Galapagos Islands Environment "In Danger"

cagrin writes "On Tuesday the UN's World Heritage Committee added the Galapagos Islands to the list of sites in danger from environmental threats or overuse. From the article: 'The Galapagos Islands, an Ecuadorian territory situated in the Pacific Ocean some 1,000 kilometers (625 miles) from South America, helped shape Charles Darwin's theory of evolution and in 1978 was the first site placed on UNESCO's World Heritage List.' Here is some background from Sea Shepherd on the insults facing the Galapagos."

Comments

insults?

[Paktu]

Here is some background from Sea Shepherd on the insults facing the Galapagos.

Did someone fart in the islands' general direction?

Danger is bad

[Kohath]

Those huge turtles should email their congressman.

Re:*sigh*

[calcapt]

What? You think throwing money at the starving of Africa is going to solve their problems?

Africa's got a shitload of problems that, in order to be solved, need more than rich fucks funneling money in their direction. Billions have already been poured into Africa, and damn near ZERO (I exaggerate, but it feels like it) progress has been made [http://www.spiegel.de/international/spiegel/0,151 8,363604,00.html]. They need economic, agricultural, political, and health aid. Also, in Africa you have crazy war mongers creating extremely unstable environments in numerous African nations, committing genocide and human rights violations left and right. I don't know what sort of aid will solve this, but trust me, I don't think anyone is going to be willing to give it.

With it's problems, Africa needs more than money. It needs help from the international community/UN. All that will probably require a gross monetary sum larger than what would be required for the restoration of the Galapagos, and if we really want to fix things in Africa, it'll probably cost lives too. Even helping 3rd world countries develop infrastructure is going to be a bitch. You can't just develop it for them; you have to teach them a whole lot of shit too. Like the saying goes, give a man a fish, he'll eat for a day, but teach a man to fish and he'll eat every day for the rest of his life.

Lastly, you can't just write off the loss of the Galapagos animals as non issue. You have no idea how this will impact the overall ecosystem. Time and time again, we have been shown that biological changes in a location have vast impacts, usually negative, on the surrounding ecosystem [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coral_bleaching][htt p://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sudden_oak_death]. And, whatever an environmental psychopath society will spend to solve the issue, I think it will certainly be vastly less than what is needed to help the rest of the world. I'm sure that people are still donating towards causes like Africa, and on top of that there will be donations/funding for the protection of the Galapagos Islands. I realize the severity of both issues are different, but I'm certain we're not going to end up sending 50 million to the Galapagos and 1 million to Africa; rather, people will spend what is needed in the Galapagos, but whatever is going to Africa will most likely dwarf that.

Oh Yeah. Stupidity gets people killed, sure, but it also wastes money by throwing it at a problem and hoping it will go away.