You may or may not have seen on your social media timelines articles claiming that the Great Barrier Reef is dead. You may or may not have then kept scrolling and thought to yourself, “I’m not an marine biologist, why should I care?” Well let’s clear up some misconceptions right now about what’s going on in Australia’s Great Barrier Reef. The Great Barrier Reef is the largest living thing on Earth -coming in at 25 million years old. Here’s a fun fact: the Great Barrier Reef can be seen from space. This amazing natural wonder is undoubtably in danger of dying out, but it’s not dead yet, that’s the good news. Wait, don't stop reading now and forget about the issue at hand. The coral of the Great Barrier Reef is getting sicker by the second, the ecosystem is currently 22 percent dead.
On Tuesday, the Outside Magazine published an article online with the title “Obituary: Great Barrier Reef (25 Million BC-2016).” It was successful in getting people educated and talking about the Great Barrier Reef, but the problem is that article’s title was false. Its true that the Great Barrier Reef was devastatingly damaged by bleaching, rising sea level, and warmer ocean temperature, but it’s only 22 percent of the whole Reef is dead (according to the Great Barrier Reef’s Marine Park Authority). Everyone makes mistakes, so we should forgive them for pronouncing the Great Barrier Reef dead when it’s still hanging in there. We have to give them props for getting people talking.
If the article’s purpose was to serve as a type of metaphor for getting people to realize what is happening to the Great Barrier Reef, then the author did just that. The Huffington Post cleared up the concerns that the article inaccurately called the Great Barrier Reef dead when scientists prove otherwise. Here’s what you should take away from my article: the Great Barrier Reef is not dead, so let’s keep the conversation about the health of it alive and well. In other words, lately once something blows up on social media, we all talk about it and post our opinions for a couple of days and then forget that the problem exists and move on to the newest trend.
Like I said, I am not a marine biologist and I am 99.9 percent sure whoever is reading this is not one either. I set out to write this article because I want people to not give up hope or think of the Great Barrier Reef’s illness as a lost cause. Instead, I want people to understand why we are talking about it and keep this in the back of their heads so that it’s actual death can be prevented. Remember this controversy and face the facts of what climate change and pollution are causing.