Like the rest of the commenters I feel horrified about this.
But why do I feel this way? The vast majority of buildings are demolished and recycled. What is about this one--the age, I assume? Maybe it's a symbol of humanity's time on the earth--but why is that personally important to me?
Maybe I'm nuts but I think it's fascinating to really dig into the "why" behind such a common emotional reaction.
Might not be the age, but the general mystery, undiscovered value and permanent loss of human history.
I mean, yes we tear down and rebuild buildings all the time, but no one is re-building these temples. Once it's gone no one is even thinking about building such a structure again because what purpose would it have? We barely even know the original function of a lot of ancient sites.
This is why I think there's more of an emotional reaction to ancient sites being destroyed, it's an unrecoverable piece of history that possibly hasn't even been fully understood.
It's a loss that can not be restored or studied further.
At the end of the day we don't really know how much value was lost, what was overlooked when the site was first discovered, etc.
This is fairly easy to dispute... people aren't even asking for clean water and clean air (we have those already!). They're asking for things like habitat preservation and biodiversity.
Here are the Sierra Club's top goals[1]:
- end use of coal, oil, and natural gas (this is three goals for them, but I see them as thematically linked)
This is a mix. They attack all three for being "dirty". They also attack oil because oil corporations are engines of political corruption (it strikes me that while this is something you can come up with if you're already against oil on principle, you're unlikely to decide, based on this, that you should be against oil). And, they attack oil and natural gas (I didn't check coal) because the extraction process causes "environmental damage".
- "Resilient Habitats"
Seems to be half about preserving existing ecosystems and half about preventing climate change. Nothing to do with clean water or clean air.
- "Protecting America's Waters"
Definitely a clean water issue.
Here are Greenpeace's "What We Do"s[2]:
- Protecting Ancient Forests
"We're working to create a world with zero deforestation." This is a stasis issue.
- Protecting our oceans
Unlike the Sierra Club, Greenpeace is not worried about water pollution. It's worried about overfishing (and especially overwhaling). This is another stasis issue.
- Stopping Global Warming
Yep, a stasis issue.
Look at my sibling comment -- the problem with destruction of this buried temple is that the loss is irrevocable. It's not that the temple was in use for any purpose (it wasn't), or that there could have been a future use; it's just that something we "had" is now gone.
Don't confuse the reason a movement began with the same movement's current goals. Movements do not cease just because they've achieved their goals.
I hope Belize and other such places learn their lesson from this about leaving important places unprotected. For instance, if someone can blow up Giant Crystal Cave of Mexico, just for the fun of it, someone will, eventually.
It's not as if there is a shortage of stupid people anywhere.
Yes, and when local governments lack the power, desire and/or resources to protect heritage sites, can the larger world community step in, and how? Perhaps start by buying the land where such sites are located?
Sure, the private-property solution can work well, as can active governmental protection. In this case though, Belizean laws made the destruction easy. This monument was on private property, but the monument itself was under government "protection". The owner of the land had no incentive to protect it.
Unfortunately, I doubt that anything (beyond a few incensed academics) will come of this. That, to me, is the true tragedy because it virtually ensures that it's only a matter of time before this happens again.
I say strip them of their rights and ship them to Afghanistan to have a drink with their buddies who blew up the 1,500-year old Buddha statues there... (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buddhas_of_Bamiyan)
But why do I feel this way? The vast majority of buildings are demolished and recycled. What is about this one--the age, I assume? Maybe it's a symbol of humanity's time on the earth--but why is that personally important to me?
Maybe I'm nuts but I think it's fascinating to really dig into the "why" behind such a common emotional reaction.