Australians, like republicans, worship money over life. They now reap what they have sown. If only it were a billion humans that died and 28 animals. That would be real proof of God.
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The real tragedy in Australia was not what happened to the people, but the catastrophe that has destroyed the native wildlife in the billions (a billion being a conservative estimate) - and that is only mammals, birds and reptiles; it ignores insects for example. And it was self-inflicted though Australians will not say that.
Their scientists have been warning for decades that the clearing of millions of acres per year, every year, would push native animal populations to the brink that one disaster could then destroy. And that is exactly what happened for it was the last refuge of much native wildlife - the state forests and national parks - that have been destroyed.
Many species of mammals, birds and reptiles unique to the Earth, already endangered, being pushed to the brink of extinction. And all we hear from Australia is the sorrowful tales of its people and the need for aid for them with the animal destruction a second or third ranking talking point.
How can Australia be allowed to clear land and cause these animal holocausts? Why is the rest of the world not holding Australia's feet to the proverbial fire as it is those of Brazil for its wanton destruction of the Amazon? Why is it only the developing world that is held to account and the so-called developed world is not?
That is the real story here that the NYT should be running with. How Australia's ignorant land clearing policies led to this extinction crisis. And what the world will now do about it.
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You might have also noted that the picture of our "soldiers driving through Mallacoota" is that they are driving military armoured vehicles.
Our soldiers have also been evacuating the locals in those ARMOURED vehicles, because of the clear dangers of burnt trees dropping across that sole road.
Which is one of the main reasons for the difficulties of getting in and out of Mallacoota.
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So sad to see our planet dying. We think of Australians as such grounded people, so attached to their surroundings, and happy to share their good nature with a beer and a barbie. Sorry if this is a stereotype, but we are visiting Australia for the first time in February. I read about the destruction and suffering multiple times/day. We will come anyway. Even at its worst, we expect (or hope for) a great if somewhat constrained visit. For what it is worth, we will not rent a car.
It seems that whether it is climate change, loss of habitat, water shortages, or collapse of diverse ecosystems, all are essentially inevitable with human population increases. We can become more efficient as societies in terms of resources and footprint, but then the population will grow until the planet groans again. All of our evolutionary forces are working against us: drive to procreate, will to survive and compete with other tribes and species and a spirit of adventurism. And in the other corner, weighing in at 98 pounds, we have selflessness, and enlightened thinking. Hug your kids often, keep a nice bottle of wine handy at all times, and live for the present. I so wish I could envision another outcome.
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@Sweet Unfortunately you are misguided at best and wrong at worst.
What you are seeing is an American lickspittle people with no thought for the consequences of their actions. What you are seeing is a people who are the second per head carbon emitters in the world who refuse to change their ways. What you see is a culture that ignores Aboriginal culture, and the Aborigine genocide, and pretends it never happened. What you are seeing is a country living a lifestyle it cannot afford and trying to use tourism to support its addiction to "stuff".
In short, what you are seeing is what stares back at you from your mirror as an American. Because you and most Americans are all of those things as well.
European Australians are not a good people no matter how much they try to tell you otherwise with their slick marketing and furry animals - many of which just burned to death as many Australians could not care less about climate change and the clear impact on their country over the last decade at least.
What you also see is a completely unsustainable lifestyle. Please focus on all the things that are wrong with Australia as they are all the things wrong with the Disney Land known as the USA.
For until you change your ways, these events will happen over and over again until there is nothing left to burn.
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Re: '...but then the population will grow until the planet groans again..." {@Sweet}
I pat my vasectomy; (w/o prev. reproduction!!)
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“If we don’t address that,” she said, “that’s the future for us.”
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The future is now, dystopia has arrived.
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So these folks decided to live in a very isolated place but are complaining bc govt can't help them fast enough?
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@James In the Australian context Mallacoota is not an isolated place. Mallacoota is a 6 hour drive from Melbourne and a 7 hour drive from Sydney. My view is that, in Australia, isolated towns don't have sealed road access. The issue is here is they have one road in/out of the town which has been cut off.
I wouldn't characterize these people as complaining.
I can understand the residents feeling abandoned as the politicians and media here have already moved on and talk (or avoid talk of) of climate change and long-term rebuilding - seemingly forgetting there are still people experiencing this crisis (all while fires still burning elsewhere the country)
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My apologies, but the hardships that humans are going through in the wake of Australia's massive fires are not important.
