You celebrated Earth Hour last Saturday night, didn’t you? Turned off all your lights between 8:30 and 9:30? Of course you did. Because otherwise you’d be denying that WE’RE ALL GONNA DIE FROM GLOBAL WARMING, which is as bad as denying the Holocaust or the moon landing. Oh, who am I kidding? It’s worse!
You know you’ve got a hit on your hands when even New Yorkers are cooperating:
The Empire State Building, City Hall, the United Nations, most Broadway theaters and other Big Apple landmarks will turn off their lights from 8:30 p.m. to 9:30 p.m. for the second worldwide Earth Hour.
“It’s a good reminder to everybody that we are in charge of our destiny,” said Mayor Bloomberg. New York will join nearly 3,000 cities in 82 countries to honor the hour.
The Las Vegas strip will go dim, the Eiffel Tower won’t shine and the Golden Gate Bridge will go black.
Yay! I was kind of worried that the Earth was going to be destroyed, but now that the most prosperous society in the history of the world has bumbled around in the dark for a whole hour in a completely arbitrary show of Ludditism, I think we’re gonna be okay.
I have written a one-act play to demonstrate how Earth Hour raises awareness:
Bloated American Pig: I can’t see!
Planet Earth: See?
Not everybody wants our world to survive, though. No matter how righteous and sensible the cause, you’ll always have a handful of malcontents trying to ruin it for everybody. Case in point:
President of the Tennessee Center For Policy Research Drew Johnson takes a Saturday drive by Al Gore’s during the time most environmentalists went dark:
I pulled up to Al’s house, located in the posh Belle Meade section of Nashville, at 8:48pm – right in the middle of Earth Hour. I found that the main spotlights that usually illuminate his 9,000 square foot mansion were dark, but several of the lights inside the house were on.
In fact, most of the windows were lit by the familiar blue-ish hue indicating that floor lamps and ceiling fixtures were off, but TV screens and computer monitors were hard at work. (In other words, his house looked the way most houses look about 1:45am when their inhabitants are distractedly watching “Cheaters” or “Chelsea Lately” reruns.)
The kicker, though, were the dozen or so floodlights grandly highlighting several trees and illuminating the driveway entrance of Gore’s mansion.
Okay, maybe it’s not fair to hold the President of the Environment to the same standard as everybody else. As a commenter at the above link points out:
Did it even occur to anyone that maybe those lights were solar powered? My outdoor lights are solar and are “on” all night without the use of electricity.
Which, to the objective observer, would seem to be a concession that this whole thing is an entirely meaningless gesture. Either your lights are off or they aren’t. If being in the dark somehow “raises awareness,” how is shedding any light on the subject supposed to help? Well, maybe there just wasn’t enough room on the logo for Earth Hour (Except for People with Solar-Powered Lights).
But hey, who cares, right? Magical thinking is fun!
(Hat tip: Every single human being with an e-mail account, apparently)
Update: Al Gore’s official denial. Perhaps those lights the commoner reported seeing were just reflections from Gore’s halo.
Related posts:
- Obama Celebrates Earth Day By Helping Destroy the Earth This story at the CBS News Political Hotsheet yesterday has...
- Oprah to Planet Earth: Drop Dead The Richest and Most Fascinating Person Who Has Ever Lived...
- Danny Boyle’s “Crap, I Forgot the Slumdogs!” Moment So it might have been the shame of being reminded...
- It’s Earth Day, and You Know What That Means We all get to be told how to live our...
- Go Veg! Destroy the Earth! For years I’ve been told by (totally not smug,...
Am I surprised at all by this? Gore is a blow hard that people actually listen to. Remember the big yacht he purchased? It is okay if he defys what he tells us, but how dare we do the same. Oh yeah, I was not only watching TV on Saturday night, but I was also doing laundry and baking. Shame on me!
You know, when I heard about this, I purposely turned on a few more lights before we left the house for dinner and drinks with the family. The dogs needed something to read by and all.
I’m not at all surprised about Al. I’m glad I just voted for him.
