I recently attended the National Wildlife Rehabilitators Association (NWRA) Symposium in Bellevue, Washington. For those of you unfamiliar with this, it’s a week-long conference where wildlife rehabilitators from around the country and even some parts of the world meet to learn and share new techniques to make the challenging practice of wildlife rehabilitation smoother and better for the animals. Lectures were given all day from veterinarians, other rehabilitators, education animal trainers, and others.
While the information given was extremely valuable, there was one very visible, resounding observation: women are the very dominant gender in this field. Out of every room full of around 100 women, perhaps one or two men were seen on average. Most of the men that did attend were veterinarians or worked only with the “cool” and dangerous animals (bears, eagles, and hawks, for example). The NWRA Board of Directors is sixteen people strong, and all but one are women. This was mentioned in a lecture I attended titled “Education or Condemnation: Face to Face with your Fellow Rehabilitators.” Who admitted it out loud? A man who, before making this exclamation, called rehabbers “the most dysfunctional group of people” he’s ever seen. He made it in jest, of course, and followed it with his observed appreciation of the field. But we soon got into the discussion: Why are there more women in wildlife rehabilitation than men?
A few other professions dominated by women include education, social services, and healthcare fields. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics in 2006, women make up 97.7% of pre-K teachers, 82.2% of elementary and middle school teachers, and 56% of secondary school teachers (high school), dropping to 46.3% for post-secondary education (like prep colleges or community colleges). 73.4% of healthcare professions are women, with 91.3% of nursing professions, and 91% dieticians or nutritionists. Healthcare support (which includes home nursing, massage therapists, and home health aides) accounts for 89.4% of women employed compared to men. Social workers are 82.6% women, with an overall 61.6% of women in social services. What do all of these professions have in common, and why are there more women than men? These professions are the so-called “nurturing” professions and have been labeled by some men as not “real” professions, because women are “naturally” more nurturing than men.
Is it because men are less nurturing or is it because of some societal standard that “real men” do “real work” like heavy lifting or operating machinery? It’s a clear distinction that in the education field, as children get older, the less likely they are to have a woman teacher. In my university alone I have been taught by a total of four women in my six semesters here. Men dominate the zoology field here, and most of them are doing research that involves trapping, killing, and opening up animals to collect data. The head of the cooperative wildlife research lab on campus is rumored to be against wildlife rehabilitation, claiming that animals should adapt to us, and we don’t need to allow more raccoons and squirrels in the world to live. I have yet to meet a woman with the same sentiment. I digress.
I once saw a book at a local book store titled “If Women Ran the World, Shit Would Get Done.” I haven’t read the book, but the title has stuck in my mind ever since. Some men may think that women are weak, and that nurturing-type jobs aren’t real jobs at all. But if it wasn’t for women nurses and healthcare technicians, men could quite possibly be walking around with broken legs and systemic infections without being nursed to health by a supportive, caring woman. Families would be in a state of utter chaos without the dedication and compassion of women social workers. Children wouldn’t grow up appreciating life and animals and the environment because the non-nurturing men wouldn’t reinforce a caring, appreciative attitude, and then who knows what the state of the world would be in today.
OK, I may be exaggerating or stereotyping here. I agree that men provide may types of supportive services us women would be lost without. According to the same Bureau of Labor statistics above, the logging industry is made up of only .4% of women. That’s four women for every 1,000 men that provide us with wood for buildings, paper, and other necessities. Men also make up the majority of the workforce in sanitation, hard labor such as construction and mining, and farming practices. However, to scoff at the less intensive work us women do as any less significant is ignorant.
To touch back on the wildlife rehabilitation part of this: the guys who volunteer at the wildlife rehabilitation center I volunteer at generally are more interested in doing construction, feeding the bobcats or cougar, or love to watch the birds of prey descend and kill their daily live mice. Most of them have little to no interest in the squirrels, the baby animals (unless it’s a baby predator), or the raccoons. Many of them will go on to work with large predators like big cats or raptors and rarely handle other less “interesting” wildlife. Likewise, a large majority of male undergraduate students that I’ve come to know in the zoology department are avid hunters and are more interested in game species (deer, waterfowl, gallinaceous birds, and other big ungulates) and the management aspects of them compared to the management aspects of protected or non-game species.
More animals that come into wildlife rehabilitation centers with human-caused injuries were inflicted by men. Forgive me; I don’t have statistics to back this up. I suppose I’m generalizing, but I find it hard to believe little girls or women are shooting eagles and red-tailed hawks. Men completely eliminated passenger pigeons, once the most abundant species on Earth, with brutal methods of trapping or killing by the thousands. It seems that more environmentally devastating political decisions and actions are created by men. Sure, some women are responsible for completely barbaric decisions (Sarah Palin and the aerial gunning of Alaska’s wolves, for example) but Reagan and George W. Were probably some of the worst influences on the environment in recent history (my lack of political knowledge, however, admittedly probably makes that an ignorant statement). I’m curious to know the statistics of women supporting or suggesting engagement in a war or battle compared to men. We hear far more often of negligent men in the military killing, raping, and abusing women in foreign lands. Men are, without question, more violent and less diplomatic than women.
The conclusion I've come to here is that women are more important in the workforce than men may think we are. We’ve come a long way from objects and homemakers to some of the most important professions in the world. Our natural aptitude to care and nurture others is unmatched, and the world would be lost without it. Should more men become the same way and join women in the same professions, or should some women embrace the rugged, physical side of the male workforce? I think a combination of the two would teach us all more tolerance when it comes to either side of our natural instincts, and could possibly eliminate a lot of the current corruption, competition, unfairness, violence, and brutality in the world. Equal opportunity for the world.
Monday, April 26, 2010
Wednesday, February 3, 2010
The Environmental Roadblock
Most people, when hearing the news of a company tearing down a tract of rainforest, would cry out in protest. Images come to mind of thousands of acres of trees being cut down, wildlife running desperately for life, streams being polluted in the wake of the machines causing such carnage, and a public outpouring of sympathy would follow. To hear of environmental devastation evokes compassion in most people, and many of them will fight to prevent such a thing.
Every day we hear of bills going to congress on clean coal technology, protecting endangered species, drilling for oil in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, climate change, pollution, and many other environmental issues. Millions of dollars are poured into creating such change or preventing it. Mostly, we know that preserving and protecting the environment is the right thing to do.
