crushed life crumbling planet

7/27/2019 Crushed Life Crumbling Planet

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This book is dedicated to

all my

fellow inhabitants...

(self obsessed humans not included)


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A MESSAGE FROM THE AUTHOR

I am wring this book to share my anger and thoughts on the sad state

of the planet and our miserable lives , where we are forced to chase

money all through our lives. I love the natural world and I feel more at

home in the middle of a forest than at my actual home. The more I ob-

serve nature , the more it is apparent that nature has already providedus everything in a silver plate. But through greed we have spoiled a par-

adise and the thing , that is so sad is that we do not even realize that we

have done this ! I just wanted to make the reader atleast aware of the fact

that, we are destroying the planet and our personal lives along with it.

I have taken the best of eorts to put my ideas in a way that most peo-

ple can understand it but like all humans I have my own limitaons. Mysituaon is like this : I am on top of a watch tower in a beach and I see a

tsunami coming. I cannot shout at everyone as nobody will hear me. So I

decide to write in a big white cloth that tsunami is coming and wave it at

everyone. If I were to make a spelling mistake in the word tsunami does

it maer ? If I make a grammar mistake does it maer ? what dierence

does it make if I write " tsunami is coming !" or coming is tsunamy ! "

I might have made silly mistakes everywhere in this book but I say this for

all the people who concentrate on rules rather than the content - " I am not

wring an English essay and English is not my mother tongue. I am not pro-

fessionally trained and I am not doing this for money. I do not have a team

to check this like a news paper because I do not have money. If you are sll

interested in grammar then read the mass media stories about what dress

an actress is wearing for dinner !"

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PREFACE

The idea to share my thoughts came to me as I met more and

more people whose lifestyles indicate that they may have a spare

planet in their pockets. It is almost as if they know for a fact that,

when the last drop of water in this planet is used, they can

simply get a connecon from another planet to connue the owin their taps. The sad reality is that, with the current lifestyles

and increasing populaon, we will soon reach a stage when our

planet is no longer enough for us.

From a planet which provided everything in abundance, we are

now reduced to looking at the planet as if nothing is enough. We

complain that the rivers are running dry , ignoring the fact that ,we are the ones sucking it dry.

We now live a life which is so disconnected from nature , that ,

we no longer feel the need for it. The social, economic and belief

systems we follow , are all acng in unison to tear the planet to

shreds.

We are happy to ignore the reality of the current situaonbecause we are told we are gaining so much by the modern way

of living. I strongly disagree that modern living has given us a

beer life because what we have is only an illusion of beer life ,

which was forced on us , by shiing our priories. Through the

mass media the ruling class has convinced the people to change

their values to consumerism driven happiness in order to suit

their own exploitave mindsets. We have become so corruptedthat we rather worry about what mobile we have , than , what

food we eat. We now have a situaon where the average person has to

work more than ever, just to keep up with the changing lifestyles. We have

made stress and anxiety a regular part of life. We are even willing to accept

all these changes as part of life without even quesoning it.

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I want to show you that this so called modern way of living has

killed the planet and our personal life with it. We are gaining

nothing from this mindless destrucon and the only people whoare gaining from this are the rich and powerful elite , whom we

will never see. If we are not gaining and the planet is dying then

why is that we are following the current system? Is the queson

I want you to ask at the end of the book.

Through this book I want to show how we are already paying a

high price for the destrucon of the planet and how our personal

lives are geng miserable day the day without us even nocing

it. My objecve is to apply some basic logic to the informaon

that is already available to all of us. I am not digging up some

underground informaon or secrets.

All I am going to do is , just aach the strings that are dancingright in-front of our very own eyes, which we are happy to

ignore. This book is just a representaon of facts that are in plain

sight which we wish to ignore and common sense which we are

happy not to apply.

The book consists of two parts. The rst part relates to how the

planet is dying and how our personal lives are not improving. I

have tried to show the fact that we have been given an illusion of

good life by even ignoring some of our basic needs. Also in

the same part , I have aempted to show you that the world

is already perfect for us. In the second part , I have tried to

analyze the important queson - why we created the mess on

the planet and why our current acons and aempts to recfy the

mess will not work . Finally I will list some of the bier pills that

we have to swallow to return the planet to its former glory.

This is a book about how your life became miserable , without

you even knowing it and how the planet became miserable in

front of our eyes , without us even nocing it.

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This book would appeal to those people who sll have love for

the natural world and are trying to nd what went wrong. On the

other hand the book would be like uer stupidity for those whobelieve we are headed towards new heights of human

civilizaon. I have taken the side of the natural world and

provided my views and if it looks like stupidity for the majority ,

then I am happy about it!

! ! ! ! ! ! !

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Contents

-----------------------------

Introducon

The Real Scenario...

Degrading Personal Life

The Failing Life Support System

A Lost Paradise !

Why Are We Doing This ?

Handling The Problem Like a Kid !

The Technology Trap

What We Actually Should Do...

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IntroduconThe eye of knowledge does not open in a blink...

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All animals in the world act the way they do, based on their insncts

and on the informaon available to them in order to full their needs.

A ger pursues a deer based on smell to feed itself; an eagle swoops

down to catch a rabbit based on its sight to sasfy its hunger. Similar-

ly, we behave and make decisions based on the informaon that is fedinto us and with our insncts and we try to achieve our goals of living a

comfortable life. Hence, when we are told right from our birth that hu-

man beings are superior and the natural world is there for us to ex-

ploit to be prosperous , then our acons will only reect those inputs.

We live on this planet as though we are the only form of life that

has the right to live and all other life forms exist only to serve us.

With such a superiority complex, we hardly ever cricize ourselves for our

acons. We boast of all the wonders we have achieved, while selecve-

ly leaving out the blunders. We have degraded anything which does not

t into our way of life, to an inferior state and try to exterminate them.

If we are so intellectually brilliant then why is the planet is in its cur-

rent status right now? You may ask what is wrong with the world right

now. If you are a person who sits in front of TV every day and watchescricket or movies then that is the picture that you will get but if you are

a person who wants some reality, please connue reading. By the way,

if you dene life by the size of the TV you own or the brand of the car

you drive then you may not understand what I am trying to convey.

Let us start with a small backdrop. The human race over the last

few centuries has grown in power with respect to the ease withwhich we destroy the planet and also ourselves. The planet is under the

control of the human race primarily because of our intelligence, but in-

telligence with some major aws. If not for the aws, how can we jus-

fy our acons in managing the planet? We are destroying the life

support of the planet in the name of personal beliefs, with the use of

science and for the sake of money. The reality is that most of our ac-

ons with respect to the planet show only stupidity and not intelli-

gence and that has a lot has to do with the way we perceive the world.

First, a very simple queson from school. What are the essenals of life?

Obviously, we have learnt the answer in school. If you ask this queson to

a child the answer would be air, water and food and he will get full marks

Crushed Life Crumbling Planet Introducon

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in school. However, if you ask an adult the same thing, the answer would

be dierent. There are N numbers of variaons in the answer you will

receive. Some of the essenals I have heard include job, car, house, mo-

bile, laptop etc., the list goes on forever. Only if you rephrase the queson

as What are the essenals to survive, will you will get the answer as air,water and food. Even in these cases there will be people who say internet!

What has changed in grownups is our percepon of the world. Through

our educaon system, religious system, polical system and mass me-

dia we are connuously fed propaganda that human beings are supe-

rior and the so called modern living is the best way to live. With this

connuous propaganda , we have acquired the impression that human-ity as a whole has conquered survival and hence we can concentrate

on luxuries. However, reality does not change. You cannot put luxu-

ry in front of survival. In the last century, it seems that luxury has come

in front of survival. We have destroyed the forests which gives us air

to breathe for the sake of furniture and paper, we have polluted drink-

ing water for the sake of factories and we have sprayed our food with

poison for the sake of prot. In short, we are destroying our ba-

sic survival mechanism for the sake of short term luxuries.