The fires, directly resulting from humanity's environmental destruction, have killed around a billion animals, sending some species to extinction. They've eliminated entire ecosystems, and it's likely that some areas will not recover, particularly since more, larger fires will occur in the coming years.
So when some people don't have electricity, or feel like they're cut off, I just don't care. There are going to be places that people just can't live anymore, and if there are people who refuse to adapt to that necessity, they can die there instead.
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@Dan Stackhouse Glad you got your apology out of the way early, but you know what? I refuse to accept it for such a thoughtless, unthinking comment. Firefighters, mostly volunteers, lost their lives fighting these fires. They died trying to prevent an even greater catastrophe.
But you just don't care?
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"She gave them iPads and earplugs to block out the wail of exploding gas bottles and the roar of the approaching inferno.
'I didn’t want them to see what was to come,' she said."
Talk about symbolism for modern humans in the anthropocene. Earbuds in, eyes on the iPad screen, while the fire rages around you...
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@Coleridge I suppose it's the modern equivalent of singing songs with your kids during the blitz to distract them of the reality around
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Burning fossil fuel to bring fossil fuel to burn to generate electricity to keep the beer cold while cut off by a fire made a firestorm by climate change caused by fossil fuels.
What is wrong with this picture?
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Global warming catastrophe cannot be stopped unless the powers that be change their ways.Any bets on that happening?
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For 27 years, Mallacoota has been our secret piece of paradise. When we built our much-loved holiday home there, people were mystified as to why we would do so in a place they had never heard of. It has a special beauty, a special sense of healing. When we first visited, I was suffering an illness that had sent my immune system into free fall setting off alarm bells in my treating doctors. After spending time there, my health returned - nothing else changed. Now that home is like so many others - a flattened pile of debris under which lies so many memories and irreplaceable treasures - not valuable in a monetary sense but precious nonetheless. We have been unable to get back to see our little home but the grief for its loss is real. We are the lucky ones - so many have lost so much more, so many precious animal lives lost. My only hope is that the healing qualities that helped me are there in abundance for this special place to heal itself from this conflagration that has changed Mallacoota from the place no-one had heard of to the place that everyone has.
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"Most cannot believe their small town has made global headlines, and become a symbol of many Australians’ hopes for a new government policy toward climate change."
Make all the policy you want. It should have been done thirty years ago, unfortunately. The enormity of climate change will make a mockery of any policy that tries to keep the conveniences of the middle-class lifestyle intact.
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It’s a shame we have to take all these blameless other creatures—plants, insects, animals—down with us due to our own greed, hubris and stupidity.
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Rural Australians voted overwhelmingly for Morrison, knowing he viewed climate change as a hoax. That was only 8 months ago.
Frighteningly, human beings seem incapable of calculating the cost of future devastation into their current economic calculations. Were Australia's fossil fuel industry profits since the election greater than the cost of just this year's bush fires? Of course not. But that math seemed to escape an overwhelming number of people while they were in the voting booth.
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@J Anders The Murdoch propaganda network is almost as toxic in rural Australia as it is in the US. And the saddest part is that very few Australians will see any of those fossil fuel profits. Like the bushfire smoke, they will be whisked away offshore to the mainly American multi-nationals that pay almost no tax or royalties.
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Climate Change, Climate Change, Climate Change. It's not just the wildfires, the Barrier Reef is dying in the north, and the Kelp forests are 95% gone in the south. The heating of the central oceans is affecting prevailing winds everywhere--rainfall/storms are becoming more intense and droughts prolonged. Australian scientists have also told us that with heating of the Antarctic, benthic organisms and possibly other organisms in the food chain will become extinct--adjusted to cold with nowhere to go, the possibility of a whole ecosystem vanishing--phytoplankton, fish, birds, whales. And with fishing for krill adding to this.
Then there is sea level rise from the melting of the ice cap, with an unknown time--which could be imminent--for the West Antarctic Ice Sheet to break off. All of this needs to be put on the daily weather forecast. It's now happening all the time and people need to know about it--an informed citizenry.
It will take action at the government level and international treaties to take responsible and realistic action to reverse man-made climate change from burning fossil fuels and cutting down forests.
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