But at what point do we really fight for it? I’m a huge environment proponent, but I admittedly do several things I could stop doing to really help the planet. I have increasing anger for the practice of mountaintop removal (for those not familiar with mountaintop removal, it’s a process where the entire top of a mountain is stripped of trees and blasted off, or removed, to extract coal to keep our electricity flowing) and the environmental devastation it causes as well as the serious health risk posed for residents around such operations. Yet, this post is coming to you from my laptop, plugged into my outlet, underneath an electric lamp, as I watch TV and listen to the TV on the stereo plugged into it. In the corner, my roommate’s snake basks under its heat lamp, and I sit cross-legged on my couch in my comfortably heated home, eating soup heated on my electric stove.
In an ideal world (well, at least mine) we would live in houses we built ourselves, tending to our own personal gardens, hunting for our own meat using natural tools, under natural light or candle light, cooking over fires and being completely self-sustainable. Not to mention our population would be reduced by several billion because of smart, voluntary population control.
This is not an ideal world. Humans are ever prevalent and will continue to be. Most, if not all, of us will not be able to give up what luxuries we have in order to prove a point. We have come to rely on technology, transportation, mass-farming practices, electricity, and convenience to get us through life. And why shouldn’t we? We as humans have the capabilities of creating these things, why not embrace our intelligence?
Let’s revert back to the ideal world situation. The houses we built must be made by wood from trees we must cut down. Our garden plots must be made by clearing even a small portion of land. Many of the vegetables and fruits we’ve come to know and love today are some sort of genetic manipulation and do not occur naturally. These gardens might even give way to future exotic, invasive species. Our candle light must be made by some type of wax, which would involve the exploitation of bees. Ways to counter disease would be sought after, starting the medical and pharmacology industry. The point I’m trying to make here is that our ancestors did start here at one point. The growing population gave way to these new technologies and more land to be cleared, making way for bigger and better things. No matter where we start from, it will inevitably lead to the same point.
I’m not saying that this technology will save us, or that our human nature is an excuse for the state we leave the world in today. Our gross waste of nearly everything has put us in a pollution nightmare across the globe. Our growing technology leads to greenhouse gas emissions that threaten our climate to possibly catastrophic conclusions. We are in danger of losing our natural resources, which no one can ignore is very finite.
The problem here is how we curb this very severe problem. It’s unrealistic to think that humans can change 360 degrees and stop waste altogether. Our growing population demands more energy use, and that means more coal. If it’s not coal, it’s wind turbines with a threat to avian creatures, or solar panels which will only work when the sun is out. Nuclear power is the next option, which is a serious health and pollution problem. No matter what we choose, any “solution” will lead to the use of some sort of natural resource and not be 100% foolproof.
The unfortunate thing is that one would think the technology we’ve amassed so far would find a way to remove the waste we’ve amassed, to solve our problems, allow us to keep this planet living for longer and more naturally. It seems that human compassion has left those who are in every position to get a head start on these possible solutions, and instead replaced with greed, indifference, and ignorance. What energy that could be used to turn the world around instead fuels the drive for bigger, better, and more profitable. Some even say that more people in the world would be the best thing to happen to us; the more minds on the earth, the more possibility of developing a magic solution to cure the world’s ills.
Politics play a big role in how our environment and planet survives underneath our growing population and technology. Economics is a very close second, if not first. As people continue to inhabit this earth, our resources to continue living must come from somewhere. We argue that we shouldn’t drill in the ANWR, yet there is no doubt in our minds that we need oil to make the gas for our cars or the plastics that we’ve come to depend on. Our increased dependence on foreign oil is something we all agree we need to curb, yet we also don’t want to destroy a wilderness to get a few million, finite gallons of oil to satiate our consumption. It raises the question: why do we care about this wilderness? Does the wilderness, that relatively few people ever trespass upon, have any direct effect on us? Isn’t it true that the oil underneath the wilderness is more useful to us, as humans, than the plants and animals within it? This goes into an entire philosophical debate that could take pages and pages to ponder, but it’s something to think about.
There’s no denying that humans are here to stay, and that our needs have to be met. No one is going to volunteer him or herself in order to reduce the population to stop the exploitation and consumption of resources so that fifty years from now we’re not all in some serious trouble. We all recognize this problem; yet in a sad twist of fate can do almost nothing about it. People recycle mostly for the “feel good” factor, to feel like they’re doing something good for the planet, when in reality it’s a very, very small piece of the puzzle. It’s a rather daunting scenario and difficult to tackle. It’s this frame of mind that fuels the bigger corporations and companies to exploit every resource possible.
There is no simple solution to any of this. I’m not suggesting that our exploitation and resource use is OK by any means. We, as humans, have become disconnected and greedy. The earth is no longer about balance towards all things on this planet, but solely on the human race. We desecrate land in order to support ourselves without regard to other organisms that might depend on it. We’ve not only eliminated all competition against our resources (the removal of predators against deer, for instance), but we’ve begun to turn on our own kind. While people in big corporate or political offices are shouting phrases like “drill, baby, drill”, people suffer and die from lack of adequate food, water, or housing. Plants and animals critical not only in each other’s food chains, but ours, are disappearing and becoming extinct at rapid rates due to our expansion and destruction. How much or how long will it take before we reach our limit and realize we’ve gone too far? Can we really rely on technology to pick up the slack once we’ve destroyed everything? It is these natural places, these plants, animals, and natural phenomena that keep us as humans inspired to look at more than just ourselves, beyond just the human race. It seems to me no coincidence that those of us in the life sciences are more compassionate, more willing to help out each other and other organisms while those who are money-interested are self-involved and only look within.
So what do we do? We can’t focus on what we’ve already done; that ship has sailed, and we can’t change the past. Yes, we need to reduce our waste, but we also need to find a way to convert what waste we’ve already made into something usable. The earth won’t be able to support us forever, no matter what technology we might depend on to save us. Eventually humans will discover their carrying capacity, and we need to be prepared to deal with the consequences and handle our mistakes. How we go about doing that is no easy answer.
