To the Editor,
The editorial of Feb. 18, Green space has real value, is a sad reminder that after a century of debt-driven monetary markets that force a price on everything, we accept the notion that everything is rightly owned by someone, and has no value if such can’t be realized in cold, heartless cash.
Of course green space has value, esthetically and to our well-being.
Land launderers are well aware how that affects market-value but there has always been greater, immediate profit in clearing absolutely everything on the road to perpetual development.
Dollar value be damned. Why we protect our green spaces cannot be only about the people dollars it attracts. It certainly cannot hinge entirely on private enterprise profiting by any means, while regulatory bodies turn blind eyes.
There’s a problem at the heart of us when we fail to act dutifully as custodians of all things green and all things breathing. We may not all want that role, but it’s ours regardless.
Nanaimo green spaces, and Earth in entirety, demand we show reverence for all we otherwise bulldoze into history, be that trees on a residential lot or an entire forest/river system held hostage by forest company barons.
We have to change the way we think – an act of awakening conscientiousness.
If successful, we’ll see biking and hiking trails for eternity however, if the aforementioned editorial is our motivation, then go take a hike now, quickly, before the back room deals are struck and the countryside drawn and quartered.
Chris J. Vaughan Griffith
Nanaimo
