Reflections: Week 7 and 8

Week 7: The cosmetic item eye opener surprised me a lot. It made me want to add on to my SMART goal with products I use. I will use that website for the future to see how I can improve myself with being environmentally friendly. The video "Green" made me realize how naive I am to the environment. I didn't know there was an area in our own country that is putting so many pollutants in the air that it is causing diseases and many problems for the population of that area. The title is clever, though, making green sound like being environmentally friendly when really it's about making money. It posed many questions such as are they going to help that population out? Where do the employers live that work for those businesses? Is it only getting worse or have they made some improvements? It is such a scary concept and I couldn't be more appreciative of where I live because it can definitely be worse.

Week 8: I definitely realized a lot when we watched "Thirst." I had no clue water was having issues of becoming privatized, let alone in parts of the US! How can such a huge problem not be more public? It is scary to think about how that will affect me, especially since I will be on my own paying for everything in a few months. I didn't realize how poorer countries are taken advantage with this situation as well. For example, in India Pepsi and Coca-Cola basically use the water that is there naturally and sell it in their marketed water bottles. The bottled water there is more than milk! That absolutely disgusts me and I can't fathom that happening in the US. Just because they don't have the money, doesn't mean we can take their rights and properties away. On the whole, these past two weeks has really made me open up and see how naive I have been to the environment. I am very excited to keep discussing these issues in class so I can deliver these messages to my family and friends!