Every day we hear of bills going to congress on clean coal technology, protecting endangered species, drilling for oil in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, climate change, pollution, and many other environmental issues. Millions of dollars are poured into creating such change or preventing it. Mostly, we know that preserving and protecting the environment is the right thing to do.
But at what point do we really fight for it? I’m a huge environment proponent, but I admittedly do several things I could stop doing to really help the planet. I have increasing anger for the practice of mountaintop removal (for those not familiar with mountaintop removal, it’s a process where the entire top of a mountain is stripped of trees and blasted off, or removed, to extract coal to keep our electricity flowing) and the environmental devastation it causes as well as the serious health risk posed for residents around such operations. Yet, this post is coming to you from my laptop, plugged into my outlet, underneath an electric lamp, as I watch TV and listen to the TV on the stereo plugged into it. In the corner, my roommate’s snake basks under its heat lamp, and I sit cross-legged on my couch in my comfortably heated home, eating soup heated on my electric stove.
In an ideal world (well, at least mine) we would live in houses we built ourselves, tending to our own personal gardens, hunting for our own meat using natural tools, under natural light or candle light, cooking over fires and being completely self-sustainable. Not to mention our population would be reduced by several billion because of smart, voluntary population control.
This is not an ideal world. Humans are ever prevalent and will continue to be. Most, if not all, of us will not be able to give up what luxuries we have in order to prove a point. We have come to rely on technology, transportation, mass-farming practices, electricity, and convenience to get us through life. And why shouldn’t we? We as humans have the capabilities of creating these things, why not embrace our intelligence?
Let’s revert back to the ideal world situation. The houses we built must be made by wood from trees we must cut down. Our garden plots must be made by clearing even a small portion of land. Many of the vegetables and fruits we’ve come to know and love today are some sort of genetic manipulation and do not occur naturally. These gardens might even give way to future exotic, invasive species. Our candle light must be made by some type of wax, which would involve the exploitation of bees. Ways to counter disease would be sought after, starting the medical and pharmacology industry. The point I’m trying to make here is that our ancestors did start here at one point. The growing population gave way to these new technologies and more land to be cleared, making way for bigger and better things. No matter where we start from, it will inevitably lead to the same point.
I’m not saying that this technology will save us, or that our human nature is an excuse for the state we leave the world in today. Our gross waste of nearly everything has put us in a pollution nightmare across the globe. Our growing technology leads to greenhouse gas emissions that threaten our climate to possibly catastrophic conclusions. We are in danger of losing our natural resources, which no one can ignore is very finite.
The problem here is how we curb this very severe problem. It’s unrealistic to think that humans can change 360 degrees and stop waste altogether. Our growing population demands more energy use, and that means more coal. If it’s not coal, it’s wind turbines with a threat to avian creatures, or solar panels which will only work when the sun is out. Nuclear power is the next option, which is a serious health and pollution problem. No matter what we choose, any “solution” will lead to the use of some sort of natural resource and not be 100% foolproof.
The unfortunate thing is that one would think the technology we’ve amassed so far would find a way to remove the waste we’ve amassed, to solve our problems, allow us to keep this planet living for longer and more naturally. It seems that human compassion has left those who are in every position to get a head start on these possible solutions, and instead replaced with greed, indifference, and ignorance. What energy that could be used to turn the world around instead fuels the drive for bigger, better, and more profitable. Some even say that more people in the world would be the best thing to happen to us; the more minds on the earth, the more possibility of developing a magic solution to cure the world’s ills.
Politics play a big role in how our environment and planet survives underneath our growing population and technology. Economics is a very close second, if not first. As people continue to inhabit this earth, our resources to continue living must come from somewhere. We argue that we shouldn’t drill in the ANWR, yet there is no doubt in our minds that we need oil to make the gas for our cars or the plastics that we’ve come to depend on. Our increased dependence on foreign oil is something we all agree we need to curb, yet we also don’t want to destroy a wilderness to get a few million, finite gallons of oil to satiate our consumption. It raises the question: why do we care about this wilderness? Does the wilderness, that relatively few people ever trespass upon, have any direct effect on us? Isn’t it true that the oil underneath the wilderness is more useful to us, as humans, than the plants and animals within it? This goes into an entire philosophical debate that could take pages and pages to ponder, but it’s something to think about.
There’s no denying that humans are here to stay, and that our needs have to be met. No one is going to volunteer him or herself in order to reduce the population to stop the exploitation and consumption of resources so that fifty years from now we’re not all in some serious trouble. We all recognize this problem; yet in a sad twist of fate can do almost nothing about it. People recycle mostly for the “feel good” factor, to feel like they’re doing something good for the planet, when in reality it’s a very, very small piece of the puzzle. It’s a rather daunting scenario and difficult to tackle. It’s this frame of mind that fuels the bigger corporations and companies to exploit every resource possible.
There is no simple solution to any of this. I’m not suggesting that our exploitation and resource use is OK by any means. We, as humans, have become disconnected and greedy. The earth is no longer about balance towards all things on this planet, but solely on the human race. We desecrate land in order to support ourselves without regard to other organisms that might depend on it. We’ve not only eliminated all competition against our resources (the removal of predators against deer, for instance), but we’ve begun to turn on our own kind. While people in big corporate or political offices are shouting phrases like “drill, baby, drill”, people suffer and die from lack of adequate food, water, or housing. Plants and animals critical not only in each other’s food chains, but ours, are disappearing and becoming extinct at rapid rates due to our expansion and destruction. How much or how long will it take before we reach our limit and realize we’ve gone too far? Can we really rely on technology to pick up the slack once we’ve destroyed everything? It is these natural places, these plants, animals, and natural phenomena that keep us as humans inspired to look at more than just ourselves, beyond just the human race. It seems to me no coincidence that those of us in the life sciences are more compassionate, more willing to help out each other and other organisms while those who are money-interested are self-involved and only look within.
So what do we do? We can’t focus on what we’ve already done; that ship has sailed, and we can’t change the past. Yes, we need to reduce our waste, but we also need to find a way to convert what waste we’ve already made into something usable. The earth won’t be able to support us forever, no matter what technology we might depend on to save us. Eventually humans will discover their carrying capacity, and we need to be prepared to deal with the consequences and handle our mistakes. How we go about doing that is no easy answer.
Tuesday, February 2, 2010
A Commercial Society
“Now you can wash your car tires with ease! Watch as it cleans this dirty patio chair in seconds!”
