It’s really great that we live in a society where we have freedom of choices. Religious, jobs, marriage, sexuality, etc. And we deem other societies as inferior when they take away the freedom of those choices from their people.
What we forget however is that we too have certain restrictions. We don’t have the freedom to murder, rape, enslave, throw garbage in a river, cut down a tree down our street, etc. But we don’t consider those to be restrictions to our freedom because we generally agree that those things are wrong.
However, we have certain freedoms that should never be made into choices. Some are the faults of corporations and the government, others of the people for continuing to make choices that go against their own beliefs.
Why should we have the choice to buy an item made by slave workers outside our borders? Society as a whole doesn’t agree with that.
Why should we have the choose between buying a renewable energy car or one that runs on petrol? Society as a whole understands the impact of petrol usage and benefits of renewable energy.
Why have the choice of paper or plastic bags when plastic causes so much damage to the environment? Society as a whole understands at least that “it’s bad”.
Why should we have the choice to poison ourselves with cigarettes and alcohol? Shouldn’t at least be a maximum allowed consumption of these substances? Society as a whole understands that drug abuse impacts families, the economy, our health system, etc.
And why have the choice to eat animals who suffered a horrible life and death, support an industry that has cut down 80% of the world’s forests, emits more CO2 than any other industry including all transports combined, destroys the eco-system of the ocean by stripping it of its natural balance, and increases your risk of having cancer by 70%, not to mention cholesterol, diabetes, heart disease, etc - when we have the choice to eat plants that are more nutritious and less harmful to the planet? Once again, society as a whole would agree that all of the above are undesirable things that shouldn’t happen.
So why be given those choices at all? Should society take responsibility for their own actions and make the best choices, or should science, studies, and statistics dictate the choices for them?
Worse than having to make certain choices, is when you have no choice other than support actions that destroy the planet. Through my taxes I am funding a war, I’m subsidizing the meat industry, animal testing, the tobacco industry, the oil industry and others. Am I truly free? I sometimes have the freedom to destroy the planet I live in but not always the freedom to choose not to destroy it.
Our greed, our search for convenience and the difficulty we have to change our habits will eventually destroy us.
We all keep on passing the buck. We may say, I’ll recycle tomorrow, I’ll stop smoking next month, I’ll become vegan in a few years, I’ll cycle to work next year… and we keep doing it forever with no care for our planet and future generations, your own offspring.
We like to think that we are in control of ourselves, that we are individuals, but we make most of our choices based on what those around you deem appropriate or not.
We need to take responsibility, we need to each think before we act, we need to boycott the industries that go against our principles even if it inconveniences our lives.
That’s the only way that things change - when society is ready to admit that what they were doing up to that point was no longer needed nor morally correct (slavery, rape, women rights, racism, etc)
The time to change is now. The time to stop supporting these industries is now. The time to rescue the world is now, there’s no later - there’s no passing the buck - later is too late and you have to start it yourself.
