论文部分内容阅读
On Route 11 north of Tuscaloosa,Ala.,last April,a pickup truck pulled up next to Greta Browne,and a young man began lecturing her about global warming. He had seen Ms. Browne’s T-shirt announcing that she was “Walking for the Climate,” and he wanted to set her straight. Humans,he told her,have nothing to do with heating up the planet.
Ms. Browne,65,a Unitarian minister from Bethlehem,Pa.,has encountered more than one global warming naysayer since last March,when she began a trek up the Eastern seaboard to draw attention to climate change. “Sometimes,you just have to stand up,” she said.
So far,Ms. Browne says,she has logged about 1,100 miles,walking from outside New Orleans to Rouses Point,N.Y.,near the Canadian border,where she will end her journey Saturday. A grandmother of three,she blogs for adults,and for children.
When she began the trip,Ms. Browne had hoped to attract crowds of other people to walk with her (think Forrest Gump running cross country in the 1994 film). Instead,it has been a mostly solo journey,which she describes as “a meditation,a prayer,” for Earth. Still,her shirt and her beckoning smile invite people to approach. Sometimes they pull their cars over and hand her fistfuls of dollar bills —— she is financing the trip with small donations,and her Social Security checks.
Sometimes people run up alongside and proffer water bottles,which she accepts,even though they violate her principles on garbage and waste. And sometimes they stop to tell her not to worry: God would never allow Earth to warm disastrously. She listens patiently and argues her case.
In choosing to promote her cause this way —— as opposed to,say,pressing for legislative change —— Ms. Browne joins a growing list of environmental activists who are hoping to draw public attention to the issue through stunts: Colin Beavan,for example,the writer who lived without toilet paper and electricity,or David de Rothschild,a self-described “eco-adventurer” in San Francisco who has built a boat made of reused plastic water bottles and plans to sail to Sydney,Australia.
As she has plodded along,Ms. Browne said,she has come to understand her journey as a one-woman survey of the American mindset on global warming,though one,she readily concedes,that is deeply unscientific. She says the trip has made her “more pessimistic.” “Mostly people think it is a problem,” she said,“but mostly they think it will not impact them anytime soon.”
A longtime member of the Green Party and the founder of a vegetarian cooperative restaurant,she has been concerned for years about global warming. But after she retired last year,she joined an environmental group and read “Six Degrees: Our Future on a Hotter Planet” by Mark Lynas. The book,which argues that most of humanity could be wiped out by the end of the century if Earth’s temperatures continue to warm,galvanized her.
As the child of Presbyterian missionaries,Ms. Browne lived in Brazil,China and Niger,and was used to a peripatetic lifestyle,so she decided to take to the road. Her role model was Doris Haddock,better known as Granny D,who in 1999,at age 90,walked across the country for campaign finance reform,generating both crowds and headlines.
Ms. Browne’s trek has not quite turned out that way,and,she says,her adventure has other shortcomings. To make the walk logistically possible,she has lived out of a 1982 van —— complete with gold-colored shag carpeting and rust velour sofas —— that is,by her own admission,“a disgusting gas guzzler.”
By living abstemiously on other fronts,she said she had managed to keep her carbon footprint to half that of the average American. She never eats out and,except for her T-shirts,all her clothes are second-hand. Even her white Clarks sneakers were bought from a thrift store.
On Sundays,she goes to Unitarian Universalist churches along the way. She has handed out fliers listing small actions people can take to fight global warming,like using compact fluorescent light bulbs and lobbying for schools to teach the subject.
Crowds or no,Ms. Browne says,she is convinced that she has reached people and “raised awareness.” She estimates that 500 to 1,000 cars pass her on the road every day and about 1 percent,she says,honk or give her a thumbs-up.
In the end,Ms. Browne said,she thinks that most people are sympathetic and want to do something —— just not too much. She was particularly discouraged by a woman who approached her after one church talk and said,“Oh,you are preaching to the choir. We already recycle.”
Ms. Browne remembers thinking that recycling was “so 1980s” —— perfectly good,she said,but not nearly enough in itself.“People just don’t see enough urgency to change their life,” she said. But she understands. She plans,to keep the van.