“We loved our back patio, but the sun was just so hot that it was unbearable to be out there.”
“Stinky, stinky, stinky, stinky, stinky, stinky! Now you can keep unwanted odor in!”
“Just wear this device and you can get a workout even at your desk. Have great abs in days!”
I’m sure you’ve heard at least one or more of these commercials recently. They all have something in common. Most of them provide some type of service to counter the inconvenience of doing something else in a much faster way.
Our society has become full of lazy people who have disconnected themselves from the real world. The first commercial is for a power washer. It shows images of this power washer spraying water at full force at a tire rim, blowing the dirt off, and a patio chair, also at full force, blowing the dirt off. Both objects could have been cleaned with a bucket of water and a sponge and used much, much less water. It’s almost sad to see this commercial advertising perfectly good drinking water (in most cases) being sprayed at full force to clean something off, when people in Haiti, after the earthquake, are desperate for clean drinking water. What a gross waste of water. We also have the luxury of wasting millions of gallons of water a day to flush only a few ounces of waste per person down the toilet. Automatic toilets are great for people suffering from some sort of mysophobia, but in the long run, something that could put us into serious trouble.
The second commercial is for the Sun Setter patio covers. This commercial acts as if the sun is an inconvenience to us, and that it’s the sun’s fault that they built their patio in the direction of the open sun. So instead of doing the environmentally friendly option of maybe planting a tree to garner shade in that spot, or go out during certain parts of the day, or even use a better planning strategy, it can all be fixed with harmful plastics and an unnecessary coal-using electric option to open the shade for you! How convenient. Then he goes on to mention that the Sun Setter can protect you from the sun’s harmful rays (thanks, Liam, for reminding me of this part)… if you were worried about the sun’s harmful rays, why did you even plan on building a patio to enjoy yourself outside? You might as well just stay in the house and save yourself thousands of dollars, especially if you’re going to bitch that it’s too hot outside. Poor you.
The third commercial is for a new type of Hefty bag. It blocks odors without being scented. Again, our waste has become a huge inconvenience to us, even though we’re the ones making the waste. The commercial shows various stinky-makers, including chicken legs, fish, vegetables, diapers, and other such items that can either be A.) recycled after getting rinsed out B.) eaten completely and not wasted (and if you don’t eat it completely, deal with your own consequences of being wasteful) C.) composted, or D.) usable by an alternate method (cloth diapers still exist, people). We throw away so much garbage it’s ridiculous. How much do we waste? Here is a video of the Great Pacific Garbage Patch: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tnUjTHB1lvM and some images of hundreds of albatross chicks that die every year due to such garbage: http://www.chrisjordan.com/current_set2.php?id=11 Ironically enough, as I went to search for the YouTube movie of the garbage patch, a popup ad came up for Hefty trash bags.
Commercial number four is for that ab workout belt you can wear that sends electrical pulses through the belt to work your muscles, as you do absolutely nothing but sit there. This is on top of the diet pills and the “fast results” diet plans, lap bands, and pills that have exploded on today’s market. Our laziness has become the epitome of waste. Instead of going outside and jogging, or even taking a walk in the park, the woods, or some sort of natural piece nature, we’re destroying nature in mountaintop removal processes that provide the coal to power your lazy-belt.
These services and items are made for our American, lazy convenience. While I realize it’s not possible for every American to stop what they’re doing and become super-environmental, products like these are completely unnecessary. I’m reminded of the scenario played out in the Pixar movie Wall-E, where everyone has evolved to have everything done for them. While I realize it’s a little far-fetched, it’s also not beyond the realm of possibilities. Every day a new product or piece of technology comes out in order to make our lives simpler or to do things for us. With the mass production of meat and vegetables, we’ve become dissociated from what really occurs in the real world. Most women nowadays would scream if they had to be self-sustainable and get their hands dirty by creating a garden, and if we had to kill our own animals for food, there would be far less omnivores in this society. However, our enthusiasm (or lack thereof) to actually participate in change will be covered in my next blog. For now, I ask that you please do the responsible thing and not give in to these products, because you’ll be jogging (or using your Segway?) the downhill path along with the planet.
“We loved our back patio, but the sun was just so hot that it was unbearable to be out there.”
“Stinky, stinky, stinky, stinky, stinky, stinky! Now you can keep unwanted odor in!”
“Just wear this device and you can get a workout even at your desk. Have great abs in days!”
I’m sure you’ve heard at least one or more of these commercials recently. They all have something in common. Most of them provide some type of service to counter the inconvenience of doing something else in a much faster way.
Our society has become full of lazy people who have disconnected themselves from the real world. The first commercial is for a power washer. It shows images of this power washer spraying water at full force at a tire rim, blowing the dirt off, and a patio chair, also at full force, blowing the dirt off. Both objects could have been cleaned with a bucket of water and a sponge and used much, much less water. It’s almost sad to see this commercial advertising perfectly good drinking water (in most cases) being sprayed at full force to clean something off, when people in Haiti, after the earthquake, are desperate for clean drinking water. What a gross waste of water. We also have the luxury of wasting millions of gallons of water a day to flush only a few ounces of waste per person down the toilet. Automatic toilets are great for people suffering from some sort of mysophobia, but in the long run, something that could put us into serious trouble.
The second commercial is for the Sun Setter patio covers. This commercial acts as if the sun is an inconvenience to us, and that it’s the sun’s fault that they built their patio in the direction of the open sun. So instead of doing the environmentally friendly option of maybe planting a tree to garner shade in that spot, or go out during certain parts of the day, or even use a better planning strategy, it can all be fixed with harmful plastics and an unnecessary coal-using electric option to open the shade for you! How convenient. Then he goes on to mention that the Sun Setter can protect you from the sun’s harmful rays (thanks, Liam, for reminding me of this part)… if you were worried about the sun’s harmful rays, why did you even plan on building a patio to enjoy yourself outside? You might as well just stay in the house and save yourself thousands of dollars, especially if you’re going to bitch that it’s too hot outside. Poor you.
