Mycket går att säga och har sagts om klimatförändringarna och exploateringen av jordens resurser.
I The Nation uttrycker dock Bolivias klimatambassadör, Pablo Erick Solón Romero Oroza, något av det starkaste uttalande gjorts av en minister. Uttalandet angriper det rådande system, globalt sätt, som utarmar vår jord på resurser, skapar enorma miljöförändringar, stärker klyftorna mellan förmögna och fattiga.
President Morales has called for a Universal Declaration of the Rights of Mother Earth. Why do you think there’s a need for such a document?
Why, because this problem is about balance – balance between mankind and nature. What we are seeing with climate change is that this balance has been broken. Why, because humans act as if they are the only ones who have rights and treat our Mother Earth like, in the past century, slaves were treated – as persons that don’t have rights, as objects, instruments for exploitation. So if you want to have a balanced relation, humans must recognize that we are not the only one’s that have rights, but also our Mother Earth. We and nature are part of one system and what happens in one part of the system effects the other part.
This way of thinking has been strengthened because of the capitalist system. For the capitalist system everything, nature – even other humans – is considered an object that you can use to obtain a profit. With this system everything can be made into merchandise. So what we are seeing is the consequence of this vision that you can change everything into merchandise, even nature, even your mother – Mother Earth.
Det är en viss skillnad mellan detta uttalande och synen på mänskligheten och hur vår statsminister, Fredrik Reinfeldt uttalar sig om just synen på människan i dagens upplaga av aftonbladet där han försvarar den nya sjukförsäkringen:
Människor kommer i kläm. Det är så att säga nästan oundvikligt i varje samhällsförändring.
Frågan är vilket synsätt vi vill skall råda, för våra normer bestäms till stor del av detta.
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Aftonbladet 1, 2, 3, 4
Igår postade jag en serie av foton. Dessa foton visar ett extremt förorenat Kina som inga Köpenhamnsavtal i världen kommer kunna råda bot på. Fotona var tagna av Lu Guang och nedan är en intervju med honom där han delar sina tankar om människorna som lever i dessa förorenade områden och deras tankar.
Intervjun var först publicerad på NetEase och den översatta versionen här.
NetEase: Where did you get the funding for your project?
Lu Guang: They were my savings. I am different from other people, I make 50,0000 and fell it’s enough, other people make 100,000, 1,000,000 still don’t feel enough, and still continue to make more money. But my thinking is different from other people, I wish my life to be simpler, for example yesterday I could have flown back, how much would it have been? 690. How much was it taking the train? 210 yuan for the whole night, for sure I chose the train. Considering my health, I should have taken the plane, but I don’t have that much money. I must save money when I can. For example, other people stayed at hotels that cost 200, 300, 500 (yuan), the hotels I stayed at were all under 100 (yuan).
NetEase: How did you find and choose the locations of your photos?
Lu Guang: The information was all provided by friends.
NetEase: There are many polluted places, how do you choose the order of your visits?
Lu Guang: Continuously travel and constantly work. Every place I went, there were always friends helping me, I gave my phone number to him, he also gave me his. Whenever something happened over there, he would call me, and I would go over there right the way. Of course there were times I couldn’t make it over there.
NetEase: You said you ate and lived with the villagers, what were most of the reactions of the villagers living in polluted villages when talking about pollution?
Lu Guang: Whenever talking about pollution, they would become very talkative.
NetEase: They want to tell you things?
Lu Guang: Yes, including “Hong River flows through here, 20 years ago the river was very nice, there were fishes, we all bathed in the river, and used water to irrigate wheat, but now we cannot do that anymore. And for so many years we have talked about it many times. We reported to the government, but nothing was ever resolved. Therefore we are now numb and don’t want to complain it anymore.” They were very miserable.
NetEase: The places you shot at where you think the pollution was very serious, how did the villagers see the pollution in their lives? Did they feel the pollution was very serious and threatening their lives or (that the polluting industries) driving the local economic development was more important?
Lu Guang: In fact, there is no economic development for them, it only brought them destructions. Back then they had fertile fields. There were many water conservancy facilities built in the 70’s, all were every good, used to irrigate the fields. But now, pollution came and the water could not be used to irrigate the fields anymore. After a long time, now all the water conservancy facilities are wastes. The polluted water has led to contamination of the underground water. All their drinking water is underground water, water in the wells or from the water tower. Water from water tower flows straight to their homes, unlike us, the tap water we drink is already processed. Drinking this kind of water for long time, many people got very ill. I interviewed a village 3-5 kilo-meters away from Hong River village and asked them if there were people with cancer there. They said yes, but only 1-2 in couple years, and very few. However (in Hong River Village), they have a dozen in each year. The difference is obvious from the same district.