This act of pung short term luxuries in the forefront is the act of only

an intoxicated person but nonetheless that is what we are doing now.

We resort to this kind of madness because majority of humans nd it

dicult to understand the larger picture of what is happening to the

planet. We all are so much immersed in the day to day acvies and

the reality is that the majority nd it a struggle to earn a living itself.

Ask yourself even aer 100 years of technology, half of the

world is struggling to live then what is the use of all the fan-

cy technologies and what pathec managers we are?

Adding to the inherent handicap of humans not understanding the

larger picture, we are also given the added pain of being overloaded

with irrelevant, fule nonsense by the mass media. In the sea of irrele-vant nonsense, we are hardly able to pick the essenal issues that need

our aenon from what is immaterial to us. Our day to day rush along

with mass media has reduced us to obedient slaves of the system and

hence we faithfully follow the economic agenda of the modern world.


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If only we take a moment o from the mainstream and have a birds eye

view, we can understand to what extent we have gone wrong. We are so

used to the mass media breathing down our necks about the wonders of

technology and the bright aspects of the modern way of living, that we havestarted believing it without quesoning it. So, rather than the so called pos-

ive aspects I want to point out what we have done on the negave side.

Here are some of our achievements which we are happy to ignore

Most of the world forests are destroyed.

Created landlls all over the world.

Polluted rivers to the extent that we cannot drink water directly.

Created a situaon where people have to wear masks to avoid air polluon.

Made cancer, asthma and diabetes common diseases.

Created global warming.

Created dead zones in oceans.

Started a mass exncon event with no clue even now, as to how many

species are already exnct.

Made spraying food with poisonous chemicals a normal acvity. Created a new kind of self replicang polluon called as gene polluon

Filled the world with plasc garbage.

Lost most of the top soil which is essenal for agriculture.

Wiped out nearly all of marine life in the name of commercial shing

Depleted most of the groundwater resources.

Glaciers which sustain the major rivers are disappearing.

Made allergies a common aspect of life. Created acid rains.

Created a hole in the ozone layer.

Most of the icecaps of Arcc gone.

The above are just the major achievements and there are huge number of

other achievements. I selected the above because of one common thing; all

these negave eects aect our daily living. From the water we drink, to theair we breathe and the food we eat - all are aected and yet we connue in the

same path. My point is what kind of intelligence has made us compromise on

the basic life giving stu and pursue materialisc madness?


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We have reached a stage where a person is intelligent enough to design a micro

chip but stupid enough to dump garbage in rivers which give us drinking water.

It is a fact that we, through the power of science , have become thedominant force on this planet but the way we are managing the

planet is nothing short of cruelty. Like a mad man we are squeez-

ing the nal drop of blood from the planet and sll not leng go.

We live on the planet in a way that suggests that we will va-

cate and go to another planet , if this becomes inhospi-

table. Get back to reality. We do not have me to spare!

I was once told that the negave eects of modern civilizaon are mere

side eects that we have to bear , because , technology and modern

living has given us such a good life. First and foremost we have to be

clear that there is nothing known as side eect. We have only eects!

The phrase side eect gives us the impression that these are miniscule

in nature. They are NOT! Secondly compromising health for the sake of

technology is the acon of a maniac not that of a person with a soundmind. You cannot enjoy the features of a mobile if you are in pain from

a broken leg. It is that simple, health and survival comes rst at all mes.

I am oen told that science and technology are the soluons for all the

modern day Side eects and I will try to explain how Science in its pres-

ent level, is just giving us a peek and not the complete picture. This paral

knowledge that we use for the sake of manipulaon of the planets lifesupport system is uer nonsense on our part and will result in a death

sentence in the long run. Science and technology are now mere-

ly tools in the hands of people who created the mess in the rst place.

We live in a fragile world and the ecosystem which supports us does not run

on nuts and bolts rather it is run by living organisms. Our mistake in treat-

ing these fellow inhabitants like machine parts will not go unpunished. In

fact we are already feeling the pain. Yet like lile kids we ignore the prob-lems and carry on with our day to day lives. I will give you some instanc-

es as to how our lives are already aected so much by this development

and mad rush and how we behave like drug addicts for economic growth.


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ter being controlled by human beings for a few centuries, we dont

even have clean drinking water. Hence the proof lies with peo-

ple who speak in favour of modern living and not on nature lovers.

This book is just my humble eort in trying to share my understand-ing about the destrucve way in which the world operates with the

readers. I can provide proof for every single aspect of this book by the

so called scienc studies but I dont believe in that either. I will ex-

plain the reason later in the book. Sll if you like parcular about

numbers, I would advise you to read a Government report like the

FSI report which will tell you that more than 20% of India is forests

and thus you can live in fantasy land , believing what you want to believe !

However, If you want reality then have an open mind.

! ! ! ! ! ! !


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T he real scenar ioThe love for illusions....

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While the main stream media boasts about the wonders of mod-

ern civilizaon, I rmly believe that we are on the opposite end of the

spectrum. Both from the sides of the planet as well as from our own

lives, we are gaining so lile from so called progress. Our lives are slow-

ly becoming miserable and so is the state of the planet. I want to startwith this because we should be clear that we are gaining lile or noth-

ing and in some cases even losing the luxuries we once had. All this is

in the name of economic progress! I would like you to start queson-

ing along the lines If we are gaining nothing then why are we indulg-

ing in exploitaon of the planet? Is there a beer way of living? This

enre secon is aimed to let you know that , unlike the common belief

that we are living a beer life, we are just doing the opposite. I have myreasons for thinking this way and let me share some of those with you.

There were two adversement campaigns in the last decade concerning

how India is poised to take on the world and become an economic su -

per power. One is the India shining campaign run by the Government

and the other was run by Times of India known as Year of India. Both

showcased how India was progressing and how India is set to become a

developed naon. I am quong a secon from Year of India campaign.

For more than half a century, our naon has sprung, stum-

bled, run, fallen, rolled over, got up, dusted herself and cantered,

somemes lurched on. But today as we begin our 60th year as

a free naon, the ride has brought us to the edge of mes great

precipice. And one India a ny lile voice at the back of the

head is looking down at the boom of the ravine and hesitang.The other India is looking up at the sky and saying, its me to y

The above message was aired in television repeatedly and an actor en-

gaged to recite these lines. As far as the earlier campaign India shining

is concerned, it is reported that more than 500 crores was spent on it and

we were saturated with that campaign during the 2004 general elecons.

Both these campaigns used money and fame to deliver their message and

were designed to show that we have achieved so much and there is moreto achieve and we are on the verge of something great! Adding to that, in

the year of India campaign, the actor was made to walk on a bridge under

construcon in Mumbai symbolically showing progress means construct-

Crushed Life Crumbling Planet The real scenario

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ing buildings etc.

What have we achieved? During independence we had a populaon of 35

crores and now we have populaon of 124 crores. During 1950s the number

of people below the poverty line was around 20 crores and now the num-ber of people below poverty is 40 crores. Again, what have we achieved?

We have made more people face misery. We can always say that, in terms

of percentage we have improved, but, the fact remains that we have more

poor now than during Independence. In fact our share of poor people in the

world has increased from around 20% in the 1980s to around 33 % now.