The third commercial is for a new type of Hefty bag. It blocks odors without being scented. Again, our waste has become a huge inconvenience to us, even though we’re the ones making the waste. The commercial shows various stinky-makers, including chicken legs, fish, vegetables, diapers, and other such items that can either be A.) recycled after getting rinsed out B.) eaten completely and not wasted (and if you don’t eat it completely, deal with your own consequences of being wasteful) C.) composted, or D.) usable by an alternate method (cloth diapers still exist, people). We throw away so much garbage it’s ridiculous. How much do we waste? Here is a video of the Great Pacific Garbage Patch: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tnUjTHB1lvM and some images of hundreds of albatross chicks that die every year due to such garbage: http://www.chrisjordan.com/current_set2.php?id=11 Ironically enough, as I went to search for the YouTube movie of the garbage patch, a popup ad came up for Hefty trash bags.
Commercial number four is for that ab workout belt you can wear that sends electrical pulses through the belt to work your muscles, as you do absolutely nothing but sit there. This is on top of the diet pills and the “fast results” diet plans, lap bands, and pills that have exploded on today’s market. Our laziness has become the epitome of waste. Instead of going outside and jogging, or even taking a walk in the park, the woods, or some sort of natural piece nature, we’re destroying nature in mountaintop removal processes that provide the coal to power your lazy-belt.
These services and items are made for our American, lazy convenience. While I realize it’s not possible for every American to stop what they’re doing and become super-environmental, products like these are completely unnecessary. I’m reminded of the scenario played out in the Pixar movie Wall-E, where everyone has evolved to have everything done for them. While I realize it’s a little far-fetched, it’s also not beyond the realm of possibilities. Every day a new product or piece of technology comes out in order to make our lives simpler or to do things for us. With the mass production of meat and vegetables, we’ve become dissociated from what really occurs in the real world. Most women nowadays would scream if they had to be self-sustainable and get their hands dirty by creating a garden, and if we had to kill our own animals for food, there would be far less omnivores in this society. However, our enthusiasm (or lack thereof) to actually participate in change will be covered in my next blog. For now, I ask that you please do the responsible thing and not give in to these products, because you’ll be jogging (or using your Segway?) the downhill path along with the planet.
Monday, February 1, 2010
Independence: A Dream
I had another dream last night. My dreams recently seem to be taking a storyline-type feel to it, which is intriguing since my dreams are normally quite random and discontinuous. There are random elements in this dream, but generally it stays together. Here goes:
I am a slightly younger girl, given a cute, quaint, pale yellow house in Florida, all to my own, with a garden surrounded by a fence in the back yard. I go to a college near this house. I narrate throughout my dream. This girl I am is a very confident, self-oriented person. She depends on no one but herself and is very outgoing.
At this new school, I begin a swimming class. I change in a wooden locker room (it much resembles a sauna, with individual rooms to change in with triangular benches built into the corner) and then go out into the hallway to go to class. My swimsuit is one piece and black, but for some reason I wear my orange underwear over the swimsuit. I don’t dream about going to the swimming class.
Next I find myself at a magazine rack in the school, and I am dressed normally. I see a famous man-- I think he is a musician-- on the front cover of a popular magazine. I look up to see him browsing the magazine rack as well. I don’t swoon or get excited; I don’t care that he’s a celebrity, but he is very attractive (by my dream self’s high standards). His hair is long and spiky and dyed various shades of black and white. I talk to him and ask if he wants to hook up. He says yes. At this point I narrate that since I acknowledged him and liked him, that I must have him. I was successful.
I go back to the locker room to change and find a muffin underneath the triangle bench in the corner by the wooden post underneath it. I eat a piece of the muffin and decide it’s pretty good. Suddenly a dog comes out from behind the post where the muffin was, impossibly hidden, like some kind of cartoon character. He is a very large, long-haired yellow lab-type dog, and he can talk, similar to that of Dug the dog on the movie “Up.” I share the muffin with him as he talks to me. I casually mention that it probably wasn’t a good idea to eat some random muffin, and it was probably poisoned, and we laughed about it. The dog was quite articulate, again, like Dug in “Up.” I decide that he is a good dog and take him home. It is then that I learn his name, appearing in text below him: “Belmont Washington III.”
I go home in my nice car (also provided to me) and park. I go to the back garden and notice that the wind has picked up and it’s dark outside. I pay no mind and continue to work in my garden. The view switches the behind the stupid kids that live next to me, who are looking down at me and my garden from their high ledge/cliff, with worried looks on their faces. I don’t like these kids. They know a hurricane is coming and are worried I’ll get in trouble instead of looking at my garden and seeing how awesome my garden is. They run off for cover as the hurricane gains strength but I’m not worried at all and continue to work in my garden through the storm. I wake up here.
I am a slightly younger girl, given a cute, quaint, pale yellow house in Florida, all to my own, with a garden surrounded by a fence in the back yard. I go to a college near this house. I narrate throughout my dream. This girl I am is a very confident, self-oriented person. She depends on no one but herself and is very outgoing.
At this new school, I begin a swimming class. I change in a wooden locker room (it much resembles a sauna, with individual rooms to change in with triangular benches built into the corner) and then go out into the hallway to go to class. My swimsuit is one piece and black, but for some reason I wear my orange underwear over the swimsuit. I don’t dream about going to the swimming class.
Next I find myself at a magazine rack in the school, and I am dressed normally. I see a famous man-- I think he is a musician-- on the front cover of a popular magazine. I look up to see him browsing the magazine rack as well. I don’t swoon or get excited; I don’t care that he’s a celebrity, but he is very attractive (by my dream self’s high standards). His hair is long and spiky and dyed various shades of black and white. I talk to him and ask if he wants to hook up. He says yes. At this point I narrate that since I acknowledged him and liked him, that I must have him. I was successful.
I go back to the locker room to change and find a muffin underneath the triangle bench in the corner by the wooden post underneath it. I eat a piece of the muffin and decide it’s pretty good. Suddenly a dog comes out from behind the post where the muffin was, impossibly hidden, like some kind of cartoon character. He is a very large, long-haired yellow lab-type dog, and he can talk, similar to that of Dug the dog on the movie “Up.” I share the muffin with him as he talks to me. I casually mention that it probably wasn’t a good idea to eat some random muffin, and it was probably poisoned, and we laughed about it. The dog was quite articulate, again, like Dug in “Up.” I decide that he is a good dog and take him home. It is then that I learn his name, appearing in text below him: “Belmont Washington III.”
