Letters to my Grandchildren

by David Suzuki

  The difficulty I have is in trying to imagine what the world will be like during the rest of your lives. Throughout human history, we could base our entire lives and cultures on nature’s cycles and regularities. Indigenous peoples of North America flourished because of the seasonal cycles that governed when plants appeared and animals migrated. After European settlement, the sudden loss of the biomass of passenger pigeons, buffalo, and salmon at the hands of the newcomers had catastrophic consequences for ecosystems—which became less resilient, less productive, and less diverse—as well as for the human societies that depended on them.

  Catastrophic events such as earthquakes, floods, droughts, hurricanes, and fires were rare. But that has changed. When so-called once-in-a-hundred-years events like floods or extreme storms begin to occur every ten years or less, something is not right. The human imprint can now be found even on earthquakes and volcanoes. Our species has become a force of nature that is the major factor altering the physical, chemical, and biological properties of the planet. We can’t do anything to avoid events that are caused by natural forces, but if we have become the major causal factor, we can change our behaviour and activity to reduce the risks and consequences of what we do. That is, in a way, very good news. The difficulty we face lies in the reluctance to make those changes our highest priority.

  We have so altered nature that much of what we could do when times were tough in the past is no longer an option. Even in the 1940s, when my family was incarcerated during the war, we could catch fish, gather edible plants and mushrooms, and cut down firewood, though we had to do so surreptitiously because these activities were prohibited. After the war, when we moved to Ontario in a state of poverty, I remember Mom bottling fish Dad and I caught, collecting fruit left on the ground in orchards, and gathering asparagus, blueberries, nettles, and dandelions along railroad tracks or beside ditches. Today, it’s harder to find such edible plants or animals, and the ubiquitous spread of toxic chemicals and pesticides means there are health risks even when they are wild.

  I think one of the most obscene descriptions of goods today is the word disposable. Instead of bragging about durability, resistance to wear and tear, or lasting a lifetime, ads boast of disposability as a convenience, as a sales feature of even big-ticket items such as cars and houses, which can be discarded for bigger, more modern or ostentatious indicators of wealth. We should cover our ears when someone uses the word disposable and admonish them for saying a bad word.

  When our species came into existence, the planet was already fully occupied and fully developed, but we, an invasive species, have thought of occupation and development in new lands solely in human terms and don’t even recognize that our development depends on the produc-tivity and abundance of nature.

  One way we become blind to what is happening in the world is the way our words are often used to ignore, cover up, or deceive. When we buy seafood, we may have a vague notion that the shrimp we eat were caught along with “bycatch.” Often a kilo of shrimp may have been net-ted along with five times as much bycatch—fish that have too little or no commercial value and so are discarded, even though they are edible and are vital parts of ecosystems. To the fishers, they are just a “waste” of time, effort, and wear and tear. At one time, red snapper, a long-lived fish species that is a prized delicacy to Japanese people, was declared bycatch for fishers seeking halibut, which are bigger and therefore more lucrative than red snapper. Art Sterritt, a Tsimshian friend, told me that one day along the Bc coast, he encountered miles of red snapper carcasses discarded by boats fishing for halibut because they were bycatch and couldn’t be kept.

  Ancient forests that took millennia to evolve are called “decadent” or “overmature,” so clearing them is justified by the notion that they are finished or at an end. Sometimes the forest industry labels such forests “wild,” and what is planted and grown after it has been clear-cut is called a “normal” forest. We define things in terms of human utility, not in any way that makes ecological or even biological sense.

  Trees for which there is no commercial value are referred to as “weeds” that interfere with commercial harvesting. That’s what alders were called until a method to make high-grade paper from them was developed, but you’d never know that alders play an important ecological role. They are the first trees to grow after an opening is cleared in a forest, and they fix nitrogen from the air to fertilize the soil for the later-growing, longer-lived, bigger tree species. Yew trees have tough wood with gnarled branches and were called weeds and burned until a powerful anti-cancer agent was found in their bark.

  Insects are the most numerous, diverse, and ecologically important (and to me, fascinating) group of animals in the world and only a tiny fraction cause problems for human health or agriculture. It is true that diseases like malaria are transmitted by mosquitoes and in the Arctic, mosquitoes and blackflies are so abundant that they are a scourge for mammals like caribou and humans. But it is their very sea-sonal abundance that enables millions of birds to migrate, nest, and reproduce there year after year. Yes, they are pests to us, but they are critical components of arctic ecosystems. If we call insects “pests,” then we can make war on them. And we have done that, developing powerful chemicals that kill all insects to eliminate the ones that are troublesome to us. To me, using broad-spectrum pesticides is like dealing with high rates of crime in a town or neighbourhood by removing or killing everyone in the area.

  There’s a battle going on in Canada right now about the use of a new, powerful class of nerve gases called neonicotinoids, or neonics. They kill the target pest insects, but a “collateral damage” is honeybees that are extremely sensitive to the neonics. Even though neonics are banned by the European Union for that very reason, in Canada, commercial interests in this class of pesticides are used to justify their continued use.