We have more poor people than the enre sub Saharan Africa combined.If we were to take an income of less than Rs.100 a day per person then

the percentage of Indian poor goes to 2/3rd of Indian populaon. We

also select a few parameters regarding food and adjust it for inaon

and then boast that, poverty in India is reducing. Now, is it not simple

raonale to take care of the ones who are already there? Instead of taking care

of the exisng populaon, we mulplied in numbers. Since we have mulplied

a lot, just by mere numbers we are bound to have more people out of poverty

but we showcase it as development. Is it not a basic fact of a failed system?

Further, the mass media shows us only the shopping malls , new roads,

cars etc. and focuses only on the urban middle class working in the so-

ware industry as the new face of India. The number of people work-

ing in soware just forms a miniscule percentage of the total pop-

ulaon of India , but they are showcased as the image of India. The

reality is that , we have thousands of suicides in India because of poverty.

I am highlighng the above example because it just shows that even

if we fail miserably , we can sll showcase the same as success.

Similarly the planet is dying but the very same scenario is presented as

progress to us.

We have created a situaon where parents dont have me to spend withtheir kids because of work and yet the same is presented as progress to us.


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All you need to achieve this trickery is to convince the public using selec-

ve informaon and thus forming an alternate version of reality. Majority

of us believe that we are progressing in life even though reality may be

otherwise. We are given an image that everything is normal and the best

is yet to come. We have plundered the natural world for the last 60 years,driven animals towards exncon, polluted the water we drink, polluted

the air we breathe, poisoned the food we eat, drained the rivers and wells dry,

destroyed forests and created garbage heaps everywhere and yet we say, we

are progressing. We have created an economic and social system where every-

body has to chase money for their enre lives and yet we see this as progress.

We are not beneng and at the same me the planet is dying is the actual realityof today. The only people who benet are the super- rich whom we will never

see. If the average person , who is the majority is not beneng, then why are

we following or even allowing the current system of exploitaon to connue?

For all those who dont understand exploitaon, here is how I phrase it:

taking away something which is common to all with absolute disregard

for the lives of the inhabitants. For example, we drain a lake dry for our

drinking water with absolute disregard for the lives of the aquac lifethat lives there. Literally we will wipe out an enre ecosystem containing

thousands of sh, just so that we have buckets of water. I am not saying

taking water from a lake is wrong, I am only saying taking everything is

wrong. Taking some water is sharing. Draining the lake dry is exploitaon.

We have been indulging in such exploitaon for every aspect of our

lives. Exploitaon and destrucon has been the hallmark of our way oflife and the evidence is everywhere from the landlls to clear cut forests.

Having engaged in destrucon, we sll see ourselves as pro-

gressing because we have cars, roads, fast food, mobiles etc.,

This is simply because we do not queson the parameters that dene

progress. Since we are TV addicts, the mass media uses TV to provide us

parameters of a beer life through adversements and thus strength-

ens the idea that everything is ne and that having cars and mobilesmeans progress. We are shown images of tall rises, mul-lane high-

ways while carefully ignoring the garbage dumps and clear cut forests.


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We are made to live in an alternate world , where we view every act of de-

strucon around us as progress . When we see a lake geng lled up for the

sake of bus stand, we see that as development rather than destrucon. If we

are intelligent beings, cant we understand lakes are a vital link in rechargingground water? We know this but sll our mind is so blurred by our insaable

need for economic growth that we see a death of a lake as progress. We de-

mand for huge highways which cut through thousands of trees just because

we want to drive a lile bit faster because going faster means progress.

In simple terms, the fundamental problem is this:

The world can fall apart around you but you will not noce

it unl the last moment because you believe it is developing.

Let me give you an example of such a scenario with water. The

world is running out of drinking water but we do not even noce it.

Through our social and economic systems we have created a situa-on where we get water through boles or through the tap, as long

as we are ready to pay money. If only we were drawing water direct-

ly from wells, we would have noced that wells were running dry.

We live in this alternate reality where we believe , as long as we pay money,

we will get everything. In cases where we have seen our wells run dry, we

resort to technology and drill bore wells and now that bore wells are run-

ning dry, what are we going to do next? Drink something else? Even though

we can see this happening all around us, sll the alarm bells are not ringing

because we are given a picture that we can desalinate sea water for all or

simply we can buy our way out it.

Understand the basics of our economic system: If water can be desalinat-

ed, then it makes it costlier and thus you have to work more to earn that

extra money. Price increases can only be oset by more income whichmeans extra work. What is the point in depleng the water resourc-

es and working more? Is it not wise to manage the exisng water pru-

dently and maintain it as plenful as nature gave it to us? Scarcity and

depleon of resources are hidden behind a concept known as price in-


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Price increases of basic commodities are the 1st

indication of a stressed planet.

We have so much over populated ourselves that we

have made essential things like water a scarcity.

Remember that water on the planet is constant . It is

us who increased in numbers. If you have one pot of

water and 1 person asking for it, then price is low

but on the other hand if you have 100 people

fighting for the pot of water , you are bound to see

increased prices. his is what is happening in the

macro scale.

!ince everybody right now has the power to pay for

water , we do not mind such the thing happening."ut what we are forgetting is that we are slowly

making all the things like water costly and thus

indirectly putting us to more work than before.

Water has changed from free to money because of

the increased stress on limited resources.

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crease. Since for price increase there can be several other factors apart

from depleon , we will not queson why the price is increasing. If the

price increases we resort to the simple soluon - earn more money!

Just in case if you think that we can desalinate the enre ocean, think

again. The desalinaon process involves energy and other chemicals which

are not innite and thus will limit the amount of water we can desalinate.

It is now normal to perceive depleon and destrucon of the nat-

ural world which gives us water, air and food as development. We

have learned to selecvely ignore the problems which are caused

by economic progress because mass media and our belief systems

have trained us to be so. If we can convince ourselves that destruc-

on is development then why would we bother to change anything

today? We think that we are already on the right path. My aim is

to tell you that destrucon means destrucon and there is no alternate

view on that.

If you want some hard core realies to convince you that cur-rent reality is not progress but destrucon, here they are. Let

us see what we have achieved in the name of development.

Forests have become a rarity:

The Government will publish a gure that 20 % of India is a forest but

they will not highlight the fact that 40% is open degraded forest andthat only 5% of it is actually the most diverse, dense forest that we

can imagine. When you consider that forests give us air to breathe

and reduce carbon in the atmosphere, what have we achieved here?

Water has become poisonous:

Almost every river in India is polluted to the core. Yamuna has a BOD level

that is nearly a 100 mes pure water level. What is the point of giving num-

bers here? We all know this as it is a sight we all have seen. Sewage lled

rivers are a common sight across India. We are now forced to drink water

only aer it comes through some treatment plant. Is this an achievement?


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Air is un-breathable:

Television channels now broadcast polluon levels along with the weather

as though it is a normal part of life. The television channels show only a

couple of pollutants but do we even know how many pollutants exist in

the air we breathe? Do we know that automobile exhaust contains sub-

stances which cause cancer? Even if we know, do we have a choice of not

standing in trac and inhaling the other vehicle exhaust? We have made

asthma and cancer common diseases. Is this not a great achievement?

Foods are poison:

We use all kinds of pescides and inseccides for growing our food that

we dont have a clue what there is on our plates. Are we 100 % con-

vinced that just by washing the food, you can remove these? Do we

even know that food absorbs these contaminants? Fishes living in pol-

luted water contain the pollutants in their body as well. What happens

to all the sh in the oceans and rivers, when we know we are dumping

everything there? Remember having pollutants in their body means theyare aected and do not necessarily die. Do we know how to tell the dif-

ference between sh with contaminants and one without? If we have

reached a level when food which was a medicine has become a poi-

son, shouldnt we ask ourselves once more what have we achieved?

