People. When we talk about sustainability, we often think about the health of the planet, rarely that of people. 'People' are usually implicated on the left side of the equation, the cause, but are rarely on the right, the outcome. Which is weird, cause a sustainable use of resources would also inevitably lead to people wellbeing. Should we shift the narrative? Yes. But could we go even beyond? Yes. Because all too often we speak about ‘people’. But actually each person has a story.
I have recently been listening to a podcast made on the costa concordia accident: 'il dito di dio' I was aiming to write today’s post on the cruise ship industry, as this week marks the 10th year anniversary since the Costa Concordia incident. But I already wrote about cruising here and here (and also more broadly about the issues of noise pollution in the sea here) . So, I recommend you to go in more details following the GCAN activists.... After binge listening the podcast (Very well made, but it’s only in Italian), I changed my mind about what I wanted to be the focus of this post. Listening to it not only gives you shivers, but makes you really think. And empathy does the rest. Even if you are not of an empathic nature, rest assured, some empathy will come out of you.. Yes, it was an accident, and yes it could have been avoided, and yes we don’t really need to send big luxurious ‘sky scrapers’ out at sea like this, as if it was the safest thing in the world... and not just the stories of the captain, or the victims and the survivors, but also the stories of those who played a positive role, helping. It makes me think of many other situations in which thinking of the people as protagonists May make a difference. Cruising - aside from this accident , do you know that the crew is treated terribly? Underpaid, and nowadays with covid marching at a fast pace but cruising keeping on going (with a less than ideal management of cases) , crew are at a high risk, and, imagine this, are to stay isolated in their cabins when they are not doing shifts and if tested positives are being transferred onto quarantene ships... And do we want to talk about the people who are basically being treated as slaves while building those ? Because slavery is basically still existing and you would know it if you just once were on a bus going past a large ship building yard.... Stepping away from cruise ships but staying on ships, most large scale fishing operations are not just unsustainable for the quantity of fish, but also for the conditions of the fishermen. This is another example of slavery. In dangerous conditions, so many people end up overboard in freezing cold waters. The sea doesn’t forgive so easily.. Most food we eat is actually harvested not only in an environmentally unsustainable way but also in a humanely unsustainable way. Tomatoes, strawberry, avocados, bananas, coffee, tea, cocoa... and those are just few examples that spring to mind without having to think about it. I think slavery might be found in many mass produced products... Would giving a voice to these people, a story, help to put it into real perspective ? I think so And it can be the place we start from... even if this is very anthropocentric, if it can help us for a better future for both us and the planet, then we should try...
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