| Expose, Educate, and Enact!! In world news tonight, an oil tanker crashed into an unlit shoreline off the West Coast of Australia. Authorities report that the tanker was carrying over fifty tons of crude oil and that clean up crews are currently on site working to clean up the spill. More to come on that later. In local news tonight some locals who call themselves the Water Pollution Patrol are suing the Western Star nuclear plant. This ten billion-dollar lawsuit is a result of the Water Pollution Patrol�s claim that Western Star has been illegally dumping its toxic waste into nearby water sources. Judge Gampee will be presiding over the case, which will take place after Easter. If you live in the United States or anywhere else in the world, chances are that you have heard a news story similar to the ones above. If you haven�t heard a story like that before then you will at least once in your life. In fact, stories such as those are so common in today�s society that they no longer cause concern among the public. The media, in its effort to make money and receive ratings, has desensitized us to such harmful things, that it makes one wonder why they even bother to show it anymore. Ask anyone you meet on the street if they know what marine pollution is or even what it entails. Chances are a good majority of those you ask, won�t be able to tell you. The reason for this is that the media is keeping us from what is really important. They only show us the really big events that �sell� and that will only have a brief affect on us. When it comes to marine pollution, people have very little to no exposure to the topic. We need to educate our children and ourselves in order to better work on solving the problem. There are several things that can be done to help us achieve our goal. However, in order to do those things, we first need to know what causes our lack of knowledge on the subject of marine pollution. As well as knowing what exactly it is that brings about marine pollution in the first place. The reason we do not know much about our topic is because of the media�s limited coverage of the events that affect and or cause it. Very rarely will you see small side stories on the news talking about how a local town is dying off because its water supply has been contaminated. News anchors and reporters have an enormous tendency to make the major events much more large scale than they seem, and to make the smaller events seem as if they are unimportant. An oil spill is an event of immense proportions that deserves proper attention from all over the world. But when was the last time you heard about an oil spill on the news that really made you want to help and do something about it. It is not just the big events that they do not always cover either. The news media also has other ways of keeping the public from knowing about marine pollution. Most likely the biggest, or most noticeable thing that the media does to keep our knowledge of this topic minimal, is that they will not air things that do not �sell�. The little things, that often make the most difference are, according to news reporters themselves, not what people are interested in. In the movie "Erin Brockovich", staring Julia Roberts; Erin and her employer are working on a case concerning a nuclear plant that did not properly line their waste sites, which has caused the ground water in the area to become contaminated. The people that live near the plant have wells that have ground water, and as a result of the contamination have become sick for reasons they did not know until the case was looked into even deeper. I would think that something like this would most certainly �sell� in the media, the movie sure did sell big. Reporters and journalists always overlook the little things that really do matter. In their minds the viewers and readers do not want to hear about such things and so it is all left out. There is so much that they do not cover that we must now turn to researching the topic ourselves. We must learn about the causes and types of pollution that we do not see in order to more effectively work to solve the problem. Industry may seem like one of the major causes of marine pollution, and in some ways it is rightly so. However, with current laws and regulations regarding how they dispose of their toxic waste, industry has become a slightly less of a contributor to the problem. In all actualality three quarters of marine pollution is actually land based (Boukhari para 7). It must be remembered though that even with the laws and such on them, they are still a factor that helps increase the size of the problem. Every day the populations around the world grow, as does the demand for resources that the industries produce, grows. As populations grow and take up space on the Earth, less and less space is left to put the toxic waste that the companies produce. This then causes them to have to find other means of disposal since they certainly can not keep it around them and the attention.community. Through government regulation, these industries have designed and maintained ways to keep the material in a sealed off area until the time when it is no longer toxic to people and animals. A good example of this sort of thing can be found by watching the movie "Erin Brockovich". In the movie, Erin and her employer are researching a case that involves a near by industry. As they delve deeper and deeper into the case, they find that the company has known about the hexavalent chromium they have placed in poorly made pits and have not truthfully informed the people that live near by. As a result of this, the people have become sick, as have their animals and they do not know what the cause of their sickness is. However, this is not a very good example in that it shows the bad side of the regulations and what the companies can get away with when the government isn�t really paying attention. *Essay continued on following page. Click arrow to read on.* |
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