I go home in my nice car (also provided to me) and park. I go to the back garden and notice that the wind has picked up and it’s dark outside. I pay no mind and continue to work in my garden. The view switches the behind the stupid kids that live next to me, who are looking down at me and my garden from their high ledge/cliff, with worried looks on their faces. I don’t like these kids. They know a hurricane is coming and are worried I’ll get in trouble instead of looking at my garden and seeing how awesome my garden is. They run off for cover as the hurricane gains strength but I’m not worried at all and continue to work in my garden through the storm. I wake up here.
Saturday, January 23, 2010
All Men Are Created Equal... oh, wait, we lied.
I know that this is tired, old subject, not to mention extremely controversial and everyone is tired of talking about it. Unfortunately it's not something you can just wish will go away. It keeps popping up in the news and will continue to pop up until everyone is represented equally.
Gay marriage.
Say what? If I scared you, I'll say it again. Gay marriage. Two words that should be able to go together without someone in the crowd screaming something obscene or a right-wing fundamentalist having a heart attack. It's a simple phrase, really, but has led to such a ridiculously un-simple debate.
Not even all gay people agree on the notion of gay marriage. To me, this is a travesty. Why would you not care about a basic freedom for everyone, especially that of your own "kind" to enjoy along with everyone else? Many straight people don't agree with even regular marriage, and yet you don't see them trying to tear down the right for their kind to marry.
Let's hit on a few key, common arguments here.
1. "Homosexuality is unnatural!" Well, Pastor Fred, so are those animals you're eating, pumped full of antibiotics and hormones. So are computers, plastic, bowling balls, pieces of furniture, your church pews, cigarettes, prescription drugs, prosthetic limbs, cosmetics, the fur coats of dead animals, sex for pleasure, masturbation, guns, torture, nuclear warheads, electricity, airplanes... you see where I'm going with this. Man has evolved to be privy to a whole host of unnatural things. What's natural anymore? I can walk into a Wal-Mart and pick up what claims to be "All-Natural Eggs." What the hell is all-natural? We created these things, and have adapted to them as long as they don't destroy the entire population. Does homosexuality destroy the population? Straight people are still breeding like rabbits. Our world population will be reaching 9.2 billion in the year 2050. I hardly doubt that a few queers in your neighborhood are going to seriously put a dent in an already over-populated world. How do you know that, like some animals, we're not becoming homosexual "naturally" to control our desire to breed, breed, breed? Do we really need more people on this planet?
2. "Marriage should be between a man and a woman!" According to whom? God? I believe I remember a certain Amendment to our United States Constitution that stated something about freedom of religion. If I don't believe in God, why should I have to follow the rules of some guy I've never met? Even if I did believe in God, who dictates what I think God wants? The Bible? OK then, let's use the Bible as my reference. The Bible also tells me that I'm unpure when I'm on my monthly cycle. Sure, I may be a raging bitch, but I don't think that makes me any less of a person. The Bible also tells me many other interesting laws and facts that I'm sure you've all heard in this endless debate. So tell me, why do we get to pick and choose what we want to follow from the Bible? Also, with the whole freedom of religion thing, why are we governing our government-enforced right to marry? I thought we had freedom of religion in our government. Why is "God's Rule" included in this? If marriage is dictated by the word of God, why do we let Atheists marry? Why do we let Pagans and witches marry? It sounds to me like this whole "man and woman" thing is less about God and more about being stubborn and childish in getting one's own way.
3. "If we let gays marry, we have to let people marry their cousins/dogs/cars!" This is the most ridiculous argument I've ever heard. Who cares if Johnny wants to marry his sister Sally? If he loves her that much, let him. As long as its consensual. You want to talk about natural? Animals all over the world will occasionally shack up with his sister, cousin, or even mother sometimes. People breed dogs within bloodlines to keep genes strong. If you're going to use the natural argument, at least apply it to everything. Is marrying into and procreating with your own blood kind of gross? Sure it is. But it's only taboo because we were raised to think so. It's not really any of your business, why do you care who marries who? And even if they DO get married, who's to say they'll even have kids? Everyone thinks that marriage = kids. But even straight marriages, several of them, don't always have kids. OK, don't let them marry. What's going to stop them from doing anything anyway? Marriage isn't some secret passageway to the world of sex or breeding. It's a status, it comes with some pretty random benefits. This goes for gay people. Just because they're marrying, doesn't mean they're going to get artificially knocked up or adopt (even though they should adopt, since the world seriously needs less kids). And hell, you should support that more, since they won't be putting recessive genes in the pool. As far as animals and inanimate objects... seriously? Can a dog give consent? Can a vehicle give consent? Last time I checked, that was physically impossible. Please stop using ridiculous arguments to prove a seriously flawed argument. "Oh, but based on this logic, polygamy should be legal too!" First off, polygamy is pretty rare. Yeah, I'm sure it involves a lot of manipulation on the established wife's end to allow her husband to marry someone else, but isn't it usually consensual? Forgive me, my knowledge on the subject of old Mormon tradition and polygamy itself is little, so I'm only going off what I know. But from what I gather, polygamy is already done in some areas, and I'm sure it can be regulated somehow, even though it is a pretty rare situation.
In short, I have yet to see a serious, realistic argument against gay marriage. Sure, I may be a hypocrite when typing this, but it's very wrong to project your morals and values onto a different group of people. Especially in a country founded on freedom, it's is extremely hypocritical and immoral to press your judgment onto others for no reason than your own. Gay marriage does not hurt you, and it does not hurt society. Tell me how gays marrying directly affect you and I'll listen to your argument. Otherwise, I suggest you stop meddling in the affairs and businesses of others and allow them to experience the same rights as you. They're people, just like you and me. Allow them to live like people.
Gay marriage.
Say what? If I scared you, I'll say it again. Gay marriage. Two words that should be able to go together without someone in the crowd screaming something obscene or a right-wing fundamentalist having a heart attack. It's a simple phrase, really, but has led to such a ridiculously un-simple debate.
Not even all gay people agree on the notion of gay marriage. To me, this is a travesty. Why would you not care about a basic freedom for everyone, especially that of your own "kind" to enjoy along with everyone else? Many straight people don't agree with even regular marriage, and yet you don't see them trying to tear down the right for their kind to marry.