Vanishing drinking water:

All the major cies are water stressed and in the rural ar-

eas the situaon is only slightly beer. With a growing popula-

on and increased consumpon of water because of lifestyle

changes, do we know where we get the extra water from? Just because

we mulplied in numbers does it mean it will rain more to give us clean

water? Do you know that the glaciers that sustain the northern rivers are

vanishing ? We all know that, we no longer get water in shallow wells rath-

er we have reached a situaon where even 200 bore wells dont fetch uswater. Have we heard about the term Aquifer No.. We only know Aquaf-

ina . Again... what have we achieved here?

Garbage dumps:


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Right across India we can see one familiar sight...garbage...This should

be one naonal symbol which unites us all. Regardless of where you

go, even inside the forests you can nd piles of garbage. Is this

the way the world should look? Are we not entled to a beau-

ful world just like nature gave it to us? With this garbage leak-

ing contaminants in our soil, we are losing the viability of the soil

that gives us food. One more achievement for us to boast about.

Degradaon of farm lands:

Huge tracts of farmlands in India have been degraded to the point where

agriculture is no longer viable. If we keep losing farm lands then where arewe planning to produce food? In our balconies? With ower pots? Is this

not a crowning achievement when we consider that we are an agricultural

country?

I have listed the above because they directly concern the air, water and soil

which are our life support. Some of us already know the above and some do

not. While the ignorant ones are the majority, others who know about the de-strucon accept the plunder, as they believe when you develop to something

beer certain sacrices should be made. Thus, in both ways we do nothing

to stop this destrucon. Even though we are already facing the pain caused

by our acons, we sll connue with our lives as if nothing has happened.


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We are already paying for our mistakes :

I want to highlight this because I would like you to understand the seri-

ousness of the problem and its urgency because it is already alteringthe way we live. In most cases the eect is not direct and hence we can -

not see the link , but , if we look a lile closer we can see that we are

already bleeding. We, as human beings, have a major problem in iden-

fying the interlinks in our life and hence cannot see the connecons

between a clear cut forest and our day to day lives. We need something

drasc to happen to make us understand, what we have done is wrong.

For example, we construct roads on hill sides cung down forests andwhen there is landslide, we blame the heavy rain. We simply cannot under-

stand the fact that forests are the ones holding the hillside together and

when we cut them we have already xed the scenario for the land slide.

In our personal lives, we are living through a system where kids of

subsequent generaon are progressively put through more and

more pressure regarding their schools than ever before. If mod-ern life is simplifying everything, then why is that, we are in a situa-

on where we cannot even aord our children having a play me?

Through mass media and our own imaginary stories , we always imag-

ine the destrucon of the planet as a dramac one, where some

comet hits us, or a huge wave washes over the land etc., but the re-

ality is dierent. In the real world, destrucon happens slowly.

There might be a scenario where the death of an ecosystem is swi but even

that occurs only over a period of me. The problem is we cannot understand

anything unless it is dramac. In other words, we need all the rivers in the

world to dry up suddenly tomorrow and only then we will turn our heads

and see what is going wrong. If the same rivers go dry over a period of 50

years we will not even noce it and even if we noce it we will blame na-

ture .

So, even though destrucon happens all around us, we will ignore its ef-

fects altogether because we simply cannot idenfy it or see a trend.

Even if we see a trend and a looming problem, we think we have


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the technology to solve it, but we fail to noce that technolo-

gies are in the hands of Companies which use them to make prots.

We also fail to understand that most of the technologies we invent are nowa necessity only because they are needed to oset the problems caused by

our own acons. Why do we need water puricaon technology , when na-

ture gives us the purest form of water. We need it only because we polluted it .

In other words, much of our technology is not necessary because there

was no need for them in the rst place. We also fail to noce the most

important part about technology the money factor. Technology in the

modern world like anything else is equated to money and thus it onlymakes you more dependent on the job you have in order to aord this.

What we have right now is a situaon where we have technology which

demands money in the place of nature , which originally gave it free.

A classic case would be the need for air condioning. We have

made the cies unbearably hot by cung down trees and lling

the place with concrete, smoking hot automobiles and tar lled

roads. The high rise buildings obstruct the ow of wind and thus,

the wind cannot cool down the place. Furthermore, we as intelli-

gent beings design structures like glass boxes which have no ven-

laon. Hence, more heang as the building acts like a green house.

Aer all these wonderful acons, we are le to bear the heat andwe resort to air condioning to solve the problem of excess heat.

What is air condioning? It cools the air, removes pollutants etc., etc. Let us

apply some logic here. The AC takes the heat from the inside of the room to

outside. This means it is radiang heat to the outside air. This means that air

outside is heated and hence the surrounding temperature is increased. So,

when you set the temperature to 20 degrees when the outside temperatureis 40 degrees, the AC takes 20 degrees worth of heat energy and dumps it out-

side. For example, If the outside temperature increases to 42 because of this

heat, then, the AC has to work harder to remove 22 degrees worth of heat.

This is a posive loop which sucks out and wastes the elec-


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The way humans manage water :

Now since we are all part of the system and because we are stuck inthe day to day chores of life , we hardly get any time to notice this

transition. This is the reality now where we are forced to turn to thesea for our water. So at the end of all this , we have achieved twothings water scarcity and conversion of water to a commodity andnothing more.

We multiply in numbers and industrialize everything and create morewater demand. We then drain all rivers , lakes, wells etc for this extrademand. When the water becomes scarce, we start put tingmonetary value to water and start collecting money for usage. Onceequated to money , water is no longer a right for allpeople rather , now people who have more money have more rightsto use or in other terms buy it. This means people who have moneycan use it, without thinking about scarcity. Finally we reach astage where everyone demands for water with money and

then we decide that the rivers and lakes are inadequate or in otherterms nature has not given enough for us. We decide it is upto us to come up with solutions and we invent desalination ofsea water. With industrial production we make water even morecostly and we now create pollution, just for producing water itself.

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trical energy and in the process heats the outside air as well.

In major cies with huge skyscrapers, parcularly the ones we are so proud of,

the building are designed like green houses and hence tremendous amount

of energy is required to cool them down. In the real world, energy meansexpense and thus ulmately we all are paying for this stupid extravagance.

In simple terms, if everybody in a city uses AC then even the ones with-

out an Air Condioner have to buy it because of all the excess heat

radiated from other ACs. Add the automobiles which are moving

radiators of heat to the citys heang problem, then we can get an idea

why it is so hot. While western countries can get away from this scenar-

io to a certain extent because they have cooler climates, we at the trop-

ics are paying the price for following a copy cat approach to construcng

buildings.. When we consider that an AC costs a month salary for most

people and it takes a substanal amount as running costs, is this really a

way forward? Aer doing all this we blame the hot sun for the problem!

Now is this really a good and an ecient system? Dont we have the brains

to nd much beer soluons than this? If we all follow such a system ,then are we really intelligent?

On the other hand, have you ever been to the shore of a river and sat under

a shady tree on a hot summer day? You will not even noce that it is sum-

mer! We have foregone the free cool breeze from the trees and taken the

sides of the air condioner which cools us down but makes us work harder

in order to aord it. Is this not a classic case of modern human living?!

Let me list down few more instances where our pockets are geng empty.

We have moved from a stage where it was safe to drink river

and ground water to a stage where we could die just by consum-

ing water. Hence we are now paying money to buy boled water.

