When I first started publishing my own books, I had lots of people criticize my efforts. People who seldom even wrote an e-mail and thought that was publishing, were telling me they never would have made the mistakes I made, or done it the way I did. They judged my every decision as if they knew better than me. I am glad I did not pay them much attention.
One of my heroes is now undergoing criticism and scrutiny and I hope he ignores it all. Boyan Slat, is a 24 year young man attempting to clean up the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, a massive expanse of mostly plastic flotsam covering an area the size of Texas. https://www.theoceancleanup.com
This is a monumental undertaking. The people who criticize the current systems failures have no idea what a formidable task this is, as huge and as complicated as going to the moon. And like going to the moon, has never been done before.
The ocean is a hostile, massive, deep body of water, with incredible powerful forces. This is not some environment you can write reports about and then everything will work fine. You have to get out there and experience it. And this is what Boyan Slat is doing.
We need to encourage people like Mr. Slat that he should never give up. We made it to the moon with far less technology and beyond. We can now clean up our oceans and restore the world. We can learn from our mistakes and revise and rebuild. One day Mr. Slat will be the most celebrated hero of the day.
Critics forget, this has never been done before. The only real way to make it work is to get it off the drawing board and go DO it. President Kennedy realized the same truth about going to the moon. We had to do it. Not just talk and write science fiction about it. The rubber has to meet the road.
Boyan Slat is my inspiration, an example of perseverance and resilience, doing something you and I could never do. He has the right attitude – learn from the mistakes and the unexpected and revise and rebuild until it works. We need to silence the critics.