Yesterday the Washington Post ran an editorial with the title, "The Oceans Are Dying." (you have to subscribe to get access to it on-line)
Very nice. Glad that one of the most highly respected newspapers in the country has said this. Now we don't feel so bad about what we've been saying. We originally debated making "The Oceans Are Dying," the sub-title of our website, but feared it might be seen as an exaggeration. If it is, then the Washington Post is now guilty.
How things have changed in just over a year. It was only a little over a year ago that we completed our slide show, "Pristine?" and received complaints from three partner groups with two of them withdrawing from the project (though one of them eventually returned). They were upset by the statements that "fishermen now have the technology to catch all the remaining fish in the sea," and the question of, "who will be the rats and roaches that are left in the oceans?"
And then the Myers and Worm paper came out last May saying that there are less than ten percent of the large fish remaining. And now ... our slide show seems mild. Which is good. Progress is being made in communicating the overall story to the general public. There seems to be some slow realization that this is not the same ocean conservation message of Jacques Cousteau -- that things really have changed.
The thinking seems to be progressing from "preservation" to "restoration." Which means the idea of "shifting baselines" is more important than ever since no one will know what to restore things to if we have no clue of what the baselines were.
But regardless, there are definitely some signs of change and even hope in the effort to communicate the dire situation in the oceans.