Light Pollution Reflection / Refraction Number 5

Posted on October 26, 2007

WARNING:

I guarantee my reflections and refractions will create controversy and confrontation; and quite likely I'll step on many toes, but it's time to be brutally honest. So if you are thin-skinned proceed accordingly--take your hand off the mouse and back away from the computer.

Astronomers: Do You Really Want Dark Skies?

REALLY?

I’M not at all convinced astronomers want dark skies!

READERS respond to my Rs & Rs with rejoinders like: What, exactly, are you proposing? I'm already angry about light pollution, but your remarks just make me madder! How do I channel my energy and anger into some productive solution to light pollution?

IN Reflection and Refraction Number 2, Hey, Stargeezer, How Do I Sack Light Pollution? I tried to answer these questions (and others) before they were even voiced.

MY Rs & Rs seem to be stirring up a cosmic hornet's nest. Well, good! Telling people what they need to hear, not the easier, what they want to hear, often stings; but I've been stung so many times over the years that I'm immune!

HOPEFULLY, some of my stinging satire, point blank head-ons and sideswipes, in-your-face lampoonery and spoofery will awaken the astronomy community and motivate it to fight back, but I’m not holding my breath.

WHY can’t astronomers think of strategies to eradicate light pollution beyond the one’s currently being used? Look around! There are thousands of nonprofit organizations all over America, using dozens of successful strategies and techniques. Have you ever thought about using or modifying some of them to fight light pollution? What the Hell do you all do at those IDeAs meetings? Astronomy club meetings? Star parties? And don’t say observing, because if you don't conquer light pollution soon, you'll have nothing left to observe!

I suppose I could write up a bulleted list of steps--no more than five, of course--to suit the short attention spans so common today, all concise, compressed, n' condensed and sure to cure light pollution. Or perhaps a one-size-fits-all template with standardized directions, virus-free and easily downloadable. Or maybe a uniformly identical, logical, methodical, consistently high-quality, off-the-shelf, patented, prefabricated, precooked, homogenized, automated solution to light pollution! Whatever.

OF course, whatever solution I’d present, it would need to be dirt cheap and readily available from a local Home Depot, Super Wal-Mart, Lowe's, etc., or any one of the other many SOBs (Satans of Brightness) that contribute to the overall glow in the night sky!

IT Just Never Ends, does it?

SOME years ago, in several of the earlier versions of my website, I provided creative ideas and detailed instructions for alternate strategies to fight light pollution. Alas, they were mostly ignored...but then I'm not the "make-it-so" light pollution authority. Still, many of the individual words and phrases I used were quickly adopted (pilfered? purloined? plagiarized?) by dark sky groups as IDeAs of their own. Whatever.

AND back when my health was still relatively good (2000), I even suggested several unique tactics and techniques to get astronomers (and nonastronomers, too) off their full moons and involved... Again, ignored. Whatever.

AND you wonder why I don't express my own ideas much anymore?

ANOTHER reason I don’t often tell others how to eliminate light pollution is profoundly expressed by one of my favorite authors, Derrick Jensen, in his 2007 book, THOUGHT TO EXIST IN THE WILD. Derrick writes:

"I am not generally known for presenting tangible solutions to the problems we face. This is because for the most part these problems are symptoms of and endemic to deeper psychological and perceptual faults, which means "solving" a problem technically without addressing these underlying faults will simply cause the pathology to present itself in a different way."

LIGHT pollution is simply a symptom of far greater, more substantial issues, including THE SYSTEM and our LIFESTYLE. In other words, from my point of view, nothing will rescue starlight until we change THE SYSTEM Part 1. and change our LIFESTYLE Part 2.

LONG before current IDeAs--light laws and changing fixtures one by one--will cure the pathology of light pollution, the Milky Way will pass into oblivion. We might as well be shooting at individual streetlights and business lights with, well, empty water pistols and hoping for success!

REAL, substantive change will come in this country ONLY when ALL the people impacted by the pathology, not just the symptoms, rise up, revolt n' rebel! Are there no astronomers in this country willing to stand up to THE SYSTEM?

QUESTION: How many rallies, protests, gatherings, demonstrations, declarations, marches, ultimatums, renouncements, confrontations, parades, pickets, sit-ins, teach-ins, dissension's, etc., focused on light pollution have occurred across America the last 20 years? Certainly, there's been at least one, right? Whatever.

HAVE you heard about the national Step It Up 2007 event scheduled for Saturday, November 3rd. There'll be at least 150 nationwide actions in almost all 50 states, including one in Tucson, Arizona, home of the so-called light pollution authority.

IT'S still not too late--as I write this--to get involved. This small group of Step It Up volunteers have been working less than 2 years and already have a nationwide network of thousands of other volunteers who actually do something for the cause; and they have no glossy magazines with more than 100,000 readers to help them!

HOW many astronomers in your community will be attending one or more of these events and will "bring the message" of dark skies to the public? Go to:

Step It Up 2007

STEP up and stop enabling the SOBs. Or as I always write: Press forward with all possible dispatch to dispatch light pollution, a contributor to global climate change. Start a Dark Sky Revolution tonight where you live or say bye-bye to starlight!

JOIN THE DISCUSSION with your own reflections and refractions. Just click on my e-mail address below and have at it! I will not sell or give your e-mail address to anyone. Your reflections and refractions will be placed under the link to the left labeled "Fan Mail - Hate Mail." I may edit comments I place there, but I will be careful to retain your words wherever possible.

NO EXCUSES! NO EXCEPTIONS! NO COMPROMISES!