NetEase: How did Hong River (region) village head see the water pollution in his own village?
Lu Guang: This is not their problem because it is upstream, a county, a city where people dump sewage and flow to them. What I am talking about is (Hong River region) Zhang Yu Zhuang village. The head of the village was very helpless, they repeatedly reported the issue to the town and county government, but it was never resolved. Even the county could not resolve it because the water is not dumped by them, it was another county, another city that was dumping sewage, they couldn’t do anything.
NetEase: if factories were set up in those areas, the villagers who benefit from it, for example family member works at the factory, what are their attitudes (of pollution)?
Lu Guang: The same, they are like this – happy about the economic development, but against the severe pollution. The best would be to reduce pollution and continuously develop industries. For example village has a lot of empty houses. 100 yuan for each room, rent out 3 rooms is 300 yuan. Some of them also can work at the factories, to them these increase in their income is very good. But pollution to them is, close the door then go to sleep in the room, the next morning their faces are all gray. They know if this keeps up, their lives will not be very long, very soon …
NetEase: How does the county government see the polluting?
Lu Guang: They are already numb, they cannot do anything. So many young people all have escaped and did not want to return. Young people going out to work all did not want to come back, many lived outside.
NetEase: Living in polluted areas, what specific actions reflect these villagers’ environmental awareness?
Lu Guang: The villagers have no way of protecting the environment. They are the victims, drinking contaminated water every day. They have no choice, unlike wealthy people can buy mineral water, they cannot afford it.
NetEase: What do you think the crux of pollution is? What is the root cause?
Lu Guang: The root cause of pollution is (businesses) want to get more profits, business owners want to get more profits, put aside their own moral and destroy environment. They gained more profits, and that’s it.
NetEase: Is it that they don’t have the rights to hold talks equally? The polluter and the people do not have the equal rights to communicate?
Lu Guang: Who do you talk to? They let you talk? Do you know what they see the farmers as? I should bring you to see what kind of people farmers are. I am telling you, they totally look down on the famers, the true poor people. When you go to the front line you will feel it, the local farmers are suffering in poverty. The right to talk is not for them, it is for the rich people. They (the rich) got the right to talk, not the famers.
NetEase: You took so many pictures of pollution, what do you think the best solution for pollution is?
Lu Guang: If China really wants to solve the pollution problem, I personally feel that it does not depend on a few people from Environmental Protection Administration (EPA), nor relying on the public to report. I personally think that it is a matter of law, because in China’s “Environmental Protection Law”, the maximum fine is 500,000 yuan, with no criminal responsibility. For a company with couple tens and hundreds of millions yearly profit, what is 500,000? Go ahead fine me, it’s ok, because the cost of processing sewage is not 500,000, maybe is millions, it’s ok to give you 500,000. Therefore it is useless to only impose a fine. It is necessary to hold criminal responsibility and to develop more strict laws.
As a legal representative, an owner, if strict laws target him, he will certainly care more about his business. There is no need for the EPA and supervision by the public. If companies who were found of dumping illegally or reported by someone of polluting get the prosecution sentencing, no one will dare to do it anymore. Just because our law is weak right now, the fines are no big deals to the companies. They will pay you as much fines as you want.
NetEase: Do you feel that your photographs have impacts (on people)?
Lu Guang: As for the impacts of my photographs, in fact I didn’t feel it when I was shooting them.
NetEase: Social impact.
Lu Guang: Yes, no feeling. This time I did not create the impact, it was the media. When I shot them I followed my own ideas to take the pictures, to do a good job, so that more people know the truth. What you said impact is because netizens are concerned; very concerned about the pollution issue in China, which shows that Chinese people are very concerned. (Key: I wish he know about ChinaHush and see how many people from other countries were more concerned) This is everyone’s life, environmental issues, the earth is everyone’s, is human’s therefore everyone was very concerned.
NetEase: What role do you think W. Eugene Smith Grant in Humanistic Photography played?
Lu Guang: Eugene Smith is a photographer, an American. In the 70’s he took a set of photos on the mist in Japan which changed Japanese people’s view on environmental pollution issues. In the 70’s Japan also had terrible pollution problems. Because of the social impact of this set of photos, they completely changed the Japan’s environmental pollution problems. They carried out this award, I thought maybe this set of my photos were similar to his. As for this award, I think there are 2 points. One, it recognized my work in the past years. Two, this set of photos will attract more people’s attention worldwide.
NetEase: Are you now the first person to know information on the pollution situation in the villages?
