Life on Earth is Dying
Robert J. Burrowes
Habitat denial by human encroachment and pollution is decimating many species.
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/gallery/2016/oct/27/worlds-wildlife-being-pushed-to-the-edge-by-humans-in-pictures
http://www.unodc.org/documents/data-and-analysis/wildlife/World_Wildlife_Crime_Report_2016_final.pdf and ‘2016 Living Planet Report’ http://awsassets.panda.org/downloads/lpr_living_planet_report_2016.pdf which includes these words: ‘The main statistic from the report … shows a 58% decline between 1970 and 2012. This means that, on average, animal populations are roughly half the size they were 42 years ago.’
http://www.un.org/apps/news/story.asp?NewsID=55724#.WEdCk1yYrIV
You just have to be an ‘ordinary’ person who pays your military taxes and consumes more than your share of world resources while participating without challenge in the global system of violence and exploitation managed by the global elite.
http://blogs.agu.org/wildwildscience/2016/11/24/whats-happening-arctic-astonishing/
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/only-60-years-of-farming-left-if-soil-degradation-continues/
http://www.unep.org/newscentre/Default.aspx?DocumentID=27090&ArticleID=36316&l=en
![animals-endangered-baby-orangutan-jpg](https://www.greanvillepost.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/12/animals-endangered-baby-orangutan-jpg.jpg)
Living in Indonesia, one of the most corporatized and politically corrupt nations in Asia, Orangutans are among the most endangered species on the planet. Meantime, Western consumers remain blissfully unaware of their own part in this tragedy.
http://www.theecologist.org/News/news_analysis/2988403/iraqs_oil_inferno_government_inaction_in_the_face_of_ecoterrorism.html or the website of the Toxic Remnants of War Project. http://www.toxicremnantsofwar.info/ But every single aspect of military spending is ultimately used to destroy. It has no other function.
http://www.un.org/apps/news/story.asp?NewsID=55691#.WETNflyYrIV
Rhinos and elephants are also two of the great mammal species in the extreme danger zone. They could both be extinct in a couple of decades. Image: Mother and baby rhino.
And do you know what drives this destruction of land and water habitats? Your demand for consumer products, all of which are produced by using land and water habitats, and the resources derived from them, often far from where you live. The most basic products, such as food and clothing, are produced on agricultural land, sometimes created by destroying rainforests, or taken from the ocean (where overfishing has savagely depleted global fish stocks). But in using these resources, we have ignored the needs of the land, oceans and the waterways for adequate regenerative inputs and recovery time.
We also participate, almost invariably without question or challenge, in the inequitable distribution of resources that compels some impoverished people to take desperate measures to survive through such means as farming marginal land or killing endangered wildlife.