Let's hit on a few key, common arguments here.
1. "Homosexuality is unnatural!" Well, Pastor Fred, so are those animals you're eating, pumped full of antibiotics and hormones. So are computers, plastic, bowling balls, pieces of furniture, your church pews, cigarettes, prescription drugs, prosthetic limbs, cosmetics, the fur coats of dead animals, sex for pleasure, masturbation, guns, torture, nuclear warheads, electricity, airplanes... you see where I'm going with this. Man has evolved to be privy to a whole host of unnatural things. What's natural anymore? I can walk into a Wal-Mart and pick up what claims to be "All-Natural Eggs." What the hell is all-natural? We created these things, and have adapted to them as long as they don't destroy the entire population. Does homosexuality destroy the population? Straight people are still breeding like rabbits. Our world population will be reaching 9.2 billion in the year 2050. I hardly doubt that a few queers in your neighborhood are going to seriously put a dent in an already over-populated world. How do you know that, like some animals, we're not becoming homosexual "naturally" to control our desire to breed, breed, breed? Do we really need more people on this planet?
2. "Marriage should be between a man and a woman!" According to whom? God? I believe I remember a certain Amendment to our United States Constitution that stated something about freedom of religion. If I don't believe in God, why should I have to follow the rules of some guy I've never met? Even if I did believe in God, who dictates what I think God wants? The Bible? OK then, let's use the Bible as my reference. The Bible also tells me that I'm unpure when I'm on my monthly cycle. Sure, I may be a raging bitch, but I don't think that makes me any less of a person. The Bible also tells me many other interesting laws and facts that I'm sure you've all heard in this endless debate. So tell me, why do we get to pick and choose what we want to follow from the Bible? Also, with the whole freedom of religion thing, why are we governing our government-enforced right to marry? I thought we had freedom of religion in our government. Why is "God's Rule" included in this? If marriage is dictated by the word of God, why do we let Atheists marry? Why do we let Pagans and witches marry? It sounds to me like this whole "man and woman" thing is less about God and more about being stubborn and childish in getting one's own way.
3. "If we let gays marry, we have to let people marry their cousins/dogs/cars!" This is the most ridiculous argument I've ever heard. Who cares if Johnny wants to marry his sister Sally? If he loves her that much, let him. As long as its consensual. You want to talk about natural? Animals all over the world will occasionally shack up with his sister, cousin, or even mother sometimes. People breed dogs within bloodlines to keep genes strong. If you're going to use the natural argument, at least apply it to everything. Is marrying into and procreating with your own blood kind of gross? Sure it is. But it's only taboo because we were raised to think so. It's not really any of your business, why do you care who marries who? And even if they DO get married, who's to say they'll even have kids? Everyone thinks that marriage = kids. But even straight marriages, several of them, don't always have kids. OK, don't let them marry. What's going to stop them from doing anything anyway? Marriage isn't some secret passageway to the world of sex or breeding. It's a status, it comes with some pretty random benefits. This goes for gay people. Just because they're marrying, doesn't mean they're going to get artificially knocked up or adopt (even though they should adopt, since the world seriously needs less kids). And hell, you should support that more, since they won't be putting recessive genes in the pool. As far as animals and inanimate objects... seriously? Can a dog give consent? Can a vehicle give consent? Last time I checked, that was physically impossible. Please stop using ridiculous arguments to prove a seriously flawed argument. "Oh, but based on this logic, polygamy should be legal too!" First off, polygamy is pretty rare. Yeah, I'm sure it involves a lot of manipulation on the established wife's end to allow her husband to marry someone else, but isn't it usually consensual? Forgive me, my knowledge on the subject of old Mormon tradition and polygamy itself is little, so I'm only going off what I know. But from what I gather, polygamy is already done in some areas, and I'm sure it can be regulated somehow, even though it is a pretty rare situation.
In short, I have yet to see a serious, realistic argument against gay marriage. Sure, I may be a hypocrite when typing this, but it's very wrong to project your morals and values onto a different group of people. Especially in a country founded on freedom, it's is extremely hypocritical and immoral to press your judgment onto others for no reason than your own. Gay marriage does not hurt you, and it does not hurt society. Tell me how gays marrying directly affect you and I'll listen to your argument. Otherwise, I suggest you stop meddling in the affairs and businesses of others and allow them to experience the same rights as you. They're people, just like you and me. Allow them to live like people.
Wednesday, January 20, 2010
Reborn
I think getting into the spirit of creating a blog to record my dreams snapped my unconscious into doing something incredible. I had the most vivid dream last night (or, this morning I suppose). I fell asleep at about 1am and woke up at 3am exactly with a dream that felt like it had gone ages. Let me recount it for you.
I am in a non-descript room. It simply has four walls and random possessions littered among it. Are they mine? I don't know. However, suddenly the entire room breaks apart, and I plummet into a watery abyss positioned somehow below this room. I begin to sink immediately among the wreckage of the now-destroyed room. I know I am doomed. I inhale water in panic, and know I'm going to drown. I prepare for my inevitable death.
Suddenly, I am pulled from the water by an unknown savior. But am I really saved? I wake up, in the dream, to find myself severely mentally incapacitated, brain damaged somehow by my near-drowning, as I finish living as a drooling, mentally retarded mess of a person around other people. I vaguely remember being teased by a cruel man and doing things for him to the best of my ability, like fetching him a drink. I have absolutely no control of my body but feel every droop of my face, the drool falling from my open mouth across my lips. I'm a pathetic excuse of a human being and wish I had died rather than suffer this.
Suddenly I find myself in the room again. It looks exactly the same before it broke apart, and I am normal again. However, as before, the room breaks apart again and I plummet into the water again. The whole scene reminds me of deja vu as I nearly drown, am rescued, and live the rest of my life as the creature I was before.
Again, I find myself in the room. This exact scene plays over and over in exact sequence for what seems like dozens of times. I perhaps spent an eternity reliving everything in that short span of time.
