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The Modern World Is Setup To Destroy The Earth’s Environment

By Editor | January 30, 2008

Environment pollution and money

The title of this article is quite strong in its statement. However, if you really think about it, it’s not far from the truth at all. Current modern society is all based on money. The all mighty green back or dollar. We are told that the more money you have the more you can do and have, which is true to a certain extent. You have the choice of what and how you consume.  Do you use your money to buy products or services to help or harm the environment?

The old saying goes “Money will make you more of what you are.” So if you are an environmentally caring individual, then when you have more money you will change your life style to reduce your bio footprint by reducing waste and buying environmentally friendly products. However, if you don’t give a crap about the environment and you are a wasteful person then you will continue to consume and pollute, unoblivious of what you are doing to your environment.

Another relation between money and being socially and environmentally responsible is this. If you are not upper middle class or wealthy it is more difficult for you be more environmentally active in your daily life.

Some people might disagree, but take this example for instance.

Mary a single mother who lives in the city, and works at a job just above minimum wage is barely getting by. She is a very caring individual who loves to go for walks and enjoy the outdoors. She is concerned about pollution, global warming and would like to be able to contribute more on a daily basis to reduce her bio footprint.

However, Mary finds it difficult because she needs every cent she makes to support herself, her 2 year old daughter and pay for rent, transportation and food.
Mary would like to do the following things on a daily basis:

Buy Organic Food to feed her and her child:
Unfortunately, Mary cannot do this because organic food in supermarkets is expensive. For Mary to buy the majority of her groceries as organic can increase her weekly grocery bill by at least 20% and for someone who is living on a low fixed income this is difficult to do.

Buy a Hybrid Car, instead of her current gas guzzler:
Hybrid Cars on the market today are priced at least $2500 to $3000 more than their gasoline engine counterparts. How can someone who want to consume less gas and reduce emissions afford that?

Needless to say this is outside of Mary’s reach.

Recycle household paper and plastic waste:
Instead of putting her paper, and plastic garbage in the trash bag Mary would like to submit the recyclable waste to a municipal recycling program.
But unfortunately, the city where she lives in does NOT have a Recycling Program.
The city says it is too expensive to implement, and the city finds it cheaper to burn all the trash in incinerators.

The above example shows that trying to do the right thing for the environment is expensive, and the majority of the population cannot do it even if they want to because the cost is simply out of their reach.

Is it me, or does anyone else see that this is a big problem?
A problem, because a society that places so much emphasis on money, punishes it’s citizens with higher cost to live more socially and environmentally responsible.

Monetary cost is the major factor in every decision we make as a modern society, even when it is about the environment and that is quite unfortunate.

I do not see things getting better anytime soon. There has to be a huge and complete shift in the way Government, Corporation and people think as a whole in order for dramatic change to occur in the next decade.

Governments will have to make some bold policies and Corporations will need to be less greedy. If global warming and rising sea levels don’t change the way people think then I do not know what will. It will be interesting to see if this changes a decade from now.

What prompted me to write this article was an piece I read in BusinessWeek magazine, about a woman who told her daughter about the U.S population hitting the 300 million mark. She then ponders about how the increase in U.S population will also lead to the increase in the global pollution and resource consumption. She states in her article that the current statistics that the United States with 5% of the worlds population, now consumes 25% of the worlds resources.
It’s a staggering and scary statistics that you should think about.

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Topics: Articles, Nature, Wildlife, World and Environment | Comments Off on The Modern World Is Setup To Destroy The Earth’s Environment

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