去年四月,在阿拉巴马州塔斯卡卢萨北部11号大道上,一辆轻便小卡车在格里塔·布朗身边停下,一个年轻人开始给她讲解全球变暖问题。他看到了布朗T恤衫写着她在“为气候而行”,于是他想纠正她的错误。他告诉她,人类和地球变暖没有关系。
65岁的布朗女士是宾夕法尼亚州伯利恒市一神教派牧师。为了让人们关注气候变化,去年三月她开始向东部沿海地区跋涉,迄今已经遇到了不止一个反对者。她说:“有的时候,你只需要坚持下来。”
布朗女士说,到目前为止她已经从新奥尔良郊区到靠近加拿大边境的纽约劳西斯角村步行了大约1100英里。本周六她将在那里结束她的旅程。身为3个孩子的祖母,她还为成年人和孩子们写博客。
开始行走的时候,布朗曾希望能吸引成群结队的人加入到她的队伍中(这个想法源自于1994年的电影《阿甘正传》,影片中阿甘横穿美国)。但事实上大多数时候只有她一个人。布朗把它描述成: 为地球“冥想,祈祷”。但她的T恤衫和迷人的微笑仍然吸引着人们走近。有时他们会停下车送给她大把的美元钞票——她旅行的资金来源是小额捐款和自己的社会保险金。
有时尽管有人污蔑她的理论是垃圾,他们还是跟在旁边跑,并为她递上瓶装水,对此她欣然接受。有时他们停下来告诉她不用担心: 上帝绝不允许地球发生灾难性暖化。她耐心地倾听,然后提出自己的理由。
同推动立法变革相反,布朗女士选择这种方式来推进她的事业。她成为了越来越多的环境保护行动主义者中的一份子,这些环境保护行动主义者们希望通过一些惊人之举来引起公众的注意:譬如,作家柯林·比万的生活中既没有厕所又没有电;居住在旧金山的大卫·罗斯切尔德称自己为“生态冒险家”,他用回收的塑料矿泉水瓶造了一艘小船,并计划乘这艘小船航行到澳大利亚的悉尼。
布朗女士表示,一路沉重而缓慢地走来,她开始慢慢把自己的旅行看成一个女性对美国人在全球暖化问题上的心态的调查,尽管她完全承认,这个调查非常不科学。她说这次旅行让她“更悲观”。 “很多人认为这是个问题,”她说,“但大多数人认为这不会在短时间内影响到他们。”
她是一名绿党的老成员,而且是一家素食合作餐馆的创办者,对全球变暖问题关注了多年。但在去年退休后,她参加了一个环境组织,阅读了由马克·林纳斯撰写的《六度变化:一个越来越热星球的未来》这本书。这本书极大地刺激了她,因为书上说如果地球持续升温,人类中的大多数将在本世纪末被灭绝。
作为长老会传教士的孩子,布朗曾在巴西、中国和尼日尔居住过,已习惯了漫游的生活方式,因此她决定上路。她的榜样是多莱丝·哈达克,也就是人们熟知的D婆婆。多莱丝曾在1999年以90岁的高龄为联邦竞选财政改革徒步横穿美国,获得了众人的关注,成为媒体的头条。
布朗女士的艰难跋涉结果大不相同。对此,她说自己的冒险有其他缺陷。为了从后勤上保障她的徒步旅行,她住在一辆1982年的大货车外面——里面有金色粗线毛毯和红褐色的天鹅绒沙发,用她自己的话说,那是“一个令人讨厌的吃油车。”
她说,通过在生活其它方面的节制,她已经成功地影响了一半的普通美国人。她从不在外面吃饭,除了她的T恤衫,她全部的衣服都是别人穿过的。甚至连她脚上穿的克拉克斯牌运动鞋都是从二手店里买来的。
星期天她去沿途的一神论信普救说者教会。在那里她把宣传册子发给大家,上面写的是人们可以通过做哪些小事来同全球变暖作斗争,如使用紧凑荧光灯电灯泡和游说学校来开设这门课程。
无论有没有人支持,布朗说自己深信她已让人们感受到这个问题并“提高了认识”。她估计每天有500到1000辆车在路上从身边经过,有1%的司机朝她摁喇叭打招呼,或竖起大拇指支持她。
最后布朗女士说她认为大多数人都具有同情心,并想要为此做点什么——只是不能做很多。在一次教堂演讲之后一位女士走过来对她说,“噢,你给唱诗班讲道。我们已反复利用了”,这让她非常沮丧。
布朗女士记得,当时她认为反复利用“太80后”了——非常好,但仅仅这样还不够。“人们只是不知道改变他们的生活是件多么迫切的事,”她说。但她也理解。她计划着继续自己的征程。
Ms. Browne,65,a Unitarian minister from Bethlehem,Pa.,has encountered more than one global warming naysayer since last March,when she began a trek up the Eastern seaboard to draw attention to climate change. “Sometimes,you just have to stand up,” she said.
