People who do nothing about environment worst kind of animal.
Cartoon appeared Dec. 9 and 11 in various Toronto Community News publications.
Patrick LaMontagne
To the editor:Once again you have printed an absolutely brilliant editorial cartoon (Wednesday, Dec. 9) painting climate-change deniers as "stupid monkeys". Unfortunately, there are a larger group of people who constitute an even worse problem. They don't deny the problem but insist others should solve it.On the international level, at Copenhagen, we see the rich nations that have for more than a century dumped carbon and other pollutants into the atmosphere now asking that developing nations not do the same. But what aid will they give the poorer nations to compensate for the problems we have caused?At the national level, we see the fossil fuel industries still insisting on the government subsidies that enable them to stay competitive with renewable energy. At the provincial level we see "compromises" instead of real environmental legislation to protect our forests and green spaces. And both levels have refused to commit to the stable funding we need for efficient and affordable public transportation.And while Toronto council has given Toronto Hydro the mandate to pursue clean, renewable energy sources, we see local councillors insist such projects shouldn't happen anywhere near their wards.The motto of the environmental movement is "think globally, act locally" for a good reason. It's hard to get politicians to agree on doing anything that will not have an immediate and direct benefit to their constituents. That's why, in North America at least, it's the cities that have taken the lead.Yet even at so local a level we still see even the most benign actions being vocally opposed. Worse, those opposed endorse the "stupid monkeys" by trotting out their "research" in a desperate attempt to justify their opposition.Perhaps the cartoon should have included a fourth "dangerous animal" - the NIMBY sloth?Gary Dale