Cancer is a common disease now and increases in cancer cas-

es perfectly correlate with industrializaon. Every year mil-

lions die because of cancer and if you are lucky with a treat-


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able cancer, the treatment will then end you up in nancial ruins.

Our uncontrolled populaon increase has led to large number of peo-

ple chasing a nite amount of resources and hence the prices ofall commodies have gone up. This means everybody has to earn

more or in other words work more just to get the basic resources.

When the Government spends money to control polluon , it

means money which could have otherwise been spent on things

like educaon, is put to a less than opmum use. If there were to

be no polluon at all then we can do away with the extra taxes.

We lled up marshes and wetlands with garbage and when it rains

these lands are no longer able to absorb the extra water. This means

ooding and washed away roads. Again money from your pockets!

Plants and trees are super eecve dust removers and air cleansers. By

destroying them we have an overhang of parculate maer and smoke

in the air causing diseases like asthma. Who is paying for the treatment?

Agricultural lands are no longer ferle. The increased use of ferlizers and

pescides increases the cost of producon. Who is paying the higher price?

Apart from these, we need to understand the following connecon be-

tween the natural disasters such as droughts and oods and our lives. When

the Government announces relief funds for these acvies this means that

the Government spends money which it has to subsequently get back. It

does not get it back from the people aected by the oods rather it gets it

back from all the people in the form of new taxes and tax increases. This

is a connecon that we all ignore and hence we all are passively paying

for our mistakes. If you think this is a small amount, go back and do your

own research on how much Government spends to rebuild the enre in-

frastructure aer a ood. Where do you think the money is coming from?

One day or the other the money will be taken from us. Similarly, when

there is a drought crops fail, the prices increase and once again we

are the ones ripped o. When you start nocing that there is correla-

on between global warming and the severity of the droughts and


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oods you will soon noce that we are already paying a high price.

The number of oil reserves that is being found per year is con-

sistently decreasing over the last half century and there will

be a me when it will reach zero. This is just simple logic.

The eects of scarcity is already showing in the prices of petroleum and

this is only the start. Remember, when any depleon happens, the sup-

ply will not stop overnight. It will gradually do so and with our economicsystem it showcases itself as price rises because of scarcity. Since every-

thing in our current system is linked to petroleum, we are faced with a

situaon where everything we consume will increase in prices. Ulmate-

ly this means that whatever money we have now will not be enough to

maintain the same standard of living. Depleon of natural resources will

make you work more and this is a fact which we cannot work around.

I once had an argument with a person who told me that such price in-

creases are a natural part of life because development does have such is-

sues but we can tackle that in future because of advancements in tech-

nology. He also said that economic progress is needed to li everyone out

of poverty and we cannot wait or even go slow on economic progress.

My take away from that argument is that people have the atude that

they can exploit whatever they can, caring lile about what the issues are

that the future generaons are going to face. The interesng thing about

this argument is that future generaons means their own kids and grand-

kids. I should say that it is a very admirable habit of exploitave humans ,

because , without bias humans are ready to exploit their own kids as well.

It also fails to address one thing about their previous generaon. Hisprevious generaon would have thought , that this person in his cur-

rent me would have started to recfy these problems but is that hap-

pening? It will not because always there will be tendency to skip the

task since it is tough. This atude that, I will exploit as much as possi-


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ble and somebody in the future will nd a soluon, does not sound

the logical thing to do but none the less that is what we resort to.

It is not only that we want to skip the tough task but we also inherently be-lieve that as generaons go, we are geng to live a beer life. We rmly take

the side of the developmental agenda because we believe we are le with

a beer life even though it is eang the planet. We are able to get new toys

for our kids to see them smile. We are able to have dinner in restaurants.

We have a car. We have laptops. Isnt all this a symbol of beer life? Yes....

I only accept this as some secondary aspects of beer life. I am on the otherhand, only perplexed by the stupidity we show by ignoring the basics of a good

life and treang these things as major goals. Let me explain a lile further...


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I can keep going on giving examples of the ways in which the planet is

aected and how you are aected indirectly but, I know none of this

will make any sense, because, you can sll get water to drink, food to

eat etc., As long as this is available, we will not be bothered about theplanet and this is the hard fact. The reality is that we now have a life

of plenty. We have access to all products and services from all over the

world and we hardly ever face any scarcity of any sort. The markets

are full of produce and all we need is to have money in order to access

them. Who would blame such a system? It is aer all like heaven isnt

it? While we have been able to reach this level of opulence in terms of

products and services , we have failed miserably on the personal front.

The fact is that whatever system we followed which led to this kind of de-

strucon has given an untold amount of pain to our personal lives as well.

We are forced to think that earning money is the only goal in life , be-

cause , once we have money we can have everything in life. Because of

this quest for money we are forced to live stress lled lives and we even

fail to noce it, as everybody else is part of the same mad rush. Since ev-erybody does the same thing, the stress lled lives are now the normal

thing of the society and people are willing to follow the same course.

We are even ready to sacrice our health just to earn money. We

drink and smoke just to relieve the stress because of the jobs we are

forced to take. Further, we ourselves try to jusfy the stress by tell-

ing to ourselves how everything is much easier now than it was100 years ago. We marvel at the social and economic structures

that we have developed and because we believe it has done so much good,

we are ready to ght and die for it. We have destroyed the planet for the

sake of these systems we developed because we rmly believe, without

this life would have been so tough. We give ourselves examples on how we

are making our lives simpler like...internet banking, online bill payments,

credit cards, mobile phones, tablets, Personal Computers. My point is:

If it is true that the modern world has done so much good to us, then it is worth

ghng for but what if the modern living has made life tougher than before?

Then, do we sll ght for the sake of our economy rather than the planet?

Crushed Life Crumbling Planet Degrading personal life

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If I were to say modern living has made life much tougher than before, then

most would call me crazy but I would like to reiterate that modern society

has made life tough. If you were to dene your life by your purchasing

power, then modern living is beer, but if you were to dene your life bythe leisure me then is modern living any good? If you dene the devel-

opment of society by the number of malls we have constructed, then it is

beer, but if you dene the same by the clean air, then which is beer?

Can anyone of us take 6 months o from our modern day roune to pursue

any kind of personal quest? Leave alone 6 months; can you at least take 12

hours sleep? The reality is we cannot! In fact, the reality is, we are so brain-

washed by the system that we feel it is a sin by taking an extended holiday.

Let me clarify this ...

The economic system which exploits the natural world for its growth also

exploits us for its growth.

We are given this illusion of beerment , by changing our denion of

beer living and luxury. For example, Good steaming hot food with ev-erything fresh and cooked every day was normal in the earlier days and it

was one of the most basic indicators of a good family. Today, we have the

opposite. Rather than the good food, we are connuously made to be be-

lieve, through adversements, that junk food is good. We have redened

our ability to pay for this junk food as a beer living standard. In simple

words if you are able to aord a pizza , you are beer o or rather if you

are eang pizza you are beer o. Have a moment to think about this. Is

this not absurd? By the way, if you are eang at KFC try to nd out when

that chicken was actually killed!

Frankly, for many of us today we are so red aer work that , we

are not even able to cook our own food. We order some junk or

go to a restaurant and convince ourselves that we are having good

food. If you are made to work so hard, then is it not exploitaon?

We are now faced with 12 hour workdays with a few occasional holi-

days. The economic system has made it a mistake for you to ask for a

leave to even take care of yourselves. We can no longer spend me to

take care of our own kids and we leave them to a preschool. We cannot


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take a month o to spend me with our aging parents. We are made to

migrate to dierent places for the sake of work, leaving behind our par-

ents and oen loved ones. We skip breakfast, rush to oce in heavy traf-

c, work late, work at home, work in holidays etc., just so that we canearn money. We are all trained right from school days into thinking that

ignoring personal stu and compleng ocial work is the mark of a pro-

fessional. Ask yourself whether you want to be a person or a professional?