So far,Ms. Browne says,she has logged about 1,100 miles,walking from outside New Orleans to Rouses Point,N.Y.,near the Canadian border,where she will end her journey Saturday. A grandmother of three,she blogs for adults,and for children.
When she began the trip,Ms. Browne had hoped to attract crowds of other people to walk with her (think Forrest Gump running cross country in the 1994 film). Instead,it has been a mostly solo journey,which she describes as “a meditation,a prayer,” for Earth. Still,her shirt and her beckoning smile invite people to approach. Sometimes they pull their cars over and hand her fistfuls of dollar bills —— she is financing the trip with small donations,and her Social Security checks.
Sometimes people run up alongside and proffer water bottles,which she accepts,even though they violate her principles on garbage and waste. And sometimes they stop to tell her not to worry: God would never allow Earth to warm disastrously. She listens patiently and argues her case.
In choosing to promote her cause this way —— as opposed to,say,pressing for legislative change —— Ms. Browne joins a growing list of environmental activists who are hoping to draw public attention to the issue through stunts: Colin Beavan,for example,the writer who lived without toilet paper and electricity,or David de Rothschild,a self-described “eco-adventurer” in San Francisco who has built a boat made of reused plastic water bottles and plans to sail to Sydney,Australia.
As she has plodded along,Ms. Browne said,she has come to understand her journey as a one-woman survey of the American mindset on global warming,though one,she readily concedes,that is deeply unscientific. She says the trip has made her “more pessimistic.” “Mostly people think it is a problem,” she said,“but mostly they think it will not impact them anytime soon.”
A longtime member of the Green Party and the founder of a vegetarian cooperative restaurant,she has been concerned for years about global warming. But after she retired last year,she joined an environmental group and read “Six Degrees: Our Future on a Hotter Planet” by Mark Lynas. The book,which argues that most of humanity could be wiped out by the end of the century if Earth’s temperatures continue to warm,galvanized her.
As the child of Presbyterian missionaries,Ms. Browne lived in Brazil,China and Niger,and was used to a peripatetic lifestyle,so she decided to take to the road. Her role model was Doris Haddock,better known as Granny D,who in 1999,at age 90,walked across the country for campaign finance reform,generating both crowds and headlines.
Ms. Browne’s trek has not quite turned out that way,and,she says,her adventure has other shortcomings. To make the walk logistically possible,she has lived out of a 1982 van —— complete with gold-colored shag carpeting and rust velour sofas —— that is,by her own admission,“a disgusting gas guzzler.”
By living abstemiously on other fronts,she said she had managed to keep her carbon footprint to half that of the average American. She never eats out and,except for her T-shirts,all her clothes are second-hand. Even her white Clarks sneakers were bought from a thrift store.
On Sundays,she goes to Unitarian Universalist churches along the way. She has handed out fliers listing small actions people can take to fight global warming,like using compact fluorescent light bulbs and lobbying for schools to teach the subject.
Crowds or no,Ms. Browne says,she is convinced that she has reached people and “raised awareness.” She estimates that 500 to 1,000 cars pass her on the road every day and about 1 percent,she says,honk or give her a thumbs-up.
In the end,Ms. Browne said,she thinks that most people are sympathetic and want to do something —— just not too much. She was particularly discouraged by a woman who approached her after one church talk and said,“Oh,you are preaching to the choir. We already recycle.”
Ms. Browne remembers thinking that recycling was “so 1980s” —— perfectly good,she said,but not nearly enough in itself.“People just don’t see enough urgency to change their life,” she said. But she understands. She plans,to keep the van.
