Once upon a time, there was a hypothesis created by the lovely Greeks called the Gaia Hypothesis. This hypothesis pretty much stated that the Earth is a living organism, just like you and me (and snails). So you would think that since the hypothesis was created way back when, that it should still be a general viewpoint in society today. But of course, I am getting ahead of myself there. Thanks to Rene Daecarte’s death (if only he was immortal) the world entered into its Modern phase. The Earth is now thought of as a machine and not an organism. You can definitely make the argument that society today, for the most part, still believes in this. However, there are those individuals that greatly stick out and prove that not all hope is lost. This didn’t start until the 1970s with James Lovelock, though. It’s horrible to think that centuries went past before people finally began to think about the horrific effect they were having on the environment, but I cannot (and neither should anyone) complain about the past. We should be thankful that at least now, people are finally caring! But wait just a second, are they really? Are people really caring about the environment now? Or have they just simply acknowledged the problem?
That’s pretty much it honestly: we all know there is a problem, but barely any of us are doing anything about it. The prime example of this in my opinion has to be the Rio de Janeiro. I can only slightly understand if those not living nearby the ecological disaster don’t do anything about it. But come on, even those living right there do nothing too! You would think that seeing the toxic fluid everyday might make you want to do something about it and not give up, since it’s presence is a constant reminder. But I guess not! I guess 470 tons of raw sewage being dumped there, along with 10 tons of solid garbage and 5 tons of oil isn’t enough to make people care. Neither is not being able to swim there, because who would want to swim alongside human excrement and diapers? I love babies, but no thank you! I sincerely wondered how all of that was even possible, but of course when you, professor, stated the facts (that as of April 2010, it was surrounded by ferry docks, a port, 16 oil terminals, 2 oil refineries, 6000 factories, domestic trash dumps, discharge of untreated domestic effluent, and large amounts of agrochemicals) it became very clear. The Rio de Janeiro is obviously incredibly polluted, to the point where now most of the water is sewage, filled with microorganisms that can cause liver cancer. Something in the water can cause cancer! Isn’t that always a green light for things to be done? It’s sickening that $1 billion was given to have it cleaned, which was more than enough according to scientists, but thanks to the always productive government nothing was done. $1 billion was completely wasted. They’re probably going to regret that now that the Olympics will be done there in 4 years. Of course, only when the world is watching and criticizing will something get done. At least, I hope so! If they still won’t clean the Rio, then I guess we can all safely make the assumption that it will never get cleaned.
I mentioned earlier that most people are in the acknowledgement phase of environmental justice. However, I would like to just give a shout out to the EPA, a group of people coming together to create an agency made to fight for environmental justice. They made two really important environmental programs in order to establish and maintain a healthy ecosystem, preserve & restore ecologically important habitat, attain water quality that supports recreational use, ensure that fish/shellfish are safe for consumption, ensure economic health & manage pollutants in estuaries. One of these programs is the Resource Conservation & Recovery Act (RCRA: 1976), which then morphed into the Hazardous Waste Management Program (1984). What I found most important and interesting about this program is that it monitored facilities that produce, transport, treat, store, and dispose of hazardous wastes (actually reminds me of vertical integration). This was an example of cradle-to-grave legislation and obviously gave the government a lot of power over companies that use hazardous materials. I am honestly not politically knowledgeable enough to make a stance on whether or not the government should have this much power, but I can tell the big businesses do not like this at all. And like usual, they always seem to win in the end.
General Electric Co made 1000 capacitors at plants in Hudson Falls & Ft. Edward in the late 1940s. In 1976, the company discharged 209,000- 1.3 million pounds of toxic waste into the Hudson River. What did this toxic waste consist of? The infamous PCBs! Polychloriated biphenyl is so dangerous in particular because of bioaccumulation; they end up disrupting and changing the DNA of a countless number of organisms. Even with this obvious negative consequence, General Electric still used it because PCBs is its cheapest option and dumping it in the River was also its cheapest method of disposal. Burning it was much too expensive and once PCBs go into the air, Lord knows what will happen then! So there we were in 1976, with way too much (understatement) toxic waste in the River. What does EPA say to do? Why, they mandate a clean up! That’s right, they order General Electric to clean up the horrible pollution they caused and make the River nearly spotless like it used to be. How does General Electric respond? By doing nothing until May 15, 2009. In case you haven’t noticed, that is a 33-year difference since the EPA mandate. I was ecstatic to know about the EPA, since I thought, ‘Yes! Finally, something will be done about the environment! And here I was thinking no one was doing anything.’ But hearing about this specific situation, and knowing there must be countless more, just puts me right back to square one. It’s disgusting, in my opinion, to have a company who obviously committed a serious environmental crime to be able to put off such a critical project for so long now. And not only that, but the toxic waste is now being put under red clay and polyethylene in Texas, which apparently will last about a century. Is no one thinking about what will happen after a century passes?
These past few classes really showed me that most people are just simply acknowledging that yes; the world is facing through an environmental crisis (among many other crises that are apparently more important) but they are not really doing anything about it. And even if they do, they just barely do. It’s really pathetic how much that really needs to change.
Duwa Alebdy
