Lumber Company Journalism
By Donella Meadows
–July 4, 1991–
The newspapers are scapegoating again — or rather scapeowling.
Lumber prices have shot up. One month ago a federal judge halted logging licenses in old-growth national forests to protect the habitat of the northern spotted owl. So we find on the front page of our local paper a big diagram showing an owl gazing down on a [...]
Environmental News Proves No One Right or Wrong
By Donella Meadows
–April 18, 1991–
You may have seen the recent and ominous headlines: SCIENTISTS FIND OZONE DISAPPEARING FASTER THAN EXPECTED. OZONE LOSS RAISES RISK OF CANCER.
Is this news terrible, or simply bad? What does it mean?
Some of the more excitable environmentalists say it means they have been right all along. The human race is unravelling the earth’s systems. We must [...]
The Lessons of War
By Donella Meadows
–March 7, 1991–
The war in the Gulf is over but the story-telling is just beginning, and the story-telling is, in the long run, the most important part of the war. What we choose to tell ourselves now will shape our future as powerfully as past stories have shaped our present.
Stories informed the decisions that led to this war [...]
The World’s First Electronic Magazine
By Donella Meadows
–July 5, 1990–
Once every two weeks the computer in my office gives me a beep to say the ESD News has arrived.
When I click back, the masthead of a 15-page magazine comes up on my screen. I can scroll through it, read what I’m interested in, skip over or even wipe out what I’m not. If there’s a [...]
A Nation Hyped on New-Jazz
By Donella Meadows
–October 26, 1989–
Once upon a time, not so very long ago, there was a place one could turn in this world of relentless, 24-hour, super-hyper news for quiet, useful information. That place was our local public radio station.
All morning long there was a slow-speaking, imperturbable host who read the news every hour, roughly on the hour, if he [...]
