Live Earth - what's the point?
On July 7, billions will watch the worldwide Live Earth concerts. But will they actually change anything apart from the careers of those who take part? In a no-hold bars personal take, Rob Fitzpatrick tears into the very idea of a global concert to fight climate change.
Do you remember when all we had to worry about was poor Africans dying of starvation and AIDS? You must do, it was only two years ago. You remember, everyone wore white wristbands and trotted smugly up and down the identikit high streets of the western world yelling forcefully about making poverty history and the like?
Do you not remember how the G8 summit was going to be swayed into meaningful, life-changing action by Pete Doherty and Razorlight, Velvet Revolver and The Killers? You must recall how moving it all was? Do you, perhaps, remember what it achieved?
Do you not remember how the G8 summit was going to be swayed into meaningful, life-changing action by Pete Doherty and Razorlight, Velvet Revolver and The Killers? You must recall how moving it all was? Do you, perhaps, remember what it achieved?
The world's still waiting
Well, the good news is it did achieve some good. Some debt relief enabled Zambia to scrap a few basic healthcare fees and hire a load of teachers. In Nigeria - a country whose elite are swimming in petro-dollars - some cash was found for teacher training.
But the starving, AIDS-having people? Well, they sort of got forgotten. The UN's world food programme had to slash its food supply plans in Darfur because G8 countries gave less than half what they had promised. Kenyan MPs blocked an aid package to drought victims over an expenses row. While Bono declared the outcome as 'Mission accomplished', Christian Aid describes the situation two years later as 'worse in many ways, as the G8 nations have failed all too often to deliver on their promises.' Still, it was nice to see Pink Floyd, wasn't it?
So now we have Live Earth, which is billed, ambitiously, as a concert to save ourselves. Because now we've done such a good job saving all the Africans we can concentrate on who really matters. Us! The great thing about Live Earth is it is going to focus our minds on climate change.
But the starving, AIDS-having people? Well, they sort of got forgotten. The UN's world food programme had to slash its food supply plans in Darfur because G8 countries gave less than half what they had promised. Kenyan MPs blocked an aid package to drought victims over an expenses row. While Bono declared the outcome as 'Mission accomplished', Christian Aid describes the situation two years later as 'worse in many ways, as the G8 nations have failed all too often to deliver on their promises.' Still, it was nice to see Pink Floyd, wasn't it?
So now we have Live Earth, which is billed, ambitiously, as a concert to save ourselves. Because now we've done such a good job saving all the Africans we can concentrate on who really matters. Us! The great thing about Live Earth is it is going to focus our minds on climate change.
What's the goal?
Perhaps you, like me, have barely heard of climate change on account of it not being the number one news item in every single news media across the world every single day. As Big Gig maestro Sir Bob Geldof asked recently, 'Why is Gore actually organising (these shows)? We're all f****** conscious of global warming. Live Earth doesn't have a final goal. I would only organise this if I could go on stage and announce concrete environmental measures from the American presidential candidates.' Not a great start.
Of course, the idea is devilishly simple. To highlight how we, the mere pawn-like minions of the globe really ought to stop taking three flights a year to tawdry holiday destinations, a load of bands who spend their lives in blacked-out SUVs and aeroplanes are going to fly into the world's major cities and preach at us while we tearfully watch polar bears crying on rapidly melting ice-floes.
Hopefully it will have as much impact as Live8. As long as we don't think too hard about these witless, shiftless, back-scratching, little bleeders telling us to turn our tellies off at night and go everywhere on a bike while they thrash up and down the planet's highways in air-conditioned mega-buses and rape the Amazon and drain the oil wells for all the paper and petroleum they need to punt their gruesome, unloveable dirges, eh?
Of course, the idea is devilishly simple. To highlight how we, the mere pawn-like minions of the globe really ought to stop taking three flights a year to tawdry holiday destinations, a load of bands who spend their lives in blacked-out SUVs and aeroplanes are going to fly into the world's major cities and preach at us while we tearfully watch polar bears crying on rapidly melting ice-floes.
Hopefully it will have as much impact as Live8. As long as we don't think too hard about these witless, shiftless, back-scratching, little bleeders telling us to turn our tellies off at night and go everywhere on a bike while they thrash up and down the planet's highways in air-conditioned mega-buses and rape the Amazon and drain the oil wells for all the paper and petroleum they need to punt their gruesome, unloveable dirges, eh?
Private jets and SUVs
But the whole thing is carbon neutral, the Live Earth people holler! The concerts themselves will be powered from the rubbish of the people attending! All electricity powering the event will be from renewable sources! All air travel for Live Earth will be offset with carbon credits! Great!
But, oh, hang on a minute. Here's an inconvenient truth for you. If any of these bands actually cared at all about climate change they'd stop selling physical copies of their records and quit touring tomorrow. Because true carbon neutrality would mean no concerts whatsoever.
Each Live Earth event will consume, roughly a million watts of electricity per hour. Then there's the lights, the temporary buildings, moving everyone around, all the heating and air-conditioning needs.
But, oh, hang on a minute. Here's an inconvenient truth for you. If any of these bands actually cared at all about climate change they'd stop selling physical copies of their records and quit touring tomorrow. Because true carbon neutrality would mean no concerts whatsoever.
Each Live Earth event will consume, roughly a million watts of electricity per hour. Then there's the lights, the temporary buildings, moving everyone around, all the heating and air-conditioning needs.
Last one out, turn off Razorlight
Just so we can see David Gray? Really? Even supposedly 'green' Biofuels have a huge environmental impact. It uses up land to grow food on, it has to be fertilized and harvested, chemical pesticides are used. And it's made from food! Instead of turning this grain into power to let us hear Razorlight bang on again, why not just give it to some hungry children to eat? We haven't made poverty history, we've just made it unfashionable.
'Telling lies to Bob and me is one thing,' an angry Bono told The Guardian recently as the G8 backsliders threatened to undo even the small amount of good work that Live 8 managed. 'Putting their signature on a G8 communique and lying to their citizenry is another matter. Breaking promises to the most vulnerable people on earth is real infamy.'
If our leaders are willing to do that, after all the emotional pressure put upon them, who thinks anyone will do much better with climate change? New research from the University of California has discovered, when emissions increase (by, say, flying around the world flogging your useless group) the ability for the Earth to absorb those emissions is lowered. In other words, your well-meaning carbon-offset programmes are utterly, utterly useless.
But hey! Enjoy the show.
Rob Fitzpatrick is a freelance contributor. The views expressed here are his own and not Christian Aid's official policy.
'Telling lies to Bob and me is one thing,' an angry Bono told The Guardian recently as the G8 backsliders threatened to undo even the small amount of good work that Live 8 managed. 'Putting their signature on a G8 communique and lying to their citizenry is another matter. Breaking promises to the most vulnerable people on earth is real infamy.'
If our leaders are willing to do that, after all the emotional pressure put upon them, who thinks anyone will do much better with climate change? New research from the University of California has discovered, when emissions increase (by, say, flying around the world flogging your useless group) the ability for the Earth to absorb those emissions is lowered. In other words, your well-meaning carbon-offset programmes are utterly, utterly useless.
But hey! Enjoy the show.
Rob Fitzpatrick is a freelance contributor. The views expressed here are his own and not Christian Aid's official policy.
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