So, I was sitting in the gym sauna today, talking with a couple of guys about what they did for Earth Hour last night, and they were appalled that at the appointed hour Champ and I were oven-broiling steaks while watching a DVD (with sound through the stereo) and also had a pair of computers humming in the background.

Yes, they were appalled. While sitting in the electric sauna.

I asked them what they did to mark Earth Hour — and, really, let’s be serious, here, how fucking condescending is it to the whole notion of “respect the planet”, to devote all of One. Fucking. Hour. to observing the wasteful way we use our energy? Couldn’t manage a whole day? — and, invariably, they replied “I went to an Earth Hour dinner party.” Which wasn’t too unusual, I imagine.

“Hey, how’d you get to your party?” I asked. One drove, the other took a taxi. Nice work, fellas. Hands up, guys — who ironed a shirt before the party?

Someone left a newspaper in the sauna — not forgetfully but helpfully, I’m sure, just passing it along to the next interested reader and not because they’re a lazy pig who figures someone else will pick it up — and The Toronto Star’s coverage of Earth Hour happened to be printed with an oversized graphic, gray text on a huge, solid-black ink background. The Toronto Star was a big booster for Earth Hour. I wonder how much paper and ink was used to trumpet its success?

It’s not just the hypocrisy of the whole thing that bugs (how many bottles of repackaged tap water were consumed at Earth Hour parties?), it’s that it also reduces a very important societal need — cutting back — to the level of an elementary school project, and in doing so continues the trend to infantilize the adult population.

Children of Hippies + Children of Children of Hippies = Torture

I use my oven maybe once a week, so don’t go all sanctimonious on my ass because that “once” happened to coincide with your kumbaya, people. I scrupulously recycle, don’t own a car, ride my bike everywhere and take public transit if I can’t ride my bike, so cram it.

We were shopping in Canadian Tire yesterday and noted with great amusement that the whole lighting section was dimmed, presumably for Earth Hour. Because, goodness knows, consumers certainly don’t want to have any fucking idea how their purchase might actually perform, do they?

We knew that the lights had been on, full-strength, the day before and that they’d be on, full-strength, today, and, more to the point, it was absolutely fucking impossible to read the information on any of the product packaging in that department. I fail to see how such an impotent gesture, which results in considerable inconvenience to the public, is worth the effort, since the effort seems purely designed to inconvenience the public through piffling gestures.

And yeah, yeah, save your breath, I know it’s just a symbolic gesture. And will increase awareness. I get it. But you’ve actually hit on the problem right there. We need more than gestures. We need to change the way we live. And if you are not already aware of the need for a change, how the hell is Earth Hour gonna do it?

On the way home from the gym, past endless mountains of cigarette butts on the street, past garbage thrown at (not in) refuse containers, past endless, honking, SUV drivers making illegal turns while on cellphones and with 40-roll packs of Bounty™ from Costco in the trunk while police look the other way and sip coffee with seven of the eight contractors (not) making street repairs, thinking about how the city which so strenuously sponsors Earth Hour is also not challenging the shutdown of the Yonge subway line this summer at fucking midnight, walking past the heaps of garbage stacked along Yonge Street in front of businesses which proudly proclaimed low-energy menus the night before…

Well, really, you just had to smile.

Smile
Toronto, 30 March 2008, 3PM