The Age of Stupid #1: Free flow of thoughts (not the essay)

Here are a few developed versions of the thoughts that popped into my head while/ soon after watching the film (it's about the video and only about the video:

POINT ONE

REALLY?

Is climate change that serious?  Are we going extinct by 2055? I sure hope not. And it's not that plausible either. The movie offers a lot of evidence in its own way, but one can't help but remain dubious. The Age of Stupid seems to carry the message that that's exactly what's wrong. It says we're stupid. We just can't see how serious this all is. We're too dumb to realize the predicament we're in. Wait, are we? This will require more research.

POINT TWO

WHY DIDN'T WE SAVE OURSELVES WHEN WE HAD THE CHANCE?

Let's suppose climate change is really as much of a critical problem as the video says.

The archivist keeps on asking "Why didn't we save ourselves when we had the chance?" 

The archivist

Why didn't we? Why don't we? 

Well, firstly, do we even still have the chance? The movie was made in 2009, and it says that emissions of greenhouse gasses must halt and start to wane by 2015 if we are to survive. It's 2013 now. We have two years. It doesn't seem like anything's going to happen in two years.

Why doesn't it? So why are we not doing anything to save ourselves? Is it really because we're not sure if we're worth saving? Of course not. Well, personally, that was the thought that arose in me after watching the film, but humanity generally doesn't think so at all. We think we're so very awesome that we don't even pause to look around and see that we've become so obese we can't stand on our environment of life anymore. Just take a look at the Indian guy that runs the airplane business. He's so full of himself and so focused on his work; his success. He doesn't know his doom, the whole world's doom, is nearing when his work is going well. Anyway, the point here is that people value themselves very highly, and also as a race. 

So why, oh why, are we confidently striding towards suicide? I believe the reason is that people are very unaware. They think they're aware, as this woman states. According to her, she is "of course worried about global warming!" Does she sound worried? She just turned down a plan to start saving the dying Earth and she thinks she's worried. 

She says that "if you look at all the facts -if you do it fair and with balance- you can get a good outcome. A good outcome. She is so shockingly unaware. She knows not. She's just outrageously unaware. This is the problem.

POINT THREE
IT'S AMAZING. IT'S SHOCKING.

It was intense. it was alarming. The story, the facts, the visual effects and the narration all approached me in a very creepy way and swooped down on me in all their might, leaving a mouth gaping and a mind shivering.  

What it was wasn't very clear to me. But I got what it was trying to say. The problem's as intense as the movie is. And we've got to start acting RIGHT NOW.   

Here are some strategies the movie used that I found effective. (click images)

            1. Special Effects

2055

            2. Animation

MANIPULATION OF OIL COMPANIES

HISTORY OF CORPSES  WHO HAD STH WORTH STEALING

ENERGY AND RESOURCE WASTE 

CONSUMERISM

ONLY MASS PROTESTS CAN MOVE THE GOVT 

 CAP ON FOSSIL FUELS

            3. The most quaking scene

THIS IS WRONG
THEY'RE KIDS AND THEIR IDEA OF 'HOUSE' IS THROWING GRENADES

POINT FOUR

THE WHOLE WORLD IS ONE.

It's not about the man in New Orleans that lasted through Hurricane Katrina.  

It's not about the guy who's starting up the affordable airline company.

It's not about the Iraqi children who fled from the war presumably caused by oil.

It's not about the guide of Mont Blanc who has to stop trucks from coming in.

It's not about the family reducing carbon footprints and organizing a wind farm.

It's not about the Nigerian woman in an oil stained village. 

It's not about the individuals.

It's not even about the environment, maybe.  

It's about how all those individuals can be placed under one context. And it's about how events and people that seem completely irrelevant actually in cause-and-effect relationships. It's all about how one action a guy makes on this side of the world is going to affect the lives of a million people he doesn't know. It's actually about how we have come to live in such a world: a world in which everybody is connected. 

I realize there's a common name for that. Globalization. It's as much of a cliché as global warming is, and I know that. In fact, I'd turned my back on the word 'globalization' long ago; a lot of people I met were rather fanatical about the idea and how it could be applied to the bright little youngsters of Korea; the rest treated it a child's play and laughed or grimaced of using it seriously as an idea or as grounds for an argument. So I grew not to like the word at all.  

But it had never been so real and right up in my face before as it was in the movie. It was new, and it wasn't crazy or childish. It was lain out subtly in the story, but at the same time imprinted in bold. Once I took a step back after the I was done with the film, it suddenly started screaming out in all pitches. I may never be able to determine if global warming is real or not until the effects take full force, but I felt like the movie was right about one thing at least: that the whole world is all connected. 

One person may be all it takes to kill the planet.

One person may be all it takes to save the planet.