Despite the obviousness of the title we have never, never been able to break away from the touchy-feely granola crunchiness that is Earth Day. We like granola. We like the earth, but the way Earth Day was originally posited to us, it came as some sort of half-cocked hippie idealism and we have never quite gotten over it.
Of course that says more about us than it says about the day. Broadly speaking, in this case, the hippies were onto something.
In the 44 years since the very first Earth Day was celebrated, the concept has gradually moved to the center of American consciousness. Back then, 1970, Americans drove gas guzzling automobiles and cared not a whit for conservation.
Nowadays almost every employer has a recycling program of some substance. Students are taught about recycling in schools and energy conservation is a high priority for almost everyone.
We embrace Earth Day today, less because it strikes a blow for Mother Earth, but because it makes sense. It’s just smart. It makes sense to reduce and reuse what we can.
It makes sense to conserve energy and pick up litter.
It makes sense to keep our humanity from contaminating the environment around us.
At the same time, we support and endorse responsible use of our resources which to us means including long-term planning and wise exploration of other sources of energy. It makes sense that there are only so many barrels of oil in the ground and we need to start looking ahead to figure out what we are going to do when the spigot runs dry.
In our world, idealism is nice, reality is nicer.