Why on earth did they start “Earth Hour” on the half-hour?
Why not 8-9pm, or 9-10pm?
Seriously. Why?
Brilliant, Simon. Now, if only we could hook you up to the grid…
They peddled that nonsense to me yesterday. Even worse, they used children to do their dirty jobs. I have no scruples about telling to an adult how wrong they are but I am extra careful with kids.
So the little girl (barely ten) came to me and started her spiel she learned from her handlers. I found a nice way to rebuke her; I mentioned her the fact that the only way to know that Earth is inhabited from orbit is by the lights shinning at night. She retreated with a confused air showing in her visage.
Why those bloody punks can’t do their bloody propaganda jobs themselves? Why they have to twist the mind of children to do it?
In case you’re interested, I turned on every light and TV in my house. I ran the dishwasher empty, and turned my electric oven on for that hour. To negate at least one persons effort.
For real. I didn’t run the microwave for that hour though, I didn’t want stray microwaves to turn me into an even bigger superhero type than I already am.
You know you were interested, admit it it’s okay.
Like Chronic Malaga, this “Earth Hour” crap inspired me to burn more energy than usual that day.
Chronic Malanga, that is. Sorry.
How much energy did Gore’s documentary and all these other green media events use? I guarantee it’s a hell of a lot more than most Americans. And why do all these so-called enviromental groups travel all over the world for conferences? It would be a lot cheaper if they stayed at home and did a conference call or use their computers and they could stay in their jammies if they wanted to. Save on energy that it takes to make all that evening wear.
I am soooooo stunned that Al Gore, leader of the church of green, didn’t turn off his lights. I think I’m going to have a heartattack and die from not surprised, actually. Wonder if Nader’s lights were on…
Like many others, my family and I made sure all of our lights were turned on for that hour (and I completely agree, Oversneer. The 8:30 thing really bothered me). I know several others who were doing the same in the Columbus area. One local radio host also turned on several window air conditioners while turning up his heat and opening the refrigerator. Ah, the art of passive-agressive protesting.
I turned on a light in every room of my house (even rooms I rarely go in) in celebration of Human Acheivement Hour.
http://www.bbspot.com/News/2009/03/patients-die-earth-hour.html
We didn’t all die, but fifteen people did, unfortunately, thanks to this f*ckery.
I am assuming, by the way, that this link I posted is a joke.
You people have insanely [bleep] attitudes. I didn’t participate on Saturday night but I didn’t act like a know it all brat about it, either. Gee, leaving your lights on? You sure showed them!
I thought this site was about hypocrisy? Guess its just more about bitching…and bitching and bitching and bitching.
I’m sad that 1) I didn’t hear about the anti-earth hour until after it happened 2) I wasn’t home anyway. If I had been home, I would’ve had all five lights in my room on, plus two computer screens and a TV . . . heck, I probably could’ve found a few extra lights to plug in. I love making earth-first types twitch.
For something they wanted everybody to get involved in, I sure didn’t hear anything about “earth hour.” Or maybe I just don’t look in the right places.
They were talking it up all last month Habandada. I’m sure that they will do it again, and we can celebrate Anti-Eart Hour as we are meant to, with every light burning!
“Guess its just more about bitching…and bitching and bitching and bitching.”
Yep guess so.
Wow showed us. Um, maybe the hyprocrisy was GORE LEAVING HIS LIGHTS on you dimwit. The fact that we were making fun of him really got lost on you, huh.
Oh, and in Ohio we are seriously looking at windmills to help us with power. I guess instead of windmills we could just have Gore come and talk for an hour. That should power up a few homes for at least a year.
Yeah, because we make fun of Al Gore’s ongoing hypocrisy and an empty, hour long gesture that is meant to raise the “awareness” that gets shoved down our throats on a daily basis anyway, we’re the ones with a [bleep] attitude?
Hehheh you say [bleep] attitude like it’s a bad thing!
And really- are you saying that anyone who doesn’t agree with you had a [bleep] attitude? Cause that’s kinda what it sounds like, intentionally or not. To me these protests are just freedom of speech, and I personally enjoyed reading them.