  My most important piece of advice to all of you is to be thoughtful about the way you live. At a time when the global economy dominates our lives, it is easy to buy something without thinking about the global repercussions of that purchase. For example, gold and diamond jewellery comes with a heavy ecological footprint because mining is just not sustainable and some methods of mining are extremely destructive. Shark fin soup is used as a traditional dish for Chinese weddings, but we have become aware of the enormous cost of killing these important predators to get the fins. But do we think about the unsustainability of Chilean sea bass (alias Patagonian toothfish), orange roughy, or bluefin tuna? And think of all the materials that go into electronic products we buy and discard so readily—where do they come from, and where do they go when we are done with them?

  I was once on a talk show that was urging people to be more environmentally responsible in the way we live. In the green room, where guests wait before going on the show, a table offered plastic bottles of water brought all the way from Fiji! The program’s host was quite embarrassed when I suggested this was a contradiction to what they were trying to do. We’ve got used to buying and using things without much thought about the true costs. And each time we buy such a product, we encourage its continued production. Before buying anything, you might ask, “Is this sustainable?”

  One aspect of being thoughtful to me means thinking “holistically,” that is, considering the context within which the item we’re going to buy fits.

  We think nothing of ordering a pizza to be delivered, but do we really need it? Is it brought by someone in a car? What kind of car? How far did it come? And think of the box that carried the pizza, the printing on it, and the wax paper inside. What were all these elements they were made from, and are they biodegradable or recyclable? And then there is the pizza itself. If it contains meat, remember that huge amounts of water and energy are required to feed and transport the animals. Were they raised organically? And think of the components of the pizza—flour, sugar, salt, pepper, chili, and much more. Where did each one come from, were they grown organically, how much were workers paid, and were the plants grown
in soil that was once covered in forest? I think you get what I mean about being thoughtful about sustainability. It’s very com-plicated in a global economy.

  You can see that the repercussions of purchasing even simple goods like clothing, food, and drinks are immense, and when it comes to big-ticket items like a car, computer, or television set, or even a house, the ecological, social, and economic ramifications become enormous. This global system is simply too destructive to be truly sustainable.

  Please also think about the way we live at home. Where does the electricity that powers our house, the water that flows through our taps, or even the air that we breathe come from? When we flush the toilet, what happens to the poo, paper, pee, plastic tampon holders, tampons, and condoms that are routinely put into the toilet? What happens to the contents of our blue boxes or garbage cans when they are picked up and put in dump trucks? Everyone should be aware of the source and the destination of these things in our homes.

  Canada is a northern country with a limited growing season, yet we can buy fresh fruit and vegetables year round, even in the far north. How is that possible? Canada has more fresh water per capita than any other nation on Earth, yet we seem to accept that there are more than a thousand “boil water alerts” in communities every day. We don’t object to paying more for water in plastic bottles than we do for gasoline. We pay even more to buy water shipped from Fiji, Italy, or France. The reason we buy this water from distant lands is that it is supposed to be “superior” to ours in some way, but I am sure that in Fiji, Italy, and France, people buy water brought from other parts of the world, sold on the same claim of superiority. I don’t know what you think, but to me, this is insane. It’s just water.

  For almost all of human existence, we were local, tribal animals, encountering perhaps a few hundred other human beings in a lifetime and travelling over distances limited to a few hundred kilometres max. I don’t think it’s an accident that we feel most comfortable within neighbourhoods—communities comprising, say, a few dozen blocks in which a local flavour or identity can develop, where local merchants are often known to customers by first names, and where local politicians are held more responsible and accountable by the community. In a northern country like Canada, indigenous people flourished long before there were refrigerators or global transportation because they lived within their ecological means, which were completely local. By becoming as locally self-sufficient as possible (the 100-mile diet was developed by J.B. MacKinnon in Vancouver), we become much more resilient and resistant to the vagaries of global market and other economic fluctuations.

  In 1989, economist E.F. Schumacher wrote an influential book called Small Is Beautiful: A Study of Economics as if People Mattered. The notion that small is beautiful goes against our belief today that more and bigger are better. But why would they be better? Other than flaunting our economic status to others, why do we need more or bigger when we should be thinking about the quality of our lives?

  I have an idea for a science-fiction novel based on the world of the future in which humans have become so numerous that they have used up all the space and all the resources on the planet. After applying every possible technological approach to the problem, genetic engineers come up with a brilliant solution: use biotechnology to create people who are half the average size. This would immediately double the amount of resources and space available while creating whole new economic opportunities in rescaling everything from clothing to homes, cars, and refrigerators. This is just one idea about where our technological optimism might lead. But it’s satire, not a serious solution.

  Being thoughtful about the way you live also means reflecting deeply on what makes us happy. By happiness, I don’t mean the kind of personal ecstatic moment when you ski a black diamond run without falling, climb to the peak of a mountain, or seduce someone you are attracted to. That’s what we in the West tend to think when we say “happy.” In the small, economically poor kingdom of Bhutan, hidden in the Himalayas between India and China, the new king’s father declared that the goal of his society was not economic growth or development but happiness.

