Mercy Mercy Me

   “Whoa mercy mercy me

  Oh things are not what they used to be, no, nn’

  Oil wated in the ocean and upon ourselves, fish full of mercury”

    “Mercy Mercy Me (the Ecology),” Marvin Gaye

 

Marvin Gaye (above) grew up in a Washington, DC, housing project and after a stint in the air force, had a string of hits with Motown Records.  On June 1, 1970, inspired by Earth Day, he recorded “What’s Going On,” but Motown mogul Berry Gordy refused to release it, claiming it was too political.  After Gordy finally bowed to Gaye’s ultimatum a year later, the song and album reached number one and yielded the hits “Mercy Mercy Me” and “Inner City Blues.”  Known as the “Prince of Soul,” Gaye continued to have success, including the 1982 smash hit “Sexual Healing.” In 1984, on the eve of his forty-fifth birthday, his father shot him dead after a physical altercation in his parents’ home.

 

Earth day 1970 was a response to several recent environmental disasters, including the Cuyahoga River in Cleveland catching fire and a huge oil spill off the coast of Santa Barbara, California.  While Earth Day had broad popular support, a few antiwar activists were skeptical, believing it was an establishment effort to distract from protests over the Vietnam War.  Nevertheless, inspired by Rachel Carson’s 1962 bestseller “Silent Spring” and the civil rights movement, an estimated 20 million people took part in demonstrations across the country. The movement led to bipartisan legislation regarding air and water quality as well as the banning of certain insecticides and the protection of endangered species.  Earth Day has continued annually, and Trump’s efforts to roll back health and safety standards, combined with fires and flooding attributed to global warming, has brought increased attention to the impending dangers to planet Earth.

 

High school friend Gaard Murphy Logan turned me on to Jane Fonda’s “What Can I Do? My Path from Climate Despair to Action.” Fonda offered to hold zoom meetings with small groups to discuss her new publication, and Gaard’s book club has scheduled one for later this month. Dedicated to “the next generation of climate activists,” Fonda wrote that when young she believed activism was a sprint; in middle age she learned it was a marathon; and at 82 she realizes that it is a relay race.  Well put.

 

Sixty years ago, a week at Big Sur Hot Springs with Human Potential Movement activists who later founded Esalen Institute transformed Fonda’s life and gave it meaning being a successful actress.  After a decade in the antiwar movement she became devoted to environmentalism. In recent years she was feeling impotent in the face of public apathy despite overwhelming warning signs until she read Naomi Klein’s “On Fire: The (Burning) Case for a Green New Deal.” Klein profiled 16-year-old Swede Greta Thuunberg, who launched a Friday for Future movement involving student strikes on behalf of climate change.  Because Thunberg was autistic, upon learning the stark facts about the destruction of the planet’s ecological balance, she was unable to compartmentalize or cope with the public’s seeming indifference and her first reaction was to stop eating or speaking. In time she single-mindedly devoted her life to the cause. 

Inspired by Thunberg, Fonda decided to move to Washington, DC, and, in conjunction with Greenpeace, organize Fire Drill Friday activities for several months in the nation’s capital.  The events included teach-ins and rallies, sometimes culminating in arrests of prominent celebrities, such as Ted Danson and Sally Field, for trespassing on government property.  During a Greenpeace planning meeting Fonda met young Vietnamese artist Vy Vu and asked where she was originally from.  “Hanoi,” Vy Vu replied.  When Fonda said she’d been there several times, Vy Vu asked the reason why.  Fonda wrote:

    I loved it.  There was no reason Vy should know all I had done to oppose the Vietnam War, decades before she was born, or for her to know that because of my trip in 1972, in some political circles they still refer to me as Hanoi Jane.

Fonda’s unforgivable sin in the eyes of many was to pose for a propaganda photo on an anti-aircraft vehicle, for which she has since continually apologized.  A false rumor spread that Fonda had even fired at American pilots dropping bombs on Hanoi.  Some folks continue to refuse to watch her movies, and at Cressmoor Lanes in Hobart urinals contain “Hanoi Jane Urinal Targets” for bowlers to piss on.

 

“What Can I Do?” features a dozen essays by experts of all political stripes, including “The Plight of Sea Turtles” by Whitney Crowder (on left), sea turtle rehabilitation coordinator at Gumbo Limbo Nature Center in Boca Raton, Florida. I learned that young sea turtles are starving to death due to their stomachs being clogged by plastic. Some turtles become entangled in discarded fishing nets; others develop tumors on their flippers and eyes, blinding them and rendering them unable to swim. Crowder declared: “Sea turtles are an indication of the health of our oceans. Without healthy oceans, life on earth cannot exist.”