Rainforests turned into smoldering ruins

[NeoConsSuck]

Source: CNN.COM

Sumatra, Indonesia (CNN) -- The land still smolders, tinted with a depressing gray. Twisted hulks of tree trunks take on abnormal shapes. A dark black canal cuts through the wasted landscape.

It looks like a scene from an apocalyptic movie where an unknown force has obliterated all life. But this is the reality of Sumatra, Indonesia's largest island.

The Kampar Peninsula was once virgin rainforest, some of the most biodiverse in the world. The region has now been transformed into a lifeless plain, soon to be replanted with monocultures.

Environmental groups describe the degradation as rampant pillaging -- the work of multibillion dollar paper, pulp and palm oil conglomerates.

Already 85 percent of Sumatra's forests are gone. What is left is vanishing at an alarming rate -- an area the size of 50 football fields disappears every hour, according to Greenpeace and the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations.


Read more: http://www.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/asiapcf/12/06/indonesia.burning.rainforest/index.html

---

What the eff are we doing?? Let's face it, the planet can no longer support the current human population.

[Faygo Kid]

1. History will condemn us.

Heartbreaking.

[pscot]

15. If there's anyone left to write it

Our last act is going to be played on a bare stage; Samuel Beckett does the Texas Chainsaw Massacre.

[TheFarseer]

2. yeah, it's not PC to say it

but Earth was not meant to support over 6 billion humans. This will truly be a depressing place in the future where the only non-domesticated animals to survive are rats and mice.

[katkat]

7. pc

I constantly shoot my mouth off about that. Against the glorification of families with many children, etc. I am sure the tax deduction for kids should be dropped after the second biological child.

[JonQ]

10. Off topic but what would you say

about child credits for those on government assistance?

[katkat]

18. government assistance

It ought to be possible to fund kids so that they have nutrition etc. without throwing excess money at them so that the parents are basically living off the child welfare payments and popping out extra kids to get more.

In my heart of hearts, I look at families with many children who don't have a hope of raising them with a good education and the other things kids deserve and who keep producing more kids, and I think the kids would be better off in a caring, well-funded orphanage. That might break the cycle of irresponsibility by giving a generation a good environment.

Before everyone starts shouting, who's better off, a kid in that caring well-funded orphanage getting a good education, or a kid with a drug addicted mother and no father in residence and unsafe streets?

[TheFarseer]

19. They're not supposed to get tax credits

no child tax credits for those making less than $11K (or so) If you're talking strictly government assistance, they're not supposed to get EITC either. For those working and on gov't assistance, I think sometimes it encourages people to quit working when they get to 11K or whatever the sweet spot for EITC is. I've seen how people trade children's social security cards like baseball cards to illegally get EITC. The program is rife with fraud. I'm glad you can only get it for a max of 2 kids. I'd prefer a credit that helped working poor pay for day care because I know that can REALLY eat into your income - I know there already is, but it should do more. I guess I have mixed feelings about it, you could say.

[NeoConsSuck]

17. I agree with the tax deduction being dropped

Personally, I think it should be dropped altogether.

On another note, I cannot believe the admins took this out of LBN and buried it in this forum. It is a story *everyone* should be made aware of.

Thank God the editors at CNN have more sense than the admins here. I found this story on their home page, not buried in one of their back sections.

[Gregorian]

14. Even the brightest are unconscious to it.

And it is already a depressing place for some of us. It started for me in 1970. I saw it. And I've never been able to un-see it. I'm truly discouraged that I can find a home where I can live with dignity. It's enraging to think that so many people can literally not see past their own face. I've begged for a population forum here, and the result is silence. Actually, worse than silence. But we expect that.

The odd thing is that there are people like Gore who are aware of a problem, yet can't seem to include population in the factoring of the equation. He never mentions it.

Until we discuss population all of the rest is moot.

Also what is odd is that even the most progressive behave as if they were Republicans when it comes to this subject. Defending their own right to reproduce. I believe it's a transitional period where population leads consciousness of it. But then anything with a 20 year lead time is bound to be difficult to observe and control. Oh hell, all I can do is type disjointed thoughts in some kind of attempt to make sense. Like Republicans, this stuff just won't make sense to most of them.

[WriteDown]

16. It's a tough issue...

Requiring applications and licenses to have children would help, but only in the US.

[The Stranger]

23. What do we need to do to get an overpopulation issues forum?

Who do we talk to?

[malakai2]

20. Don't forget the roaches and the ants

and possibly rock doves.

[winyanstaz]

3. K & R....

And what really stinks is that there is NO need to cut trees for wood products..if we legalized hemp.
How can we stop this rape of the planet?

[JonQ]

4. The key is to make it economical viable

to this country to prevent this sort of thing.

Penalize those companies who destroy forests irresponsible. Harvesting can occur without wholescale destruction.

Work to promote tourism of the remaining forests, find alternative sources of wood and oil via intensive farming, etc.

[Rosa Luxemburg]

5. there seems to be more of an awareness of global warming this year

we have to do much more

[JonQ]

8. Environmental degradation

eg, chopping down forests and global warming are not the same thing.

[Rosa Luxemburg]

11. I know but I was just transgressing

I have global warming on my mind too

[joshcryer]

22. I disagree, public knowledge is down, apathy is up.

From what I am seeing anyway, and from the few polls I saw.

[izquierdista]

6. 50 football fields/hr

How much is that in postage stamps per fortnight? :shrug:

[JonQ]

9. Depends on the size of the stamp

[d3m0l1sh3r]

12. If you're going to cut, cut

If you're going to cut the trees, then cut them, but don't freaking burn them! That not only kills the trees, but it pollutes the atmosphere and ruins the land.
Why is it always news articles about these things happening, but no one is ever working against them?!?!?!?

[JonQ]

13. Huh?

I wasn't advocating either.

[joshcryer]

21. Little known fact, but most forest is *burned* to build cattle farms.

Or other animal farms. It doesn't ruin the soil (and in fact can actually benefit the soil, this is why forests grow back so quickly after a natural lightning based fire). But a few years of cattle grazing does.

[Javaman]

24. what are we doing?

nothing more than continuing our destructive ways.

profit before sanity is the mantra of the rich.