  The Bhutanese are Buddhists, and happiness is seen there as coming from a sense of belonging or having a place in society, of living where nature flourishes and where there is adequate medical care, low infant mortality, and universal education. These are all measurable indicators of happiness. This is quite a departure from Western society, in which economic growth and consumption are seen as the measures of success rather than as a means to a higher goal. As part of its pursuit of happiness, Bhutan protects over 70 percent of its forest cover, is 100 percent organic in its food production, emphasizes the wearing of traditional Bhutanese clothing, and controls tourism, which can be highly disruptive of society. Whether Bhutan will withstand the impact of television and its ads and the allure of economies based on hyperconsumption is still a question. But how refreshing to consider the economy as simply a means to attain a higher goal of happiness!

  In Ecuador, under President Rafael Correa, who was trained as an economist in the United States, the constitution was rewritten to enshrine the rights of Pachamama (Mother Earth). In other words, it’s not just people who are guaranteed constitutional protection, but nature itself. This makes a real difference: in a legal suit taken up on behalf of the Vilcabamba River, for example, a judge recognized the river’s rights by ordering its restoration after a road-building company dumped rocks, sand, and gravel into it. Like the people of Bhutan, Ecuadorians do not define progress by economic growth. Instead, they set the goal of their country as bien vivir or sumac kawsay, the Quechua term for the “good life,” a notion similar to the happiness of Bhutan.

  You know that as Japanese Canadians, my family, like all the First Nations, didn’t have many of the rights that Caucasian Canadians enjoyed, especially the right to vote. And during World War ii, the rights we did have were abrogated by imposition of the War Measures Act. So now that we have gained rights all others have, I hold those rights in great esteem, especially the right to vote. I believe that democracy is the best system devised so far, but it is still far from perfect, especially the first-past-the-post system in Canada. In each riding, the candidate who gets the most votes wins. If candidates from two or three other parties garner significant support, they can split the votes between them so that someone with only 30 or 35 percent of the votes can win. So most parties, left and right, don’t form governments with the support of a majority of voters.

  For democracy to function as it should, citizens have more than a right—they have a responsibility to be involved. Active involvement is not some kind of frill or indulgence; it is a fundamental responsibility, and I hope you will all fulfill that responsibility.

  Democracy is only as good as the people participating in it, and we never get enough participation. Once elected, any politician has to think about getting re-elected, and that means doing things that he or she hopes will keep voters’ support. Now imagine political candidates appeal-ing for support so that they can implement programs that will cost enormous sums of money that may benefit “future generations.” It would be political suicide; yet that is what is needed to confront issues like climate change, toxic pollution, and habitat destruction.

  Children and future generations don’t vote, so they are not on the agenda. That’s why I urge parents and grandparents to be warriors on behalf of children. We have to put their interests and their futures on the political agenda and make politicians serve them as well as us. When there are deliberate attempts to monkey-wrench democracy, as when robocalls are used to misinform certain groups about where their polling stations are, all who believe in democracy should howl with outrage and demand that the perpetrators be punished and pledge not to condone or support such practices.

  Another suggestion: slow down. I mean, why are we in such a hurry? We are all going to end up in the same place— dead—and we lose so much in our rush to get through life, to do things, to go somewhere. I have sp
ent a lot of time filming in exotic places like the Amazon, the Arctic, Papua New Guinea, and Australia, yet often the pressure to “get stuff in the can” and move on to the next location means I have no time to take in the places I visit. Sometimes when I am back in Vancouver or Toronto and viewing the rushes, I will think, “Oh yeah, I kind of remember that,” and regret that I didn’t fully experience the place while I was there.

  Being thoughtful about how you live also means being kind and generous to others. I find I derive far more pleasure and satisfaction when I share with others than when I hoard something for myself, because the act of sharing affirms that we are members of a community and that the community matters to us. Even though we as a species have moved from living in rural villages to inhabiting big, crowded cities, we seem more isolated from each other than ever. It used to make me uncomfortable that in Japan, people always speak to you. Whether you get into an elevator or onto an escalator or when you enter a cab, you will be formally greeted or welcomed. But now I treasure those rituals as acknowledgments of my presence. We need rituals like that. Hartley Bay is a remote village of some two hundred people on Canada’s west coast. There are no cars there, since all the houses are connected by an elevated wooden boardwalk. So people are constantly walking along the boardwalk, and even though they may pass each other several times per day, they always greet each other with a “hi” or “hello.” To me, it’s as if each salutation is an affirmation that they know each other is there, and that they are together as a community.

  Today we retreat into our homes, which are twice as large as homes were forty years ago and are loaded with electronic entertainment. Even when we walk down the street, we wear earbuds hooked up to electronics or text or talk on our phones, shutting down our other senses, which inform us about the world around us, and shutting out other people. If you have ever taken an elevator for several floors or ridden a bus, you know that everyone avoids eye contact and finds ways to occupy themselves, including talking on a phone. There’s something wrong with that. In subways in Japan, there are signs everywhere admonish-ing people not to talk on cellphones because it interferes with the community of fellow riders.