Live Earth: Love It? Hate It?

Its so damn convenient and easy for everyone to throw a rock concert to help raise awareness of global warming. So damn hard to make it really relevant and powerful. Hell, some of the biggest sponsors were car companies, for god's sake. "The last thing the planet needs is a rock concert," The Who's Roger Daltrey said earlier this year. And the critics had a field day with rock stars flying in private jets, and that the concerts themselves were irresponsible because of the pollution they caused.

C'mon people, lighten up. Claiming the Live Earth concerts were bad for the environment is like claiming that the Indianapolis 500 is the cause of dwindling oil reserves.

I think the main problem the critics had was simply that the concerts were spreading an inconvenient message. Yes, most folks are aware and agree that global warming is a serious issue. But most folks don't get to rally around the cause and talk about it at the water cooler on Monday. Awareness and discussion in everyone's routine lives is a great thing.

The music was great but maybe hard to hear the message over Fall Out Boy or the Beastie Boys. And at times the message seemed trite: make sure your tires are properly inflated?

The most powerful and radical message of the day was delivered by Al Gore - the Seven Point Pledge. Al recited this from the stage in Giant Stadium and that was as much as we heard about this (thanks for the great work on that dear corporate media outlets).

But this pledge is radical - Al Gore standing on stage in front of hundreds of millions of people on every continent and in 130 countries asked all those people to stand up to their governments and demand that they step up to the plate and negotiate a treaty on global warming, to fight power plants that can't control CO2, to fight for laws that reduce use of coal and oil, and to boycott "bad" businesses (that's not what it says in point seven but that's what it means). Unbelievable.



Who was the last activist to ask 2 billion people at the same time to fight, organize and petition their governments.





Here are the key section of the pledge (in my mind anyway). I pledge to:




1.To demand that my country join an international treaty within the next 2 years that cuts global warming pollution by 90% in developed countries and by more than half worldwide in time for the next generation to inherit a healthy earth;

3.To fight for a moratorium on the construction of any new generating facility that burns coal without the capacity to safely trap and store the CO2;

5.To fight for laws and policies that expand the use of renewable energy sources and reduce dependence on oil and coal;

7.To buy from businesses and support leaders who share my commitment to solving the climate crisis and building a sustainable, just, and prosperous world for the 21st century.

For all the nay saying, sign the pledge and live the pledge.

Oh, you'll be a little inconvenienced but that's why the earth is in trouble. We hate doing inconvenient things that don't directly benefit ourselves. Particularly in the USA.

Time to get over it.

Namaste.

PS: One of the simplest things you can do to help the environment is to go vegan.

Tech Tags: live+earth sos al+gore carbon+footprint madonna sting fall+out+boy beastie+boys global+warming