Regrets & Fireworks

To the Editor:

John Heckel invites other elders to join him in apologizing to young and future generations for allowing continued degradation of our planet and ruinous changes to our climate.

Here’s my confession: In 1970, when I first saw a call to mass participation in teach-ins and other actions to challenge lack of attention to environmental problems, my knee-jerk reaction was that all this enthusiastic activism should instead be mobilized to halt the war against Vietnam. I remember saying to colleagues, “I hope this so-called EARTH DAY isn’t going to take energy away from anti-war activities!” (I was working for American Friends Service Committee training draft counselors and publishing a war resistance newsletter.)

I apologize for not recognizing that protecting Earth’s air, land and water AND abolishing war were all part of the same movement to realign our values and save precious lives. We might have called that “intersectionality.” There’s no denying this unity of spirit and purpose.

Also on page ten, Shelly Moran shares her memory of fireworks embers landing on attendees at a 1991 Bob Hope USO event in Little Rock. Add that to this year’s fouling of the air with particulate debris on the hot and humid 4th of July in Washington, D.C. There are so many reasons to discontinue the noise, trauma, risks and degradation caused by fireworks.

Why would we want to keep venerating bombs!?

Chip Sharpe, Bayside