By Howard Whiteman
Murray State University
“Howard Whiteman! You get over here right this minute!” I can hear it echo in my brain, the call of my Mom when I had strayed too far from her watchful eye. Or maybe my room was messy, my bed unmade, or my shirt untucked. I (almost) always listened to my Mom, because she was my Mom. That is what we do, or should do, because we all know that our mothers know best.
That isn’t true of all mothers, or fathers, for that matter. Unfortunately, some parents probably don’t deserve to have children. Those mothers don’t always know what is actually best, and we are often better off avoiding their advice rather than following it.
But what about our other mothers? Mother Nature is all around us, enveloping us in her warm sunshine, providing the air we breathe, the water we drink, and the productivity to keep our planet, and our human population, going. She does all of this for free; we don’t pay her for a healthy planet. All she asks is that we do our part by keeping our room clean. If everyone does so, she is able to function normally and keep the house running smoothly.
This image of the continental United States at night is a composite assembled from data acquired by the Suomi NPP satellite in April and October 2012. The image was made possible by the satellite’s “day-night band” of the Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS), which detects light in a range of wavelengths from green to near-infrared and uses filtering techniques to observe dim signals such as city lights, gas flares, auroras, wildfires and reflected moonlight.
(NASA Earth Observatory/NOAA NGDC)
We have a third mother that influences us, and arguably she has won more of our attention. Mother Culture is a permissive mother, which is why we love her so much. She whispers that pollution and climate change and species extinction are not real or at the very least normal, and that humans certainly do not have the capacity to change our entire planet, no matter what Mother Nature tells us. We could not possibly mess up our rooms, and even if we could, we can always use more resources to fix it.
Mother Culture tells us that we have no limits; we can grow our human population as large as we want, because we can just produce more food. We can keep burning oil and consuming the Earth’s other resources because we are so intelligent that we will always figure out ways to keep progress humming.
She tells us that it’s okay if we push out nature as we grow, because the world was made for us, not for forests and wildlife. They don’t matter; they are just here for us to use as we see fit. We are the special ones.
We are special. Every good mother will tell their kids that. But good mothers know that being special doesn’t mean ignoring responsibility. Mother Nature tells us we have a responsibility to care for our home; Mother Culture tells us the house is fine, we should be focused on caring for ourselves.
You can see Mother Culture all around you, if you open your eyes. Commercials sell us products that have no bearing on the quality of our lives with advertisements that subtly litter every part of our existence, all urging us to consume. Fossil fuel companies create doubt in our minds through their politicians and a supporting cast of “news” programs that twist and confuse us about the science that has been settled for decades. Constantly we are being told to consume, to ignore the consequences, to live our lives and not worry about anything.
Mother Nature is telling us things as well, if only we would listen to the scientists that are monitoring her vital signs. She’s in intensive care, after all. The Earth is now warmer than it has been for over a hundred thousand years. Increasing temperatures have sparked catastrophic storms and fires, which is Mother Nature spanking a bottom or twisting an ear. Get with it, buster.
But that is not all. PFAS and other human-created chemicals are now common in our bloodstreams as well as in the fish we eat. Fungal diseases and invasive species have decimated our forests and wildlife, and unregulated agriculture has led to dead zones in the Gulf of Mexico, disease in deer, and sex-changed wildlife. We are entering a period of extinction that has only happened five times before in the history or our planet, the last being the demise of the dinosaurs.
Have you seen Mom? Yeah, she’s not happy.
Most good mothers are forgiving, thankfully. But they also have their limits. It is way past the time when we should be pushing away Mother Culture and running back to the loving arms of Mother Nature, asking for forgiveness and promising not to mess up our rooms any more.
Howard Whiteman
The reality is that we only have one home, and it is already a mess. We can help Mother Nature clean it — she is always willing to help us — but we have to get going, and now. We cannot allow our room to get any messier than it already is, because every mother has limits.
Mother Culture is not going to go quietly. As we have made progress in alternative energy, regenerative farming, and population control, she has become louder and louder, telling us we are wrong, that we are ruining our economy, our happiness, and our way of life. She keeps badgering us to not worry about Mother Nature, and just live our lives to the fullest; Mother Nature can take care of herself. Our dear Mother Nature is on life support, and Mother Culture wants to pull the plug.
I am not one to want to break up families, but the sooner Mother Culture loses custody of us, the better.
Mother Nature is waiting, with open arms. We all know that mother knows best. But which mother do you choose?
Howard Whiteman holds the Commonwealth Endowed Chair of Environmental Studies at Murray State University where he is director of the Watershed Studies Institute and a professor in the department of Biological Sciences.