去年四月,在阿拉巴马州塔斯卡卢萨北部11号大道上,一辆轻便小卡车在格里塔·布朗身边停下,一个年轻人开始给她讲解全球变暖问题。他看到了布朗T恤衫写着她在“为气候而行”,于是他想纠正她的错误。他告诉她,人类和地球变暖没有关系。
65岁的布朗女士是宾夕法尼亚州伯利恒市一神教派牧师。为了让人们关注气候变化,去年三月她开始向东部沿海地区跋涉,迄今已经遇到了不止一个反对者。她说:“有的时候,你只需要坚持下来。”
布朗女士说,到目前为止她已经从新奥尔良郊区到靠近加拿大边境的纽约劳西斯角村步行了大约1100英里。本周六她将在那里结束她的旅程。身为3个孩子的祖母,她还为成年人和孩子们写博客。
开始行走的时候,布朗曾希望能吸引成群结队的人加入到她的队伍中(这个想法源自于1994年的电影《阿甘正传》,影片中阿甘横穿美国)。但事实上大多数时候只有她一个人。布朗把它描述成: 为地球“冥想,祈祷”。但她的T恤衫和迷人的微笑仍然吸引着人们走近。有时他们会停下车送给她大把的美元钞票——她旅行的资金来源是小额捐款和自己的社会保险金。
有时尽管有人污蔑她的理论是垃圾,他们还是跟在旁边跑,并为她递上瓶装水,对此她欣然接受。有时他们停下来告诉她不用担心: 上帝绝不允许地球发生灾难性暖化。她耐心地倾听,然后提出自己的理由。
同推动立法变革相反,布朗女士选择这种方式来推进她的事业。她成为了越来越多的环境保护行动主义者中的一份子,这些环境保护行动主义者们希望通过一些惊人之举来引起公众的注意:譬如,作家柯林·比万的生活中既没有厕所又没有电;居住在旧金山的大卫·罗斯切尔德称自己为“生态冒险家”,他用回收的塑料矿泉水瓶造了一艘小船,并计划乘这艘小船航行到澳大利亚的悉尼。
布朗女士表示,一路沉重而缓慢地走来,她开始慢慢把自己的旅行看成一个女性对美国人在全球暖化问题上的心态的调查,尽管她完全承认,这个调查非常不科学。她说这次旅行让她“更悲观”。 “很多人认为这是个问题,”她说,“但大多数人认为这不会在短时间内影响到他们。”
她是一名绿党的老成员,而且是一家素食合作餐馆的创办者,对全球变暖问题关注了多年。但在去年退休后,她参加了一个环境组织,阅读了由马克·林纳斯撰写的《六度变化:一个越来越热星球的未来》这本书。这本书极大地刺激了她,因为书上说如果地球持续升温,人类中的大多数将在本世纪末被灭绝。
作为长老会传教士的孩子,布朗曾在巴西、中国和尼日尔居住过,已习惯了漫游的生活方式,因此她决定上路。她的榜样是多莱丝·哈达克,也就是人们熟知的D婆婆。多莱丝曾在1999年以90岁的高龄为联邦竞选财政改革徒步横穿美国,获得了众人的关注,成为媒体的头条。
布朗女士的艰难跋涉结果大不相同。对此,她说自己的冒险有其他缺陷。为了从后勤上保障她的徒步旅行,她住在一辆1982年的大货车外面——里面有金色粗线毛毯和红褐色的天鹅绒沙发,用她自己的话说,那是“一个令人讨厌的吃油车。”
她说,通过在生活其它方面的节制,她已经成功地影响了一半的普通美国人。她从不在外面吃饭,除了她的T恤衫,她全部的衣服都是别人穿过的。甚至连她脚上穿的克拉克斯牌运动鞋都是从二手店里买来的。
星期天她去沿途的一神论信普救说者教会。在那里她把宣传册子发给大家,上面写的是人们可以通过做哪些小事来同全球变暖作斗争,如使用紧凑荧光灯电灯泡和游说学校来开设这门课程。
无论有没有人支持,布朗说自己深信她已让人们感受到这个问题并“提高了认识”。她估计每天有500到1000辆车在路上从身边经过,有1%的司机朝她摁喇叭打招呼,或竖起大拇指支持她。
最后布朗女士说她认为大多数人都具有同情心,并想要为此做点什么——只是不能做很多。在一次教堂演讲之后一位女士走过来对她说,“噢,你给唱诗班讲道。我们已反复利用了”,这让她非常沮丧。
布朗女士记得,当时她认为反复利用“太80后”了——非常好,但仅仅这样还不够。“人们只是不知道改变他们的生活是件多么迫切的事,”她说。但她也理解。她计划着继续自己的征程。