“Oh, and in Ohio we are seriously looking at windmills to help us with power. I guess instead of windmills we could just have Gore come and talk for an hour. That should power up a few homes for at least a year.”
Actually AAW, and I find this completely f-ing hilarious by the way, wind mills are more likely to cause something you could legitimately call ‘global warming’ than burning fossil fuels. ‘Farming’ the wind is exactly what it sounds like, there is less there after you farm it than there was before. The Earth is naturally cooled in part by the patterns of air flowing over the surface. The best analogy is physics, if you’re using the wind’s momentum and energy to move turbines, it’s not like the wind just keeps blowing passed without being effected. Energy is transferred from the wind to the turbines, therefore robbing the wind of some of it’s power. Just think of the difference in temperature between a room with air flowing through it and a room with all the doors and windows shut up, which gets hotter?
If we start using wind to try to replace fossil fuels, we’ll probably end up making things worse.
Is anyone else bemused by this wonderful sentence?
My outdoor lights are solar and are “on” all night without the use of electricity.
Unless your lights make use of technology that predates Edison, e.g. campfires or candles or glow-in-the-dark paint, then yes, you are using electricity.
(No, I’m not trying to be a smart aleck; what the person no doubt meant to say was that they were not drawing electricity from the grid to power their night lights. That’s all well and good. But if someone presumes to lecture me on how I should or should not use the electricity I’m paying for, I’d expect them to know a little something about it first.)
respectfully,
Daniel in Brookline
Those are some kick ass solar lights since the ones I used to have, would last about two hours after dark. I’ll leave the solar power stuff to Ed Begley Jr., and lizards thank you very much.
I was still nursing a hangover from Friday and was blissfully asleep the whole time.
Had the usual-for-Saturday-evening lights on though.
Same with mine, Pasta. My outdoor solar lights are LED, which have that blue tint, and wouldn’t make very good spotlights.
Scott: Your analogy could use a slight tweak. It’s more like a room with a fan versus a room without, as a room where all the windows and doors closed doesn’t get warm due to the lack of circulation. It gets warm due to the fact that the heat beaming in from the sun is stuck in a (presumably) insulated room with a limited amount of heat loss due to conduction. It’ll be much warmer than a room with simply no air flow, where air molecules can still conduct the heat from the room right out the open window. That’s why you leave your windows partially unrolled on your car on a hot day, wind or no.
Also, I’m not too sure about your logic. Most of the wind currents are formed by a combination of the Earth rotating and temperature differences. Warming the place up from a lack of wind should conversely cause a lot more wind- there’s a reason hurricanes form in the tropics.
When a comment starts with “You people!” and a profanity, you just know it’s going to be incisive and well-reasoned.
Very good. Now please explain how Al Gore leaving his lights on during Earth Hour doesn’t qualify.
I don’t know the technical term for it, but it is some manner of sorcery.
I would have particapated if it was held from 8:30 am to 9:30 am.
I kinda like Chelsea Lately…
I love you people, even if you do have a [bleep] attitude. Mostly b/c I am the leading exporter of [bleep] attitude in my state. You’re making me RICH, do you hear? RICH! HA HA HA…
Well, not really.
And we weren’t even home over the weekend, but I did make sure that lights, radios and other stuff was left running. I would have done it anyway, but it’s nice to know that it served a nobler purpose than usual.
As for “really showing them”, I suppose turning off lights for a fargin’ hour really changes life as we know it, right? Meh.
Since I am feeling the love, I think I will go home tonight, do a load of laundry, watch TV and peruse the internet, all while I leave the lights on in every room in the house. Just cause.
My contribution to Earth Hour? I turned on all the lights, and lit several camping lanterns in the backyard, and then left the house with nobody home and went to a birthday party for several hours, just on GP. I let the lanterns burn all night until they ran out of fuel, too. . .
I’m not being a hypocrite – I firmly believe that “Man-Made Global Warming” is a farce.