If You Can't See It, It Doesn't Exist

There is an online news agency called Vice that I have new found respect for. I’ve heard of it before, even watched a few of their bulletins, but the name put me off. 

Now let’s get things straight, I watch the news, I live and work on the internet, get immediate SMS to my phone in time of war or terror, and I even get a newspaper delivered to my door every day. 

The clip below is something that I feel is very important. It’s not new, it’s not sexy, and in fact it’s downright "un-sexy". It is something that is important to our lives, and will affect us, maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow, but it will somehow have an impact on each of our lives.

Let’s stay informed:

As the Captain says so poignantly in part 2, below, "there is no answer book – we’re writing the answers".

The saddest part? This was made in 2012 and its only getting airtime, in my head at least, now.

kthanxbai!
 Jumblerant

The Ocean is Broken

I learnt about acid rain and the hole in the ozone layer in school back in London in the 1990's. Since then we have had genetically modified grain, BSE (bovine spongiform encephalopathy), Avian Flu and of course, Justin Bieber.

Now we have something even more serious that we just don't know about.

As a yachtsman explained after crossing yet another ocean: 

Exactly 10 years before, when Newcastle yachtsman Ivan Macfadyen had sailed exactly the same course from Melbourne to Osaka, all he'd had to do to catch a fish from the ocean between Brisbane and Japan was throw out a baited line.

"There was not one of the 28 days on that portion of the trip when we didn't catch a good-sized fish to cook up and eat with some rice," Macfadyen recalled.

But this time, on that whole long leg of sea journey, the total catch was two.No fish. No birds. Hardly a sign of life at all.

So where did the fish go? As the article goes on to say, a mixture of pollution, over-fishing and even more pollution. We're not talking about beer can plastic getting stuck around the necks of penguins or big fish getting caught in illegal nets, this is much worse, this appears to be the systematic rape of the oceans. And no-one seems to be doing anything about it.

Read more about it at the article The Ocean is Broken.

How the hell are we going to fix this one?

kthanxbai!

Jumblerant

Related articles

• The ocean is broken
• The Ocean is Broken (18 October 2013) a Fukushima reality
• We Broke It
• Briton relaxes after grueling solo ocean trek
• Sailor Recounts Experience of "Dead Ocean" in Fukushima Region