strawberries in a top box

My new epitaph - "Not as reasonable as Colin"

Indeed. I was agreeing with you BTW.. On that point anyway.

We *do* need to be responsible on the ecological front to avoid
poisoning our own environment (and the more we learn about the
ecosystem the more we realise about how interconnected everything is -
while the death of a butterfly species in Amazonia probably isn't going
to have a huge impact on our ecosystem the massive die-off of bees
probably will - because they pollinate something like 40-50% of the
fruit trees..). I'm firmly of the 'move industry into space' persuasion
but I doubt that will happen in my lifetime.

Phil.

 

While we are on environmentalism does anyone else get irritated by the
whole 'innocent savage' schtick that people like the Inuit and American
Indians put out?

You know the whole "our ancestors lived in harmony with nature until
you evil white men turned up" guff?

It's easy enough to disprove but the new age types get very upset when
you do[1]..

Phil.

[1] One of whom was my former helpdesk admin. Who was a sucker for any
wacky idea going..

 

No, but seeing the bints knocking about without bras and with tits around
their knees, puts me off my chuck.

D.

 

You want short term, personal, financial gain in preference to The
Future Of The Planet? Jeez...

 

We grow strawberries here. We don't make Japanese motorcycles here.

It's reasonably easy for someone even my (currently) limited brainpower
to understand.

You want me to summarise the moral and ethical considerations for
having in-season, locally-grown produce?

I'm sure even you will have seen this before but here you go:

It supports the local economy.
It supports the local farming infrastructure without which we would be
even more dependant on imported food.
The fruit is fresher (generally - not always!)
It incurs less energy debt (note the in-season bit. The OP was quite
correct about out-of-season fruit grown in this country is probably
grown in a very energy-inefficient fashion).

This is by no means an exhaustive list.

Of course if you just follow the 'cheapest is best' philosophy none of
the above need bother you in the slightest.

Phil.

 

Because I was agreeing with one point you made while disagreeing with
others.

And hooray say all of me.

Phil.

 

I never would have guessed..

Well yes. But there are ways of minimising it (and driving Toyota
Prius' doesn't count) and even negating the effects. Given that those
things are possible shouldn't we be doing them?

I wouldn't say quite 'every aspect'..

It might only be a tiny effect if one person stops - but if a million
people stop it becomes a big effect. If one person walks/cycles to work
instead of driving it's will have vertually no effect - if a million
people do it it will have a big effect.

Its the accumilation of small effects into big effects that will make
the difference - not one big magic bullet.

Phil.

 

Because demand outstrips local supplies.

 

Heh, excellent point!

 

We don't grow American strawberries either. You may argue that English
ones are best, but in the same way one could argue that the range of
motorcycles available from European manufacturers is perfectly
adequate, so let's just not bother importing those nasty Japanese
ones, given the Energy debt it incurs.

I doubt he did.

Quite so.

--
_______
..'_/_|_\_'. Ace (brucedotrogers a.t rochedotcom)
\`\ | /`/ DS#8
`\\ | //' BOTAFOT#3, SbS#2, UKRMMA#13, DFV#8, SKA#2, IBB#10
`\|/`
`

 

I suspect you mixed up Phil's posts with mine. Next time, just watch out
for the feral apostrophes ... ;-)

Well at least it's frank.

For me, because I happen to have faith in humanity. Much of us are dirty,
smelly, selfish, egocentric arsewipes, but I agree with Theodor Herzl: man
is improving, albeit slowly.

But there is 'us', and I'd like to see future generations at least have
the _opportunity_ to **** up, or to 'do good'. The way it's going, we're
ensuring that they won't have the choice.

D.

 

Well we can reduce our impact on the planet. For example, I never throw
anything on the ground. I don't ride my bike to school 'cos I live 12
minutes away on foot. My Mac is up 24/24 and 7/7 but the screen is
switched off when I'm not using it, and indeed my last bill was 37EUR (EDF
debits my account every two months, so that's less than 20EUR a month).

I'd like to be remembered by the people I knew (and by my forthcoming
novels being bestsellers in forty-eight languages, naturally enough),
but I want to leave no discernible 'trace' on the planet (yes, I know it's
impossible).

D.

 

And this is because...

The supermarkets discovered it was cheaper to buy the chemical-ridden
stuff picked by peasants paid 1-penny-a-week the other side of the
world so the local growers stopped growing. And now it's presented as a
reason to carry on buying from said foreign sources..

Overseas supplies for fruit that we produce (in season) has been and
always will be about price.

Phil.

 

Only if you don't bother to think..

Phil.

 

Why let the future generations have all the fun?

Maybe *our* ancestors decided that *we* should be allowed the
opportunity to **** up!

 

They're looking down on us with contented smiles, then...

D.

 

Well - given that I'd challenge you to tell the difference between an
English strawberry and an American one I'd say that's a bit of a red
herring.

Whereas there is a considerable difference between (say) a Tiger and a
fireblade..

One could - if one wanted to carry an already strained and flawed
analogy right over the breaking point.

Fruit isn't motorbikes. Comparing the two is at best pointless (I was
going to say fruitless but that would be.. silly) and at worst
disingenuous.

Face, bovvered?

See you at Asda and Quiksave then.

Phil.