I have never understood the global warming controversy. I don’t mean the physics or climatology: it’s the politics that give me trouble.

When the subject first appeared in Countryside in the ’80s I assumed it was one more example of how we‘ve been mistreating the planet, and all good tree-hugging organic homesteaders would rally around the cause. (When they didn’t, that was my first clue that not all homesteaders are tree-huggers or organic, but that’s another story.)

Editorially, we treated global warming on a par with aerosols and the ozone layer, or DDT, and similar environmental threats. It was more of a tsk-tsk approach than a rabid jumping up-and-down reaction. So I was surprised when some readers vehemently objected that global warming was nothing but a crock of baloney.

Twenty-some years later, the evidence seems overwhelming: global warming is real. A few people are still in denial, but now the big argument has shifted to whether the climate change is “man-made” or not. As if that makes any difference, but more on that in a moment.

The topic has been in the headlines in the past week, partly because of the upcoming 192-nation meeting in Copenhagen on global warming. But the political squabble heated up considerably with the revelation that a large number of scientists who contend that humans are responsible for global warming tried to squelch dissenting views. Adding to the intrigue, the revelation came from a few thousand emails hacked from East Anglia University, a prominent climate change research center in England. The emails came from several countries, including the U.S. U.K. police are investigating the illegal hacking, and U.S. congressional Republicans are investigating the discredited American climate scientists.

So where does all this leave a poor tree-hugging organic and apolitical homesteader?

I learned long ago that trying to collect “facts,” then sifting and winnowing them to get at some semblance of truth, can be confusing at best and at worst, a waste of time. Facts ain’t what they used to be. And rational logic often doesn’t count for much either, nowadays. So how about some good old-fashioned horse sense?

If the planet is warming and climate is changing, as certainly seems to be the case; and if this will play havoc with the current economic and political structure, which seems likely enough; then what possible difference could it make whether it’s caused by humans or by nature? Even if humans didn’t cause the increase in carbon dioxide, but it’s within their power to DEcrease it, then what’s the big deal? (The cap-and-trade mumbo-jumbo makes as much sense as Daylight Saving Time: Cutting off one end of the blanket and sewing it on the other end doesn’t make the blanket any longer.) Let’s decrease the emissions!

The heart of the argument of course is that this would cost untold billions of dollars, which bothers me not one whit.

That’s because my personal agenda goes far beyond the politics and economics as most people see them, including politicians and economists. My homesteader bias is the belief that all of the elements contributing to global warming — the belching smokestacks, endless lines of traffic, lawn mowers and deforestation, etc. — are part of a much larger problem endangering humanity and its spaceship, to say nothing of the quality of human life. Overproduction and consumption of largely useless goods, and the waste of natural resources (including energy, water, and human labor) that go into them, simply are not sustainable on a finite planet. Something that’s not sustainable is doomed to collapse.

Which means if we do nothing, or the wrong thing, the entire system will deteriorate to the point where either (a), it will become so serious that the petty bickering must end, in order to survive at all; or (b), the system will simply shut itself down. Nature, 1; Humanity, 0.

Without getting involved in either the science or the politics, some people are helping the situation on their own, by living sane, simple lives, beyond the sidewalks.

_Jd Belanger

Note: My new book, The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Self-Sufficient Living, which goes on sale tomorrow, has more to say on this topic. Check it out!