We have technology to make our life simple. We can now call and

ask our parents about their health but we do not ask the ques-

on why is that we dont have the freedom of me to take care of

our own parents? . In spite of having technological innovaons on

a daily basis, the amount of me we spend for working has not re-

duced. The nature of work has changed but not the amount of work.

It is me we understand that.

We are constantly kept on our toes at our workplace by a hierarchy of

Managers who are themselves exploited too. We are converted to beg-

gars for the sake of increments. We are made to sacrice our self- re-

spect , for the sake of promoons. Once in a while we are told that our

jobs are at risk just so that we do not demand much. While the Com-

panies we work for make crores of Rupees, we are given meagre hand

outs and bluntly lied that the Company is not doing well. Let us face the

fact, the current system we follow runs not for our sake , but for itself.

We can create another 50 years of economic growth and invent wonderful

technologies but it will not create another 50 minutes of free me for us.

If you think technology will change everything, then think again. Technol-

ogy has always been a tool which has extracted more from this planet andit does the same thing to you as well. When computers came everybody

thought that human beings can sit around because they nish their work

early with just a click of a buon but did that happen? The economic system

we invented will not allow you to be free and hence when the Companies


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In a country with evergrowing population there is

also an e#ual push for automation using technology.

!o even if the economy grows the $ob growth will

not be proportional and hence there will always be a

gap between the number of people and available

$obs.

When more people are there then the available $obs

this would inevitably mean competition, lower

wages , unemployment and thus ultimately stress on

everyone.

"ut instead of solving this fundamental problem weresort to more economic growth and hence more

destruction to the planet. We create pain for

ourselves as well as the planet. Is this the way

forward %

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Parents believe that their $ob is to provide good food

and good #uality education for their kids. hey

sincerely think this is their purpose of life and they

go to great e&tents to achieve this goal. 'ike all

humans these dedicated parents also lack the

foresight or the vision to see the over all picture of

the planet. While they want all that is best for their

kids, they do not reali(e that their kids are forced to

live in a world covered with garbage, filthy rivers,

poisoned food, smoke filled air etc.

he reality is food and education are the easy thingsparents can provide and it seems parents have

started to believe that these are their only

responsibilities.

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saw the free me they either made you do extra work or they red the extra

employees. In both ways, how has advancement in technology helped you?

Further, understand the much deeper problem linked with technology. Whensoware can do what you can, then it means your importance in the work

place is reduced. In other words, with more and more technology, our posi-

on in the Company becomes disposable. Inially, we will be there to over-

see the automaon but eventually when technology reaches a certain level

we will all be like machine operators. Once we reach that level of technology

then the Company no longer needs skilled people and they can hire unskilled

low wage contract people. At this point, what happens to you? With fur-

ther automaon, the Company no longer needs even that unskilled labour.

Reports that once took many people to complete are now done

by the click of the buon. Roads that needed hundreds of peo-

ple to lay are now laid by a few people using machines. All these are

great if you love technology...but from a personal standpoint when

a large secon of people are going hungry because they do not havejobs, does the automaon really help the people or the company ?

This is what is happening all around us and that is the real rea-

son for unemployment and thus the erce compeon in the

job market and low wages. The old companies are reducing sta

and the new companies are hiring less, all because of technology.

In a society where work is equated to livelihood, is this a good trend?

Shouldnt the Companies which are nothing but people exist to serve us

rather than exploit us? Shouldnt technology be concerned with eciency

in ulizing materials which we plunder from the planet rather than humans.

In simple terms, are we machines? Then, why is it that we allow

Companies to use the word eciency and producvity when speaking

about us?

Further, we have been given a situaon where if we are not connuously


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trained , we are a failure in this system. Now we can always rephrase that

learning is good. Knowledge is good . Life is a process of connuous learning

etc. The fact is that we have to understand that in this system , we do not have

a choice of what to learn. The quest for knowledge is now no longer basedon curiosity, it is for survival ! If you dont update yourself, you will be red !

Searching for knowledge for the love of it has now gone. The systems that

we have created has made so many demands that we oen need a Mas-

ters Degree or a Ph.D. for a good job. This means that we are under pres-

sure all the me for me to acquire the skills. In earlier days all we need-

ed was simple maths and language skills to be successful, now nothing is

enough! 20 years of educaon is only enough for us to just get started !

Being forced with this quest for knowledge, we are now forced to train our-

selves around the clock. We simply do not have me for anything. We do

not have me for playing, playing with kids, taking care of our health etc. If

that is not enough we are told that we are not good in me management.

We are told to maintain schedules for our life like some kind of a machine!

Also we have created an educaon system which demands so much mon-ey for educaon that it literally drains whatever we have just to get start-

ed in life. Most oen the students are in debt even before they start a

career and this means their only aim at the me of nishing college will

be to earn money to repay and nothing else. Is this a healthy trend?

What this means is that any stream of educaon which does not pay enough

money to repay the debt will not be pursued by students. In this way , we

have created a system where people cannot even pursue their own interests.

It seems we created a system and authorized it to squeeze us!

This system will rip you, as well as the planet and will stop at nothing.

One way to predict where our lifestyles are headed is by looking into

big cies like Mumbai. People go in crowded trains, live in cramped

places and have no me. With all cies aiming to grow as big as Mum-


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bai, then we can only imagine what kind of lifestyle we are heading for.

Remember, Mumbai also has super rich people whose life is always high

but I only talk for the majority. The mass media might glamorize the

city but the ground reality is that life in Mumbai is what we picture as

hell. The media showcased how Mumbai is strong by going back to nor-

mal even aer bomb blasts. We can also take the same case with a dif-

ferent perspecve - how selsh and money minded people of Mum-

bai should be that they do not even care what happens around them or

how people have no me to even think about their own surroundings?

They say that surviving Mumbai is in itself a challenge. Now, I am asking avery basic queson

Isnt progress dened by making life less hard? What kind of idiots will de-

velop a city which is tough for its people to even survive and call it progress?

From a phrase where surviving nature is hard, we have moved to a lev-

el where surviving in cies is very hard. This is the ground truth. Peo-

ple are struggling to barely seek out a living. Is this going to be the

trend for the future because of this compeve world created by us?

Further, the concept of equal opportunity will not create equality among us. Ac-

tually if we all are given equal opportunies then we will become more unequal !

It is simple mathemacs. In the real world everybody starts at dierent

levels in terms of backgrounds, money, etc. For example , if you give equal

opportunity to 2 persons who invest 2 lakhs and 2 crores and if they both

make 100 % prot , then the prots are 2 lakhs and 2 crores, The net

worth of both the persons are now 4 lakhs and 4 crores. Earlier the dif-

ference in wealth between the two was 1.98 crores now it is 3.96 crores.

Therefore, ask yourself whether equal opportunity system can work? Fur-

ther, in the above scenario the person with 2 crores has more capital to sus-

tain his business than the person with 2 lakhs. Who has the beer chance

of winning ? This is because of the economic system we invented, based on

money, is inherently awed and thus we will never be socially equal. In the


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centuries ago lived happily without any modern technology and if

that was possible, should not we rethink the current way of life?

This is the reality of the day now. The exploitave systems we inventedare sparing nothing and just like the planet we are also part of its menu.

