I read "The rime of an ancient mariner" for the first time when I was in 10th grade. Since then I was obscurely drawn to this classic poetry from the romantic era. Coleridge was remarkable in his masterpiece, proving everyone wrong that quantity and quality can go hand in hand by writing one of his longest poem with such eloquence.
Spoiler Alert: if you have not read the poem, do read it before reading this post further as I will be using lines from the poem as analogies for the purpose of this writing.
A cocky old mariner sails off with his crew. The ship was greeted with nature's humbling gift of mighty breeze which carried the ship south across the ocean. Suddenly, the storm hit. It tormented and tortured the hearts of the brave sailors. A storm is not a punishment by nature, it is not a curse. It is the nature of nature. The fire won't feel cold on its embrace, the sun won't rise as emerald at dawn, wrinkles won't be intact on the jowl of a lover, ergo, the sea won't be calm at the convenience of voyagers.
As they went further south, ice sculptures appeared all around the ship. Their cold wordless number kept increasing every hour the sailors sailed, sending a chill of repugnance down the spine. And then finally, the Albatross appeared. The bird, they believed, was a sign of luck and joy. Sailors gave it food and welcomed its presence. And then the thinkable happened. The thread of crossbow screeched for mercy, the arrow glided towards albatross, dissecting the winds of joy, and struck down the bird. The murderer of their good fortune was none other than the mariner himself.
The question is why would a man kill his fortune?
Why would we destroy the very thing which gives us the stuff of life?
Is it sheer ignorance or pleasure. The German language even has a word for it. Schadenfreude, the pleasure one gets from other's misfortune. Ignorance is not bliss anymore, it takes much more resilience to be ignorant when facts are bombarded onto your head every day. That's why I got to commend the republicans and the "honorable president" Donald Trump, for not just ignoring the facts but to build a wall so rigid that allowed him to disregard climate change and global warming.
It is upon us, the fate of our albatross. The environment is our albatross and for past century we are continuously shooting arrows at it.
The interesting fact is that both the type of stands, the selfish ones and the selfless ones, agree with the philosophy of environmental conservation. For the selfless ones, it is pretty clear why they feel to protect the environment. Compassion, humility and peace are the driving force for them. But even for selfish ones, there is a clear motive. Every source of resources trace back to nature. For every monetary benefit, for every selfish desire, we need the stuff of earth. And even if this cannot drive us then there is one more fact, we need a hospitable place to live and we have no chance of finding and reaching a new one in next 100 or 200 years but we do have the capacity to destroy this planet in next 200 years to a point where it is beyond repairs.
The power of destruction possessed by humans is so grand that we have managed to endanger a species of animal which has survived all 5 mass extinction in last 450 million years. Sharks, the ruthless queens of the oceans have survived 5 mass extinctions on earth, including, the great dying also known as the Permian-Triassic extinction. It is the Earth's most severe known extinction event, with up to 96% of all marine species and 70% of terrestrial vertebrate species becoming extinct. We somehow have managed to endanger the species by killing more than 100 million of them every year. At this rate, sharks might go extinct in coming century. Tiger population is already severely endangered and nearing extinction( the story of tigers is a topic very close to my heart as I have been drawn towards them and photographing them since a very young age. I will be coming up with an article on tigers very soon).
Let's come down to climate change now. We have had 16 record breaking hottest years since 2000. That's got to count for something. We cant live in ignorance like this. If you have any doubt about the effects of increased temperature, here are the facts. The rising temperature has caused sea level to rise by 8 inches in last century, 8 inches is not a insignificant number. It is not enough that the sea level is increasing which will cause more coastal flooding, the acidity of ocean has increased by 30%. The rising sea level will act as a more devastating fuel for storms and flooding. As the sea level rises, the strength of storms and hurricanes also rises. One of the social impacts of this would be increasing number of refugees.
Another surprising recent observation is that the CO2 level was peaked and increased dramatically in each of the mass extinction, including the great dying. It is a clear evidence that every time carbon dioxide level has increased, it has led to massive extinction cycles on earth and we are coming close to those numbers in near future. The concentration of carbon dioxide is currently highest in human history.
"Ah! well a-day! what evil looks
Had I from old and young!
Instead of the cross, the Albatross
About my neck was hung."
It won't be the cross of hope that will be hung around humanity's neck, it would be the corpse of our albatross, with us standing guilty in the dark abyss.