Thoughts
I had sorta ranted out in someone's comment page, and it was somewhat interesting to me, so I thought I'd stick them into here

Edited from a comment I made in livia’s livejournal:

It IS difficult to keep motivated about "saving the world", when it all seems like such a hopeless situation, I'll admit that. But I figure it's not really any reason to not care.. Maybe it's a matter of surrounding yourself with like-minded individuals so that you can feed off of each other's energy.
And you are right in saying that it won't be in your lifetime that everybody will think the same way as you do, that people should work towards saving the world and being sustainable. And in a way, I doubt that will ever happen. Like you said, the world's such a fucking big place... I dunno if it's even possible to concieve a change on such a large scale. But it's all about the grassroots. Individual to individual, community to community, I think change will come about. And while it may never reach the upper echelons of society, it should be what people strive for right?

And sometimes, it boggles my mind to wonder as to why nobody in power ever thinks like "us", the idealistic environmentalists. I dunno, part of it is that I think that type of person isn't necessarily conducive to a political life of any sort, and even if there was someone that was like-minded, and worked their way through the system to a place of power, I think that their beliefs would change through that process, and their original passion diluted and diminished. I think that the very structure of society IS to perpetuate its current way of living, and not to do so is to destroy society as we know it. And I think that they realize this, and then, they become trapped, because they can't destroy society, nor can they continue to contradict their values.

I also think that people are reactionary by nature. In general, people have a mentality of "if it ain't broke, don't fix it", simply because modern life takes up so much of their energy. To live is to eat, to play, to earn the dough, to feed the kids, to pay the bills, water the plants, walk the dog, connect with friends, to go scuba diving, to procrastinate on the internet, to get smashed on weekends, etc....

I am guilty of this as well, and I wish I knew how to change. But I have no impetus to change from what I know is working in my life, to something potentially uncomfortable and difficult. And I think that a lot of people's apathy also stems from our collective disconnectedness from our surroundings: our land, our trees, our air, our food. There is no understanding of where and how things come to be. How often do people think about where they get their steak, or their salad, or fruit. Globalization and the media simply exacerbate this problem. Globalization makes it so that we have no chance of understanding where things come from. Our clothes are no longer made in one place. The stitching in Canada, the cloth in China, the buttons from Australia, the washing instructions from Cambodia, and so on. you know what i mean.
And the media, especially the news. The way that news is conducted today, in short 1.5minute clips, with randomly truncated quotes, render all news devoid of context. People rarely understand why things happen, just that they do, and as a result never learn. This applies to actual world events, not to entertainment news. By overwhelming us with useless information, it becomes very easy to become disconnected with the world, with no causality to events happening in the world today. There is a need to become reconnected with the land, to know who you are, and to set roots in where you live, like how David Suzuki described it in The Sacred Balance.
I'm not saying that everyone's needs to become a farmer/gardener, but simply that people need to take more pride and responsibility for the land in which they live.
In terms of people having different values and priorities... I get the idea from what you're saying is that the environment has intrinsic value and should be preserved at the expense of people's livelihoods. Maybe it's not the way you would word it, I'm not sure. But I dunno, I think that the right to a clean environment, clean air and water should almost be a right. That doesn't mean zero human activity, because that's simply not feasible. but there are many ways in which these seemingly conflicting issues can co-exist. Just look at eco-tourism, or agroforestry, or the myriad of creative ideas that are springing from the minds of people. And having to cut down trees to clear land for farming is one thing. Clearcutting thousands of hectares for profit, so that your family can all have matching gold chains, convertible colour changing cars is another.

Overpopulation is something that worries me. I can't fathom the fact that like every second there are at least thousands of people being born. that simply boggles my mind. And unfortunately, so many of these people will lead short, sad lives, of survival, conflict, hunger and sadness. It's depressing, to say the least. I don't think that even with advancing medical technology to "save the lives of millions, and to alleviate suffering" will do shit all. All that happens is that there's more people on a planet of fewer and fewer resources. There just needs to be some sort of population control, or else, it'll just be (or already is) like those population curves that increase exponentially until the point where it simply cannot be sustained, and then it will crash.

Anyways, sorry about the length.. Maybe I should just make this a post instead of a comment. hahaha! but thanks for stirring my brain. :)
And haha, I think it's interesting how you can really see how we're enviro scis.... ranting about the environment in our livejournals... haha we're so cool. :p