Peninsula News is bad for my health
I think I had better stop reading the Peninsula News.
It is bad for my health.
I believe I have understood correctly that there really are people who believe that a sea wall should be built right around Australia (Council Upgrades Umina Beach Viewing Area, Peninsula News Edition 437, January 29).
They surely do not just want to protect their own little patch?
Have these people considered the effect of a wall at Ocean Beach on surrounding beaches, such as Umina and even Ettalong Beach?
Perhaps they have not been here long enough to remember the effect of the placement of rocks at the Point, in the late 1970s, after which a complete beach in front of the now Vietnam Memorial disappeared and Ettalong Beach was severely impacted.
Do these people have any qualifications or knowledge of beach morphology, environmental science or climatology?
Whatever humans do to the planet has an effect somewhere.
I have always admired how all other animal species on the planet manage to provide shelter, progenerate, feed themselves and leave no sign behind them.
They certainly do not litter or destroy their only nest.
And they keep their numbers in check.
Even the First Peoples in Australia changed it very little and led healthy, interesting lives, even though very different from what we expect.
When, as a politician commented recently, the great "Western Civilisation" arrived in Australia, I believe the rampage or destruction of Australia began.
In just over 200 years, we have changed Australia forever.
We lead the world in small mammal extinctions and are near the top of the list for many other extinctions.
The human species is not travelling too well either: female characteristics and reduced sperm counts being of concern.
We are only now realizing that many of our discoveries or achievements, of advantage to the business fraternity and indeed the economy, are in fact leading to disaster.
The tobacco industry provided jobs for many people for many years but until we woke up, it also led to many cases of cancer.
Fire retardants, used on our clothing, timbers, furniture, plastics, insulation and electrical cables, to name a few, cause cancer and are, according to the UN, among the world's most dangerous, toxic chemicals.
BPA employed to make plastics more malleable and used in bottles, toys and food containers, is now banned for use in many states of the USA and in the EU and is restricted in Australia.
You have only to look at the news to wonder if human society really knows or thinks about what it is doing.
Despite protestations to the contrary, we are not the only species on the planet: we are just one of the animal species.
Build a wall by all means, by ignoring the fact that it will eventually end up under the sea.
Greenland's freshwater icesheet is melting at an alarming rate and the permafrost in Siberia is also melting.
Our Peninsula was completely under the sea a couple of thousand years ago.
I used to think that was a mighty long time ago but now as I get nearer to my first 100, I realize that it is nothing.
Surely the making of money at all costs is not our only desire and reason for existence.
Email, 8 Feb 2018
Margaret Lund, Woy Woy