Gulf Oil Spill: A Symbol of What Fossil Fuels Do to the Earth Every Day, Say Environmentalists

Oil blobs and oil sheen are seen in the waters of Chandeleur Sound, La.,

Tuesday, May 4, 2010. (AP Photo/Eric Gay)

by Dan Froomkin
Published on Friday, May 7, 2010 by The Huffington Post

The leading edge of a vast oil slick started to come ashore in Louisiana on Thursday night, a shroud of devastation falling on America's coastline even as the blown-out BP oil well that produced it continues to belch millions of gallons of thick crude into the Gulf of Mexico for a third straight week.

At moments like this, it's hard to see any silver lining here at all. But it's possible there is one. Many environmentalists say that the wrenching and omnipresent images of filth and death are at last providing Americans with visible, visceral and possibly mobilizing evidence of the effects that fossil fuels are having on our environment every day.

More: http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2010/05/07

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If the earth does grow inhospitable toward human presence, it is primarily because we have lost our sense of courtesy toward the earth and its inhabitants. ~ Thomas Berry