We now have a situaon where both parents have to work in order to

maintain the standard of living and thus we are reduced to a situa-

on where parents cannot tend to their own kids. Parents push theirkids to preschools and jusfy themselves that they have done the right

thing. Parents are so busy that do not have me to play with their chil-

dren and they resort to switching on the Television for their kids stare at!

Women now have three months of maternity leave and they are happy

that they get this! If a mother cannot spend me for breast feeding her

kids, then what kind of beauful society have we created? In olden days,

when women were pregnant they went to their mothers home for restand care and even aer child birth they were taken care by their moth-

ers. Is this not a basic luxury that the earlier system provided for women?

Compare that with the work pressure, the so called modern wom-

en face right unl child birth. Isnt pregnancy a me to be happy

rather than worry about some stupid oce report or soware bug?

We talk about women rights but we slowly made the women, work-

ing slaves who are unable to even spend me playing with their kids.

Of course, they now have nancial independence and I am not say-

ing that she shouldnt have that. I am only asking at what expense?

Destrucon of the basic family structure? I am not against women

earning their own money; I am only against a situaon where the in-

come of two people is needed to run a family. According to me ei-

ther spouse should work and the other should spend me with kids.

Taking care of the kids is one of the prime family values that goes


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)verybody believes that the modern living has given

them lu&uries such as car , mobiles, laptops etc.

With so much lu&uries showered upon them

e&ploitation of the planet seems to be $ustified. "ut

are these really lu&uries% 'u&uries are supposed to

the one*s where we have a choice of using them or

not. !ince we can no longer live a normal life

without mobiles, is mobile still a lu&ury. +an you

have a $ob without a mobile % If you cannot then

mobile has become a essential item and thus no

longer a lu&ury.

ur modern system is making more and more itemsessential to our life in the disguise of lu&ury. nce

these have entered into our lives as essentials , we

are then invariably forced to work more , $ust to

afford them -

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across all cultures in the world. Its one of the most basic insncts

that we all carry but we are now so addicted to modern living that we

are ready to sacrice this basic responsibility for the sake of mon-

ey. Money which is needed to shop and indulge in showing o !

Cases where parents leave their kids in boarding school , just so that

they can be abroad to earn money is common. Both parents who work

and leave the kids to tend for themselves aer school is the order of

the day. Parents who keep on geng transferred and making their

kids live through an unstable school life is everywhere. All this in a so-

ciety which boasts itself as caring . Is this not contradicng? On onehand we say that kids are everything and on the other hand we never

have the me for the kids. Why do we feel that such a system is good ?

We jusfy all this by saying that earning money is important because , only

money can provide everything for the kids. If that is the case, why are we

not quesoning the basis of the problem? The real problem is, why is thata single persons income is no longer able to provide enough? Understand

the fact that if income rises through one persons income, then it is because

the system is providing growth at a personal level. On the other hand, if two

people work and earn more money, then the system is not providing you.

You are only working double just to maintain the relave standard of living.

Since inaon is built into the economic system, the values that you

earn might be higher, but in reality you are only earning almost the

same as your parents did. With an average inaon of 7%, an amount

of Rs.10,000/- today is equal to an amount of Rs.2,700/- twenty years

ago. We are just doing more work and earning almost the same.

Further, if you presume that rise in asset prices means that you are wealthy,

think again ! If your house doubles in value, then it only means that your kid

has to earn twice that amount you spent to buy the same property. Wealth

increase by asset prices is a double edged sword which will hurt future gen-


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eraons at the expense of current illusion of wealth. Again, since wealth by

increase of assets is a common phenomenon not specic to you, the relave

wealth with respect to our peers will not change. In simple words, the mod-

ern system will make you sit in the same e posion as a wage slave for life.

What has happened now is that, the modern econom-

ic system has made everyone a worker whereas before, it was one

working person per family.

All of us are imbibed with the evil quality of greed and an obsession for

goods and thus we have been reduced to wage slaves. We are now readyto work 12 hours a day and all nights, work weekends, and aend calls

when ill etc., for the sake of consumerism. What is amazing is that like a

monkey with a banana we are happy to conform to this way of life happily.

Earlier I had menoned that we are earning the same amount as in real val-

ue though many might disagree stang that they are earning high wages.

We do have more consuming power than the previous generaons and the

real reason for this is the availability for loans. If you were to save moneyfor a Rs. 50 lakh home from your monthly salary, can you ever spend money

on others like we are doing now. That is the reason our parents never spent

us. Our parents saved for their purchases, not swiped their credit cards!

If you are not taking loans then the Company which employs you is taking

loans or the company which sells things is taking loans. This is the real

reason for a Company to pay high wages and shops can sell at discounts.

Let us consider what is wrong with the current system of taking loans?

Repayment! Since all loans that we take are to be repaid with interest,

it reduces us to salary dependent slaves in our workplace. With depen-

dency goes self-respect. If being a slave is what you will be for the sake

of a fancy car, then disregard my argument and connue reading.

We boast that we are loving, caring parents and we jusfy everything that

we do , based on our dedicaon to our kids. Each and every one will say the

same thing, but if this is the case, then why is the life of kids so stressful ? If


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ity of the system to take care of people who worked all their lives as a

part of the system ? Aer having worked their enre lives , dont they

deserve peace of mind ? It is as though we are saying we have got as

much as we can from you and now we do not care what happens to you .

Since the younger generaon is pushed to the limit , they cannot and in

some cases, will not take care of the elderly. Result .old age homes !

As a person, we now do not spend me with elderly people nor , with chil-

dren yet we are caring, humane people with kind hearts. We may like all

these tags if we are really like this, then why do our acons show otherwise ?

Another big failure is the interacon of people with people .

We are kept so busy that we hardly ever get me to spend me

with people and build relaonships. All our relaonships are

Hi.... Bye.... relaonships. Since majority of our me is spent in of-ces with people who compete with us our relaonships with

them, in most cases, has no meaning whatsoever in terms of real

Friendships. Cant we understand the fundamental fact that in a compet-

ive scenario, personal caring relaonships simply cannot be formed.

We now have the online illusion of social media where peo-

ple interact meaninglessly. The situaon is so bad that they

have a 1000 friends on face book but not a single friend to help

them. People send birthday messages like machines ! All with

the click of a buon !

Building relaonships is one of the primary things humans do and it is doneby face to face interacon. It takes me but it builds trust. With trust comes

care and safety as one will have people to help in case of trouble. We are

clouded in our mind so much that , we have let go of such a basic aspect of life.


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If this is not enough, there is more nonsense on our health side. When refer-

ring to health, I refer to the majority, as there will always be excepons. Dis-eases such as malaria, chicken pox which came and went in our lives are now

a rarity, but at the same me there are new diseases which last for a life me.

In simple words, earlier we were sick for a few days and returned to nor-

mal, but now we are connuously sick.

Is this not a crowning achievement of modern day living? Diseases like diabe-

tes and asthma are now our life partners. We have made cancer a commondisease and even with so called advancements in science we sll do not have

a valid explanaon for it. Allergies are a common thing now. It is disturbing

when people say they cannot eat something. It only shows how much our

body is reacng to changes we have made to our surroundings and yet we

are doing nothing about it. We have made food which provided all nutrients

are rare commodity but now we eat food and have vitamins separately.

We are sold fear through adversements which portray that what we eat is

insucient . When it comes to kids, the system is even more horrible. There

are connuous adversements in TV which show that , if kids eat some-

thing they will grow faster indirectly meaning that those who do not eat it

will be short. We have no peace of mind as to what we eat or with what

we feed children. Why is it that these adversements make us so anxious?

