People say we need to keep up with the times. That progress is everything.
I say we need to take care of what was given to us.
My mother once told me about the wonderful coasts she visited in her childhood. Her eyes were glassy imagining the pictures of idyllic beaches.
"Diving through coral reefs is an incredible experience. Fishes in every colour with every patterning you can imagine", she raved.
I listened when she talked about the different species wondering how the world could have changed this much. My mother carried on talking and smiled like a little child who gets narrated a fairy tale.
Somehow a little smile appeared on my face, too. Her story could have its source in a fantasy book.
But suddenly she furrowed her brows.
"One day I went diving in the ocean again. I haven't been an adult yet. I remember observing an Arctic skate. I had been so amazed by his movement that I just followed him for a while. I didn't recognize anything until I suddenly felt something plain and cold touching my arm.
I looked up and was shocked by the image I saw." She stopped for a moment and swallowed. "A plastic bag was swimming past me. But it wasn't just one. There we're hundreds. And not only plastic bags. Sheets and packaging of every kind. Small and big. Thick and thin. Red, blue, orange, white ... We haven't been in an ocean of water any longer. We have been in an ocean of plastic." My mother looked at me with her eyes glassy one more time. But this time she wasn't moved to tears in a positive way. She mourned. You could see the grief in her eyes while she was clenching her hands in despair. "I was so shocked. It was the moment I realized what we were doing to our planet. Our planet full of life and beauty. We have so many to discover on earth but all we are doing is destroying it." Again, she paused.
"You know, they warned us. 32 years ago they already knew what consequences our consumption, our greed would have. But we were too selfish to listen. We destructed this planet. And we're still killing it."
I know the facts. I know this planet has once been wonderful. I know the oceans have once be clean and I wish I could have seen the wonders of nature my mother told me about.
But today the amount of plastic outstripes the amount of fish in the oceans. We wear masks because of the toxic vapours generated by the burning of plastic because the people don't know where to put it.
It's horrible.
I don't want my children to live in such a world.
The question everybody must ask himself is what his priorities are.
What is more important?
Wealth or sustainability?
Destruction or preservation?
Planet or Plastic?
It shouldn't be that hard.
I would always choose the Planet.
