rewards of our hard work, we'll know that future generations will see us as the generation who combated climate change not the ones who shied away from it.