Finally, after perhaps the hundredth time, no one saves me as the room breaks apart. I am pulled into the abyss as the debris creates an undercurrent. I attempt to fight the current but it is a losing battle. I am exhausted, and accept my fate. With much reluctance and fear, although ready, I give up and voluntarily inhale the water into my lungs. It's as terrible as I expected, and my lungs fill with water as my body gasps and convulses in hope for air, but finds none. Soon I have sunk to the bottom of this strange body of water, and am still alive, but dying. Finally, hoping to rid myself of the torture and pain of drowning, I inhale and release the last bit of air, and expire.
I wake up, in the dream again, and am standing in the grass in front of a sidewalk. Chad stands there, as if he were waiting for me. Notices me. A huge, friendly, excited smile crosses his face as he runs towards me.
"You did it? Finally?" he asks in excitement. Chad is dead, like me. I know this somehow.
I nod.
"Sancti?" he says incredulously. "Me too! I can't believe you got it! Well, I guess in your case, it's Sancta," he adds, noting the feminine placement.
He leads me towards a place at the end of the sidewalk with what looks like several life-sized mobiles (you know, like those things that hang above baby cribs?), all suspended in mid-air, each mobile a different color and dangling with different shapes.
"Now you have to choose one," Chad says, indicating the mobiles.
I notice that each shape represents something. I see a blue one that says (in magical floating text) "Guidance." Do these shapes represent reincarnation? I wonder. I know that these representations are what fit us most and it is what we are tasked to do to the living but I do not know the details of how.
Chad informs me that my sister, Laura, failed to receive the title of Sanctus, and therefore was not eligible to follow this esteemed path. I do not know where she is now, or if she exists at all anymore.
My friend Stacey sees me and Chad. She is not dead. Immediately I realize that I can see everything about her. How old she is, her habits, little details- but most importantly, how many days she has left before her demise. I know that this is some unwritten code to keep that detail a secret, but as she has plenty of days left to live, I make a joke to Chad about our ability to see such things and not be able to do anything about it. Stacey does not look amused at this fact as we laugh about it. The dream ends in a light, happy tone after this, and I wake up, feeling like the top of the world.
I am in a non-descript room. It simply has four walls and random possessions littered among it. Are they mine? I don't know. However, suddenly the entire room breaks apart, and I plummet into a watery abyss positioned somehow below this room. I begin to sink immediately among the wreckage of the now-destroyed room. I know I am doomed. I inhale water in panic, and know I'm going to drown. I prepare for my inevitable death.
Suddenly, I am pulled from the water by an unknown savior. But am I really saved? I wake up, in the dream, to find myself severely mentally incapacitated, brain damaged somehow by my near-drowning, as I finish living as a drooling, mentally retarded mess of a person around other people. I vaguely remember being teased by a cruel man and doing things for him to the best of my ability, like fetching him a drink. I have absolutely no control of my body but feel every droop of my face, the drool falling from my open mouth across my lips. I'm a pathetic excuse of a human being and wish I had died rather than suffer this.
Suddenly I find myself in the room again. It looks exactly the same before it broke apart, and I am normal again. However, as before, the room breaks apart again and I plummet into the water again. The whole scene reminds me of deja vu as I nearly drown, am rescued, and live the rest of my life as the creature I was before.
Again, I find myself in the room. This exact scene plays over and over in exact sequence for what seems like dozens of times. I perhaps spent an eternity reliving everything in that short span of time.
Finally, after perhaps the hundredth time, no one saves me as the room breaks apart. I am pulled into the abyss as the debris creates an undercurrent. I attempt to fight the current but it is a losing battle. I am exhausted, and accept my fate. With much reluctance and fear, although ready, I give up and voluntarily inhale the water into my lungs. It's as terrible as I expected, and my lungs fill with water as my body gasps and convulses in hope for air, but finds none. Soon I have sunk to the bottom of this strange body of water, and am still alive, but dying. Finally, hoping to rid myself of the torture and pain of drowning, I inhale and release the last bit of air, and expire.
I wake up, in the dream again, and am standing in the grass in front of a sidewalk. Chad stands there, as if he were waiting for me. Notices me. A huge, friendly, excited smile crosses his face as he runs towards me.
"You did it? Finally?" he asks in excitement. Chad is dead, like me. I know this somehow.
I nod.
"Sancti?" he says incredulously. "Me too! I can't believe you got it! Well, I guess in your case, it's Sancta," he adds, noting the feminine placement.
He leads me towards a place at the end of the sidewalk with what looks like several life-sized mobiles (you know, like those things that hang above baby cribs?), all suspended in mid-air, each mobile a different color and dangling with different shapes.
"Now you have to choose one," Chad says, indicating the mobiles.
I notice that each shape represents something. I see a blue one that says (in magical floating text) "Guidance." Do these shapes represent reincarnation? I wonder. I know that these representations are what fit us most and it is what we are tasked to do to the living but I do not know the details of how.
Chad informs me that my sister, Laura, failed to receive the title of Sanctus, and therefore was not eligible to follow this esteemed path. I do not know where she is now, or if she exists at all anymore.
My friend Stacey sees me and Chad. She is not dead. Immediately I realize that I can see everything about her. How old she is, her habits, little details- but most importantly, how many days she has left before her demise. I know that this is some unwritten code to keep that detail a secret, but as she has plenty of days left to live, I make a joke to Chad about our ability to see such things and not be able to do anything about it. Stacey does not look amused at this fact as we laugh about it. The dream ends in a light, happy tone after this, and I wake up, feeling like the top of the world.
The First
I purchased my first laptop yesterday, finally. I decided to join the bandwagon and keep a blog. I've done the old-fashioned paper and pen(cil) journal before, but it's time I joined the digital age in the world of personal memory-keeping.
I will probably be dedicating this blog mostly to my dreams, which I am extremely fascinated by; my experiences at Free Again, a wildlife rehabilitation center I've been volunteering at for close to two years now; and rants on the environment and the world in general. I expect to seldom dwell on the goings on of normal life, as there isn't really much to tell in that area!
For now I will be going to sleep, but I already have a few things I plan on blogging about starting tomorrow. Ciao!
I will probably be dedicating this blog mostly to my dreams, which I am extremely fascinated by; my experiences at Free Again, a wildlife rehabilitation center I've been volunteering at for close to two years now; and rants on the environment and the world in general. I expect to seldom dwell on the goings on of normal life, as there isn't really much to tell in that area!
For now I will be going to sleep, but I already have a few things I plan on blogging about starting tomorrow. Ciao!
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