To: letters@guardian.co.uk
Re: Our addiction to the motor car is much more serious than we realise
Date: Wednesday 8 Jan 04

Dear Jackie,
 
In referring to our "addiction" to the motor car ("Divorce the car, and learn to love the traffic warden") you have hit the nail squarely on the head. Although I doubt you realise quite how serious an addiction it is; or that it is not just the motor car we are addicted to, but our whole materialistic, non-sustainable way of life.
 
Today's Guardian headline, "An unnatural disaster" throws yet another spotlight - yet again - on what a perilous situation Spaceship Earth is in.

I suspect that you use the word "addiction" as a metaphor. In fact, we are addicted in a terribly real sense. As a society and civilisation we are in a comparable situation to an individual on hard drugs, and facing the same hard choice: either to get off them or to perish. At the moment, however, we are not even facing up to our addiction, but still in denial - as the latest figures for car sales in the UK indicate ( "UK's love of motors pushes sales to 2.6m").