more light; less heat

We can never protect ourselves from every single scenario.
You 'didn't need to hear this'? Bzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzt. Wrong.

History has repeatedly taught us how vulnerable we are at times, yet our instinctive reaction to natural disaster is to target a series of scapegoats to focus the blame - since the Causes are too difficult! - and then invest in an exercise to 'ensure it can never happen again.'
Even when we know, deep in our brains, that it probably will.
Much as it's human nature to seek them, there are no easy answers.
Particularly for those of us who choose to live in Paradise … in the middle of one of the most combustible forests in the world.

Blame 'the greenies' all you like if it floats your leaky McBoat.
In joining this tiresome game, I'll take a slightly more rational course: I blame the increasing ascendancy of 'Wants' over 'Needs'.
We stomp across the planet in our quest for repeated self-gratification then wonder why systems start to break down.
It ain't rocket surgery.
Overconsumption: climate change: erratic weather patterns: stuffall rain: drier bush: reduced opportunities for strategic FRBs (… which are, incidentally, endorsed by your 'greenie' scapegoats).

I expect a lot of really useful outcomes from the Royal Commission.
Hundreds of people should never die in vain.
But we'll never be invulnerable.
That's one piece of useful knowledge reaffirmed during my few hours of 'mortality' last Monday.

Something that seems to have gone 'AWOL' over my lifetime is personal autonomy, yet - unless we are prepared to take full responsibility, in every sense, for the consequences: our destiny - we simply don't deserve 'autonomy'!

Invest a few minutes in this article.
Most of the Comments are also worth reading.
(The intro follows. I'd dispute its claim that It is the other side of the story, since the 'story' is way too complex for a dualistic debate, yet it offers a series of valuable insights that need to be brought to the table.)

Hazard Reduction: The Blame Game
February 18th, 2009

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The Bushfires in Victoria were a paradigm-shifting event - gripping, terrifying and devastating for dozens of communities and hundreds of families…The news was shocking in its magnitude and the disaster will have enormous consequences for land management and housing development across the nation. Professor Poongschtok is an alias for one of Real Dirt’s most informed readers. He knows what he is talking about so his piece may be long but every word is worth reading. It is the other side of the story.

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