Lu Guang: Yes, my information comes very fast, because they will call me, and if I want to know information about a particular place, I can call them to find out everything. But I want to say one thing, actually the pollutions I documented was only a very small part in China. There are many places I did not discover and did not take photos of, therefore I have many work to do. Now what I did was three rivers, Huai River, the Yangtze River and Yellow river. But there are Hai River, Liao River, Songhua River, Pearl River, these four rivers also were heavily polluted, I still did not go there yet. Because the power of one person is limited, time is limited. Maybe my focus of future work will be those.
NetEase: Looking forward to more of your work.
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Kraftigt uppåt på börsen
”Efter förra veckans kursfall steg börsen på måndagen. Det var främst de konjunkturkänsliga aktierna som drog upp börsen. ”
Skriver SVD idag och DN kontrar med ”Uppåt på börsen igen”
Det har vart intressant att följa medias rapportering av hur börsen faller och stiger. Under förra veckan sjönk börsen konstant vilket beskrevs med mediokra ordalag, men nu när börsen steg med ynka 0.83 % skrivs det stora rubriker utan att ge en fullständig överblick.
Det är oansvarigt och dålig journalistik.
Just nu lånar vi till oss en andhämtning i form av olika stimulanspaket som hjälper regeringar, banker och företag att just för tillfället hålla läpparna ovan vattenytan för att få lite luft.
Samtidigt som media skriker och försöker för allt i världen få oss att börja konsumera mer av de stora företag som styr våra liv, genom att utropa en vändning av världsekonomin, ökar de antal människor som inte har något arbete och kan därmed inte hjälpa till med den medicin som tros vara den enda lösningen på problemet. Den officiella siffran, som är grovt friserad, över arbetslösheten i USA var i februari i år 8,3 % och är nu uppe i 9,8 %. I denna siffra räknas inte de med som står utanför någon form av ersättning eller aktivt sökt arbete de senaste veckorna. Om vi räknar in de är arbetslösheten uppskattar bl.a. Huffington Post att siffran är dubbelt så hög av människor i USA som står utanför arbetsmarknaden.
Dessa kommer inte börja konsumera.
Om vi lyssnar till finnasministrar, bankchefer, IMF, WTO etc. är det lätt att få uppfattningen av att denna totala kollaps av detta ekonomiska system kom som en klar blixt från himlen utan några varningstecken eller förutspådd av ekonomer.
Det gjorde den inte.
Nouriel Roubini är en av dessa ekonomer som ingen innan kolapsen lyssnade på, men nu närmast uppnått kultstatus för hans förutsägelser. Men som innan krisen lyssnar inte vare sig media eller banker på vad han har att säga om framtiden.
Vad som utöver detta kommer påverka vår framtid är bl.a. klimatförändringarna som ”någon” måste göra ”något” åt. Peak oil är också något som inte direkt skrivs om.
Vi gräver en grop åt oss själva genom detta system som har en närmast religiös status, förankrat tyngre än naturlagar som gravitation etc.
Men vi har skapat detta system till förmån för några få, på bekostnad av de flesta.
Min far sade här om dagen då jag berättade om börsens nedgång att det inte var bra för hans pension som han kommer gå på om ca ett och ett halvt år. Han som så många andra har verkligen slitit med sin kropp genom att aldrig ta ut en sjukdag om han inte vart sjuk. Aldrig utnyttjat systemet mer än vad han behövt, aldrig fuskat med skatten eller några bidrag. Han har gått till arbetet och utfört det han vart anställd för med en tro på att om det händer honom något, kommer han få den hjälp han behöver.
Han är inte ensam om att ha haft denna inställning.
Han är den som absolut kommer förlora på alla stimulanspaket och hjälppaket. Han har ingen bonus som återigen är en kultur som växer trott massiva bidrag av staten.
Det är dags, om det finns någon ryggrad kvar, bland vanlig media att granska rota och presentera alternativ fakta och nyheter som verkligen visar på det som händer.
Jag skiter i Victoria Silverstedt ”softa stil” eller om Amy Winehouse festat upp 100 miljoner, vilket är så ignorant mot de 25 000 barn som dör var dag av fattigdomsrelaterade sjukdomar att hon borde fråntas alla sina tillgångar pg dumhet. Jag bryr mig inte om Anna anka eller Maria Montazam som är med i en töntig dokusåpa om misslyckade hemmafruar i ett Hollywod som håller på att gå i konkurs. Dom har haft sina 15 minuter av kändisskap och kommer snart vara glömda.
Istället börja skriv om verkligheten, om möjligheterna som faktiskt finns, om hur vi kan bli ett samhälle utan klass skillnader och orättvisor.
Börja skriv rapportera som den media ni en gång vart!
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