On Being A Killjoy

I don't feel awkward about it. It's what I've known for a long time. Perhaps it is to do with having been a vegetarian for 23 years; having been a birder for even longer; having been in awe of the Hertfordshire landscape where I grew up and learning through observation at an early age of the important and fragile balance that man and nature live in and appreciating how the latter gave far more than it received. I don't know. But I do know that I am a killjoy. And I'm proud of it.

What this means is that when I see a family on holiday - Mum, Dad, three teenage kids - in the high heat of a summer's afternoon taking their dinghy out onto a part of Bassenthwaite Lake which has been designated a 'no boating area' for conservation reasons I'll get worked up about it and I might even have a go. They won't understand. The father will get shirty and tell me to sling my proverbial; but I'll be adamant. It will cause a scene because they will maintain it's for the kids and that they are all doing no harm.

Well perhaps not. Perhaps.

But what if they are disturbing a nest site close by, or a particular breed of freshwater fish that warms itself in that spot at this time of year or, most likely of all, their feet as they paddle back or splash each other damage algae growing beneath the surface which hasn't had a chance to re-establish itself after years of just this sort of activity and is being brushed away from its rocky bed?

You see I'm a killjoy because someone has to be. Because there's no room left for partying at the planet's expense. We've destroyed the buffer, the comfort zone of 'allowable' damage. Yet we carry on as if any destruction to the ecology of a place is someone else's responsibility; and if questioned about it claim innocence through some non-existent moral high ground.

Being a killjoy means taking responsibility for other people's actions as well - like picking up their litter after they've had their picnic and left the rocky shore looking like their living room presumably. What I mean is would they live like that at home?

So I get angry and I mouth off. But, you see, it is important. We have no room left to blame others. We are all responsible now.

Three species of moth, including the dusk thorn and the hedge rustic, once common in the UK, have been discovered as now being close to extinction. Their numbers reduced by more than 90% in the last 35 years. Reasons for their decline include the oft cited and most obvious destruction of habitat, climate change and light pollution from street lights and from houses in the ever-encroaching settlements of the population. These moths have decreased their breeding because it never actually becomes night as they know it anymore, it's never dark enough. So the right conditions for some good moth loving never occur - result: no baby moths. No moth population. No moth dinner for, let's say, nightjars or bats. No nightjars or bats.

And that is kind of my point for having a go. Something, some creature, some habitat, is now constantly being affected by all that we do - and being on holiday does not mean responsibility ends. Tourism, as we are discovering, is responsible for a major contribution to greenhouse gasses, for Everest turning into the highest altitude refuse dump in the world (some claim to fame!). Not for nothing does it also have the moniker 'the tourist industry'. Time I think for a different revolution.

Cumbria 16/7/06