50th Earth Day virtually ignored!

https://pjmedia.com/news-and-politics/earth-day-is-irrelevant-on-its-50th-anniversary/

Yesterday was the fiftieth anniversary of Earth Day, the annual recognition of the importance of protecting our one and only home planet. But the response across the world was tepid at best. Despite the boast on Earth Day’s website that they have coordinated “1 billion individuals mobilized for the future of the planet,” there were only about 7,000 real-time viewers of their live broadcast at 1 p.m. on April 22, roughly one-millionth of the world population. By 8 p.m., when their “Concert for a Healthy Planet” started, the number of viewers had dropped to 3,303.

Coverage of Earth Day on April 22 was minor in the press as well—no mention at all when I checked the home page of the left-leaning Toronto Star or the right-leaning Fox News. Practically nothing appeared on the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation home page on April 22. To find anything on the event on the CNN home page, I had to scroll three screens down; five screens down for both The Washington Post and The New York Times.

[ Could it be something else is more important? ]

An obvious reason Earth Day was a bust this year, despite its semi-centennial, is that when faced with a real-world immediate health emergency, few people are thinking much about the environment right now. Indeed, in an April 21 Gallup poll, a full 45% of Americans said that the COVID virus was the biggest problem facing the U.S. In contrast, only 2% said that the environment/climate change/pollution was the top concern for the country, a third of the fraction who said health care and the economy were the top issues.