Human Behaviour is Hardest To Change
Earth Day … 22 April … has come and gone.
Your jaw dropped when you watched “An Inconvenient Truth“.
You said, “yeh, I should do something about it”, when you watched, “The 11th Hour“.
But after all the fanfare involved in staging Earth Day every year, involving over a hundred countries on the 22nd April, has anything tangible changed? No doubt, an awareness has been spread onto the 4 corners of the earth, and children would have had an extra lesson in moral class to talk and discuss about environmental issues but fundamentally, what has changed?
I believe if every one of us were to do our small part each day and commit ourselves to doing something significant that would lead us towards the objectives of ‘Earth Day’, we would have made the Earth so much the better.
My wife is the main ‘agent provocateur’. She sometimes really irk me by insisting that I take the thrash, especially from the waste paper basket and migrate it into the ‘huge’ basket she has put aside, just for paper recycling. Then she has another one specially reserve for all those soft drink cans that we drink. I call her the ‘thrash lady’ and that has created a lot of unneccessary arguments within the household.
I think she meant well. And we have had many a discussion, one of which she motivated me to do the same forever thereon. She said, “If you don’t start now and show a good example, how do you expect your children and your children’s children to follow suit in the days to come.” – I guess she was talking about ‘leading by example’.
Do you turn off the tap when you are brushing your teeth? Or do you ensure that you children does so likewise?
Do you switch off the lights/air conditioning unit when you go off for lunch everyday? What about taking a walk round the block for lunch instead of driving?
Do you re-use the back of fax papers and/or letters? What about envelopes?
Can you save a stappler bullet a day? If every one on Earth can commit to this one, by the end of the year, we would have used 15 million tons of steel … LESS!
You may think these things may sound or seem insignificant, but imagine the effects we can create if done collectively. Its call the ‘Snowball Effect’. In Malay we call it “Sikit sikit lama lama menjadi bukit”
Another thing which really puzzles me is that even if I have seperated my thrash into the Green, Brown and Blue thrash box, when the rubbish truck comes every 2 days, will they just dump everything into the same ‘compressor’ and ‘pressed’ them? I don’t see any special trucks that are catered for such thrash seperation.
It all boils down to the ‘attitude’ of the people, if ever they bother. That’s the important thing. Its not about how many slogans we can create or shout, or how many environment shows we watch, its all about ‘mindset’.
Think before you throw!
P.S. I have just quoted some small examples, I welcome your suggestions on how to help us keep the earth a better place.
jason Ang
April 30th, 2008 at 6:37 am
as LKY said human after 30 years old very hard to change their mindset already, but for me i believed that a human being after 3 years old , the character will remain for whole life never change
Jason ANG
April 30th, 2008 at 12:01 pm
車被拖走，黃泉安火大(parking also dun know how to park stupid)
車被拖走，黃泉安火大 (parking also dun know how to park stupid)
2008年4月30日
（吉隆坡29日訊）新任議員三把火？民主行動黨日落洞區國會議員黃泉安今日炮轟國會的泊車管理欠缺規劃，導致他停泊在國會內的國產車威拉被拖走。
他表示，針對此事，他要內政部長拿督斯里賽哈密及內政部負責，因為國會在首日會議上剛通過一項議案，指示全國警察總長確保國會在和諧、和平以及有秩序的環境下召開會議。
「可是，才不到24小時的時間，這個指示卻完全被忽略，導致國會的泊車管理簡直糟透了。」
他今日在國會走廊召開記者會時指出，今天所有的國會議員出席國會，為了聆聽國家元首的開幕御詞。可是出席之后，車子卻被拖走，對國會議員造成重大的不便。
他說，他今天駕著向妻子借來的國產威拉前來國會，發現給予國會議員的泊車位都已滿座，他向值勤的交警詢問哪個是E區的泊車位，可是沒一個人告訴他，E區的位置在哪裡。
他指出，他原想把車子停放在國會走廊，卻被拒絕，因為車位需要留給那些比國產威拉車還名貴的汽車，這其實是一個雙重標準。
他表示，最后在無法尋找泊車位的情況下，他只好把車子泊在國會範圍之外的地方。
「正因為這樣的情況，我的車子在不知情下被拖走，我還刻意將國會議員泊車單，放在車鏡后， 以通告執法單位。」
他說，當他離開國會來到車子停的位置時，駭然發現車子已不見，接著他到國會警亭詢問，查詢之下，才查出車子確實已被拖走。
他也指出，他的車子沒有國會議員的標誌，也不是名貴汽車，而他一直想把車子泊在國會範圍內，但是不獲允許，可是卻允許大使館的汽車泊放在此。
[Editor: This is an open forum, therefore if you can kindly keep your comments in line with the topic in hand. This post is about Environment and Conservation. Thank you]
Henry
April 30th, 2008 at 12:09 pm
Change will happen only when the heart is strongly convinced……
When we say we want to change, are we saying it b’cos everyone else is talking about it or are we really convinced to the core.
Changes in behaviour starts from the heart.
Klaw
April 30th, 2008 at 2:05 pm
You are right. It does start with our own attitude, but knowing is sometimes not enough, we should go the extra mile.
For example, if you have sorted the rubbish already (kudoes to you), you should already know that there is no local council in Malaysia that cares whether you sorted your recyclables. I do not think the people handling your trash are trained to know.
The already sorted rubbish could easily have been driven to a recycling center, which I think is a pretty commonplace thing in most major cities nowadays.
Jason ANG
May 1st, 2008 at 4:32 am
Believe or the world is keep changing but human being is scare to change
andyyong
May 2nd, 2008 at 5:07 pm
Indeed it is the mindset, mentality and attitude of the people. But how do we go about in educating them? The government and NGOs have not really foster this environmentally issue aggresively. I believe although it’s difficult to change the current generation, it will be sensible to start with education from the school and the family. It really irks me whenever I see kids littering and even spitting. Such uncivilised nature will eventually destroy the country. Look at Australia, people of all backgrounds have inculcated the habit of separating their recycleables. Ask around the people of our society, how many of them knew the difference of the 3 colours? Perhaps it is time for someone to promote this habit by describing or showing pictures of the repercussion of not being environmentally friendly such as pollution to the river leads to the water we drink. As you mentioned not only there are insufficient awareness such as the 3 colours bin being easily accessible but also ‘not bother’ attitude of the garbage collector, so our efforts will be down the drain. Further to that there are groups of people who actually concern particularly with plastic and paper waste not because they are being civilised or care for the earth but of monetary value. Waste papers and plastics are controlled items whereby one is disallow to export. It is this commodity that makes it lucrative by smuggling those waste to neighbouring countries which are highly in demand for good value. So do not be deceived by those companies. How did they manage to smuggle? That you have to check with the customs as I am inclined to believe that hundreds of containers are smuggled monthly. So you see our people are not educated plus lack of awareness and facility of the same. Those who do it are for the wrong motive, a result of the corrupt officers. So who to be blamed?