Save the Water; Kill the Whales
By: Brian Parks
This is an important time, for the United States of America and Lehigh University alike. In fact, it is so important a time that I had difficulty deciding what topic to choose as the focal point of this issue’s article. Ultimately, I chose a topic that has affected Lehigh recently, and forms a central issue within today’s politics: conservation of resources (water in particular).
Water is used for everything in our daily lives. Water is used for washing, drinking, hydroelectric power, and other such crucial aspects of our daily lives. As such, it is a resource that must be conserved, lest it suffer a similar fate that, according to liberals, will befall many other resources.
Lehigh University Dining Services saw this problem and acted quickly and without prejudice to do what they could to help conserve the valuable resource that is water. By removing trays from the Dining Halls, they not only cut costs, but also reduced the amount of water used for dishwashing, leaving it available for other more significant uses.
Worldwide, we see that conservation of water is rapidly becoming more and more critical. Polar ice caps are melting and Antarctic ice shelves are breaking free of the Antarctic landmass. Skies are becoming cloudier and cloudier, reducing the amount of water that is available for us to use. However, the biggest culprits of all are animals.
75% of the human body is water and the percentage is comparable for other animals. As the largest animals on earth, whales have the highest water content per body. That water is essentially inaccessible for human consumption, which leaves only one question: what can we do to liberate the water?
The answer is simple: kill the whales. Aside from containing an outrageously large amount of water, dead whales serve many other practical purposes. Many whales are an excellent source of oil (not petroleum-based, but still oil and still quite useful) and the meat off a good-sized whale could feed a village for several days.
The hunting and chase of the whales would also provide a much-needed catalyst to help out a struggling economy. For certain, there might be Jonah-style experiences and situations akin to that related in the Decemberists’ Mariner’s Revenge, but all-in-all it would be a benefit to society.
While still important, all this talk about the usefulness of dead whales has strayed from the topic at hand. Water is in danger, and is a valuable resource that must be conserved. Lehigh University Dining Services sees this as a major issue; as such, this is an issue that we should not ignore. Regardless of party, regardless of race, regardless of age, we need to stand up for the rights of Water.
