nuclear-news

– 2013 – the struggle for a nuclear-free, liveable world

With nuclear power, nuclear weapons there is  a difference from cigarettes and asbestos. The smoker endangers mainly just his/her own health. That horrible cancer, mesothelioma, affects only those who work with, or are closely involved with, asbestos.

But there’s  a kind of sinister democracy in the nuclear and fossil fuel killers.

The wealthy people of the global corporations who now market the nuclear killers do face consequences themselves – in global warming, nuclear annihilation, radiation poisoning. In the immortal words of Tom Lehrer  –  “We will all go together when we go”

I find it hard to understand the mindset of those who push nuclear power as the solution to climate change. They know full well that any impact on global warming, of nuclear powered electricity would be minor – and many thousands of nuclear reactors would have to be built very fast even for that small effect. Meanwhile, the full nuclear power cycle – uranium mining to burying dead reactors produces huge amounts of greenhouse gases.  Worse still, nuclear reactors are especially vulnerable to the very features of climate change – water shortages, rising sea levels, extreme weather events.

At last, the world is waking up to the reality of climate change.

The world needs to wake up also to the reality of the nuclear threat – from both nuclear weapons and “peaceful” nuclear power. They have the potential to bring about drastic global change – both slowly through spreading ionising radiation, and quickly – through nuclear “events” or wars, which would bring about rapid destruction, and sudden nuclear winter.

In 2013 the global human family is up against the powerful forces of mainstream media. Television, Online news, Newspapers, Online magazines, Print magazines – and now, increasingly, “social media” is used to promote the agenda of the polluters.

It seems easier to just go along with “business as usual”. After all, everybody worries about “the economy”, “jobs” – and we will be told that our well-being depends on the success of nuclear and fossil fuel industries.   It seems easier to just go with that flow.  and most people probably will.