WATER SHORTAGES, IGNORANCE, AND PREDICTIONS FOR VIOLENCE
Arizona has a severe water crisis. It’s been met with silence. State government has said almost nothing about it, and no action has been taken. It’s as if it doesn’t exist, or that the bountiful monsoon rains from this summer have suddenly erased a 26 year mega-drought.
Even with a record monsoon in 2021, shortages and drought conditions remain over 80% of the state. It’s not hard to predict that the shortages will become more severe in the future.
Remember fist-fights taking place over masks? That will look like child play when Americans are finally forced to ration it. My reasoning for stating that we will react badly is based on simple observation of how many people reacted to something as simple as a mask, a small piece of cloth placed over mouth and nose.
It takes little imagination to envision the day when fist fights will break out on lawns over water use and sprinklers. I see more anger when we are required to curtail regular showers, when golf courses and sports fields will be forced to cut back, and when we can’t use the water we want whenever we want. Americans don’t react well when being told what to do.
Many American people think they can do what they want, and that constitutes freedom. If that is true, you most likely have an enlarged sense of self-importance and entitlement. Doing what we want whenever we want is not freedom; rather, it’s the indulgence of pre-adolescence and displays that level of maturity.
Lake Mead, the reservoir which feeds the Colorado River, providing 39 percent of Arizona’s water, is at its lowest level since it was first built and filled in the 1930’s. READ THAT AGAIN. And the Upper Colorado Basin Snowpack fell below normal for the second year in a row according to NOAA snowpack winter data. Spring snowpack levels are 11 inches below normal, which contributes to low spring water levels.
Arizona politicians and officials stay silent and pretend nothing is wrong. It amounts to burying their heads in the sand while parts of New Mexico are observing a Stage I Water Shortage Emergency.
Stage I shortages call for voluntary citizen conservation and cutbacks. There are four stages identified when defining water shortages; a stage IV Emergency requires mandatory cutbacks on water use and violators will face water suspensions and $500 fines.
Rather than institute steps to use LESS water now, or even talk about conservation, the so-called governmental leaders (believing that technology will find a way to fix the problem), hope to build another draw canal from the Mississippi River to feed water GREED here. This will mean spending millions — if not billions — so that we may continue acting out the fantasy that clean water — even in the desert — is unlimited.
It’s either spend billions, or we, the citizens, change our behavior, conserve water, and act as if we really are in the desert. They don’t get it, so we will be required to teach and demand change from below just as any real change for the public’s good has always been due to pressure from below.
As politicians ignore this impending crisis and citizens delude themselves into comfort and joy, the obscene waste of water in the desert goes on as if we were living in the Great Lakes Region. Water rationing measures are needed now — as a quick band aid — but serious action will be required in the future. It’s because the climate is not just changing, but as Jeff Gibbs, director of Planet of the Humans has written, the planet is collapsing.
To stop climate change and civil disaster, everyone will have to curtail their consumerist habits. Nobody will like this, and it’s a truth that officials will not speak because it means changing our minds from our attitude of entitlement.
To avert serious action in the near future, or a response to a crisis, maybe we could ask our politicians to engage in some forward thinking. Ask them to publicly state that we need to:
Turn down the heat in winter.
Turn up air conditioning in summer.
Wash your car only occasionally, cut back once every several weeks or months or use a bucket.
Stop watering lawns.
Eat less meat — or none, it takes 10 times more water to create one pound of meat than it does one pound of grain.
Cut back on showers.
Consciously conserve.
Become aware of our water use individually.
More pointed: DON’T WASTE WATER.
This week, I picked up a copy of The Navajo Times where I read three articles on water use. The other news outlets seldom publish this information but I read in The Navajo Times three long and detailed water analysis articles. BRAVO to The Navajo Times.
It makes sense that the Dine Nation would hold water precious, for up to 40% of households still carry their water. Water IS a precious resource, but for most Americans, its far too easy to turn a faucet and get water without even thinking about it; therefore, its taken for granted.
If we want a future with clean water, change is required from all of us now and that means treating water as life. If we don’t, our children’s children will be justified in rightfully condemning us for our gross selfishness.
Politicians know their constituents don’t like hearing anything that’s not positive or anything inconvenient. As a result, the problems will grow more severe while leadership goes on fiddling as if all is ok, eating their pudding and fudging the facts.
But soon, when our adolescent American indulgences are pressed way beyond a minor inconvenience — like wearing a mask — and when the economics of water become inconvenient, divisive, and even violent, it will be too late to institute small measures.
