You may have noticed that campus is a little warmer than it should be around this time in October. You would be right; the temperature of Oxford, as well as the entire globe, is higher than it should be.
This column is not about convincing climate change deniers that they should agree with 97 percent of active climate scientists, because if people are willing to deny thousands of pages of evidence, a 500-word article is unlikely to change their minds.
What it is about is the way we should treat the situation before us.
The attitude toward climate change in the United States is apathetic at best. Ken Bone was the only person who seemed to care to talk about it much during the debates, and it hardly holds any place in the news cycles or in our minds.
That is because even when the climate is changing rapidly, it still seems slow to us. Another reason we do not give it much thought is it does not seem to affect us very much, if any at all.
That was the mentality of many residents of the Pacific island of Kiribati until they realized their entire island could be swallowed up by rising sea levels, a direct result of the damage we are doing to our own atmosphere.
I am convinced that at one point or another we will all have this moment of realization; we all call Earth our home, after all. While this issue may seem partisan or debatable in our country for the moment, even our politicians will have to eventually awaken to the reality of our situation.
Until that happens, though, we will have to be the more responsible group, caring for the wellbeing of humanity. We need to have a culture of environmental health.
I use that phrase intentionally, because we take our personal health seriously, as we should the health of our world. The ways we care for both our personal and environmental health is also similar: modest lifestyle choices.
When people try to eat well, they assess the effects of the food they consume. It does not mean they never eat doughnuts again, but it does mean they are aware of how it will affect their bodies.
The same is true for the way we treat the environment. I may be drinking out of a disposable Starbucks cup as I am writing this, but I also realize the effects that it has on the environment, so I try to keep waste to a minimum through a reusable bottle. Small lifestyle changes can have large impacts, given everyone does his part.
So try to reduce, reuse and recycle. Do not consume so much. Be happy with what you have, and consider the impacts of your actions. Remember this world is our home and will be the home of our children.
They will see the impacts of our actions, so let’s be responsible. I think when we act with these things in mind, it will not only better our world but also our bank accounts and our consciences.
Daniel Payne is a freshman integrated marketing communications major from Collierville, Tennessee.