It is not only for foods where anxiety and fear are used to sell us some-

thing, it is for everything. Even if you have achieved everything you hoped

for in life, the adversements we see connuously tell us that it is not

so. We are sold the fear of death by insurance companies, fear of health

by food companies etc., all only aimed to keep us in a constant state of

anxiety, so that we will look at their products as soluons to our anxiety.

What kind of society is this which allows people to constantly broad-

cast messages that make everyone feel discontent and anxious?

The fact is, fundamental purpose of adversements is to tell


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you that whatever you have now is not enough or you do not

having something at all. With such a move how can a soci-

ety with adversements ever achieve sasfacon in anything?

If there is no sasfacon, then how can a society be happy?

The system is so corrupt and invasive that it has made the life of women

so pathec. Women today are put under so much pressure about their

appearance that they cant even eat what they like! They need a whole

bunch of products to showcase themselves to others. From head to feet,

they have a product for everything. The mass media has made them thinkthat, without these products , they are not complete. Isnt that pathec?

It may look like a social issue which has nothing to do with the planet,

but I am menoning it to prove that the system does not spare any-

one. It feeds on everybody. Women are now anxious about their ap-

pearance because the society as a whole is bombarded with imag-

es of so called models and thus indirectly telling them to conform to

standards. The evil part of the system is that these so called mod-els who represent the so called fashion keep on changing and thus

the average women aer taking care of all her regular responsibilies ,

has now the added responsibility of conforming to physical standards.

Modern life simply does not allow us to be hap-

py. It destroys our health and ruins our family life.

I am highlighng this current state of our personal lives be-

cause we are happy to take the side of the modern living

and use it as a juscaon for the exploitaon of the planet.

In case, you are happy to ignore all these personal issues because you like

to have the opulence of the modern world, then I have something for you.We sure do have plenty at this point of me and there is no denying that

the abundance will last only unl the planet has something to exploit. The

planet is fast running out of everything we use now. From oil to water ev-

erything is already plundered. Why do you think western countries engage


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in war mongering? It is all about resources. When a country like USA which

consumes a quarter of worlds oil has exhausted the easy reserves in its

land, it goes around looking for oil elsewhere for sustaining its economy.

So, what is the result? Resource wars...People killing people. All the major

wars of the world where people were killed in millions are all resource

wars. The media will always show fancy reasons like democracy , people

rights, women rights etc. but the reality is that, it was always for resourc-

es like oil, minerals, mber etc. Do some research on what happened

just aer the wars , you will be amazed on what contracts were signed !

In simple words, as we demand for more and more prod-

ucts, it indirectly fuels the ght for resources and ulmate-

ly leads to people killing people. Is this the right thing to do?

Any person needs a place to live and a land-base where things he

wants and needs for his life like food to eat, clothes to wear etc.,can be grown or manufactured. In simple words, everybody needs

a place to home and a place to provide us with things to run our home.

So, where do you think the land for the ever increasing pop-

ulaon will come considering the fact that planet is xed

in size? Given the current scenario overcrowding, scarci-

ty of resources and reduced living standards are inevitable facts.

When people feel they are at the edge of doom they will do anything. Even kill

each other and hence there can never be reciprocity of kindness or sharing.

Is this the way we progress? If this simple example does not

make any sense then, the rest of the book certainly will not !

We are killing the planet for just an illusion of good life. When the illusiongoes, we will realize that we were already living in a paradise before this. If

you want the illusion to go just switch o the Television and start walking

around the place where you stay then you will see , what terrible things we

have done to this planet. I only hope this illusion goes away , so that I could


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show you what you are missing. The planet has given us everything not only

to just survive but to live happily but, it seems we are not content with that

and now we are threatening the very life support mechanism of the planet.


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Failing life supportI really do think I can live without air !

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We are able to survive on this planet because we get the air, water and

food from nature. We might hold the belief that humans invented agri-

culture and hence we have food but the reality is humans did not invent

plants. We just have an arrogant view that everything in the world is for us,

created by us and dependent on us. The reality is opposite, every human is

rather dependent on nature for his survival and not the other way around.

We take it for granted that all the three life support elements water, air

and food and believe that they will be there regardless of what we do to

this planet. Nature is resilient by design. It has the power to withstand

shocks and that is how there is connuity of life on this planet for bil -lions of years. A plant can grow even in the crack of a wall but like ev-

erything, there is a limit for endurance. While we can always argue what

that limit is, the fact remains that we are seeing signs of collapse right

before our eyes. So, it is just a maer of me when it will collapse.

The air, water and food we use for survival are not of an innite volume rath-

er they are formed and destroyed connuously through cyclical processes.

Photosynthesis creates oxygen for us to breathe, the nutrient cycle ensures

that plants grow to create food and water evaporates and condenses to give

us fresh water. These three processes have been working in the planet for mil-

lions of years but in an evoluonary micro second we have made it unstable.

There is an interesng data collecon done for the last half a cen-

tury regarding the oxygen and carbon di oxide levels in the at-

mosphere. Known as Keeling curve, it clearly shows howcarbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere are constantly rising. From around

320 ppm, it has risen to 400 ppm over the last half a century. What does it

mean for us? The climate is changing right before our eyes. The last decade

is the warmest on record. There has been a severe increase in the number

of extreme weather events all over the world. You are aware how burn-

ing hot the weather has become and it is the new normal temperature.

Further, this increase in CO2 has literally melted away the arcc ice sheet

and has already induced worldwide climate changes , with droughts and

storms intensifying. Is this not a wonderful achievement of humans?

Even though the evidence is compelling, we show no urgency in tackling

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the situaon and the reasons are many. Some of the important reasons

from the average person perspecve are because of lack of me. Other

acvies like watching TV, washing the car, playing video games, gossiping

about the neighbours, tracking cine actors etc., have taken the priority.

From the perspecve of the ruling class, the simple reason is money. There

is simply too much at stake in the form of business investments to fore go.

There could be other reasons like our belief in future technologies

as the Saviour or that a miracle of God which will happen any me.

Either way,we do nothing to tackle this situaon. But, we give an im-pression that we know everything about it and thus have it under con-

trol. Just how much do we know about our life support systems? Let

me list down some quesons regarding one aspect of the life support

system the air we breathe. Try answering these simple quesons.

Do all plants produce the same amount of oxygen?

How many trees are needed to produce the oxygen needed for one person?

How much oxygen is consumed while driving a car or to burn something?

How much oxygen is absorbed by the ocean?

Do you know how much oxygen is produced in a day and consumed in a day?

Do you know the contribuon of microbial algae in our oxygen supply?

How much me does it take for CO2 to return to O2 form

or in other words for the me taken for an oxygen cycle.

How much oxygen is present in the planet totally?

If trees were to stop oxygen producon then, how much reserve do wehave for survival?

The point of the above quesons is to make you realize that we cannot an-

swer many of them. If you try answering the above quesons with respect

to our own locaon such as our city, then our knowledge is all the more pa-

thec. For example, try nding out how many trees there are in a city like

Chennai and try to calculate how many are actually needed. You will nd that

, for such a basic thing as air to breathe, we have no knowledge whatsoever.

We believe that there are experts, who are taking care of these things

and there are scienc studies which have the answers for this. Af-

ter all, it is the job of the Government to take care of this, since we

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have more important things to look aer, like checking the scratch

on our car. The reality is that, an average person nor the Govern-

ment knows nothing about , where the oxygen we breathe comes from

and the interlink we have with the natural world. Even the lile weknow is in the form of theorems and data with standard deviaons.

We can all jump up from our seats and say I know where the ox-

ygen comes from. It comes from plants which do photosynthesis.

This is where our so called knowledge stops. If I ask the

crushed life crumbling planet

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