The Tea Party and Sustainable Development

First off, I would like to say that I am not very involved in politics, and that although I do have my ideas of how things should be, I do not follow what parties are saying what and who believes who should be running the country. 

With that said, it is increasingly difficult to ignore the growing popularity and public saturation of the Tea Party Movement.  It's everywhere, and highly controversial.  Although I have not followed this movement much over the last few years, there is one argument that I have heard from the group that I am having trouble grasping.  That is, their argument against sustainable development. 

I first heard about this opposition through a colleague who told me that when the county became a certified FGBC Green Local Government, there was resistance coming from the Tea Partiers of the county.  This obviously sparked my interest.  For at least two years, I've learned and heard about everything that sustainability and sustainable development can do for the world, and how much we need it to save the environment and ourselves.  Now, I find out that there's a huge culture of people who believe that sustainability is a sort of scheme that is the United Nation's "vision for a completely managed society, dictating the process to be used for industry, agriculture, housing development, and especially education. It’s an all-encompassing plan to rule from an all-powerful central government.” This is a direct opposition to Agenda 21 which was adopted by more than 178 governments in 1992.

So in my research, I found this article called The Tea Party's Next Target: Sustainable Development, which as you can probably tell by the title, is not exactly unbiased.  However, I think that the article makes some good points.  The article also has a sarcastic tone to it, which attracted me to it, of course.

The author pulls some quotations out of Agenda 21 about its 27 Principles, such as "#1 which states that, “Human beings are at the centre of concerns for sustainable development.  They are entitled to a healthy and productive life in harmony with nature.”" Yepp, that sure sounds like a terrible idea to me...

A few other things that stuck out to me from this article.  The first was that there is/was a group in Florida that was urging people to oppose a bill that would "require homeowners to responsibly maintain their septic tanks". Really? I understand that many people believe that the government should not have the right to decide what people do to their land.  But septic tanks affect so much more than your land. And in my opinion, people do not have the right to pollute our already diminishing ground water supply or to negatively affect their neighbors, since they have rights, too. 

Another spot in the article explains that in her new book, author Beverly Eakman blames our education system for training us to focus on the collective, rather than the individual.  So it's our kindergarten teachers' faults for teaching us to share.  However, I do know that this article is biased, and therefore is probably skewed and drastic (I hope). 

This has all been almost directly from the article, with some narration by me. So here is just me saying what I see and how I see it...

Sustainability means something different to almost everyone, but all definitions share the want to impact the planet less and conserve our land and resources rather than using them all up as quickly as we have been.  I understand that there are many different stances on sustainability and even climate change and that some people believe that these are just works by certain people to control the population.  However, what I would like to say is... who cares?

Who cares why some people are behind certain initiatives.  The truth is that the less materials we use, the longer our planet lasts, the more generations our planet can sustain.  And if you don't believe that our resources are scarce, then think of it this way... If we don't recycle our plastic and aluminum and paper, etc, the faster our landfills will fill up.  Then, as landfills fill up, we are going to have to open more landfills and chances are, we are going to run out of room for landfills that are far away, so they will get closer to our houses (and not only do they smell, they are also not great to look at).  And the longer landfills sit, the more likely they are to seep into our groundwater, forcing us to create systems that are complicated and expensive in order to clean our water before we can drink it.  These systems will most likely be heavy duty machines that will cause more air pollution which will cause more smog in cities, which will reduce your right/ability to clean air, which will probably increase disease and lower life spans.  And as the population continues to increase, there will be less and less rural places to escape to. So why don't we recycle? because recycling is a scheme someone invented to control us?? ok.

Enough ranting. As I have said, the article that I linked here is very biased, and I am not saying that I 100% agree with it.  Also, I am not claiming to be extremely knowledgable about these topics, especially the stance of the Tea Party.  However, I would like to learn more, and although I am going to continue researching the topics, I would really like to hear what you think about this and how you feel sustainable development and Agenda 21 may affect our county and world, or even just reactions to what I have written.

"This is not speculation; this is high school science."

Okay, so it's been a while, to say the least.  But what's important is that I'M BACK! And I'm going to work on writing here instead of repeating my sustainability thoughts and woes over and over again to friends and family.

So here's what has happened since April, when I last posted.  For starters, I GRADUATED! From the University of Florida with a Bachelor's of Science in Sustainability and the Built Environment.  What do you do with a BSSBE degree, you may ask? Well I'll let you know when I find out! I have moved back to Punta Gorda, FL where I live with my parents. yippee! every college graduate's dream.  However, on a happier note, I just started an internship with Charlotte County's Community Development Department, in the Comprehensive Planning office.  I've been there three days now, and I LOVE IT! I have already learned so much, and I am so interested in anything I have been able to get my hands on.

So that's my little catch up, now back to sustainability and learning and all of that...

Today I found an interesting article written by Thomas Friedman (who is my current obsession).  I've been reading his book, "Hot, Flat and Crowded", speaking to globalization and pretty much all that is involved.

Anyway, the article I found is called The Earth is Full, which Friedman wrote for The NY Times about Paul Gilding, and his new book, “The Great Disruption: Why the Climate Crisis Will Bring On the End of Shopping and the Birth of a New World.”.  The article is interesting, and I might see if I can find that book to read, but there are a few memorable quotations from Gilding's book that I will post below.  These are the kind of articles and books that make us think about why things are the way they are, and why we haven't made changes to how we do things, both here in America and all over the World.  


“If you cut down more trees than you grow, you run out of trees,” writes Gilding. “If you put additional nitrogen into a water system, you change the type and quantity of life that water can support. If you thicken the Earth’s CO2 blanket, the Earth gets warmer. If you do all these and many more things at once, you change the way the whole system of planet Earth behaves, with social, economic, and life support impacts. This is not speculation; this is high school science.”


“We are heading for a crisis-driven choice,” he says. “We either allow collapse to overtake us or develop a new sustainable economic model. We will choose the latter. We may be slow, but we’re not stupid.”


There are a few thought-provoking quotes from the article/Gilding's book, but read the article. There's more and it's awesome.  In fact, I think I'll see where I can find that book this weekend. 

A question for you...

So I haven't been posting as much as I had planned on, and it isn't for lack of things to say... I have, however found, that I struggle with putting my thoughts into words, especially when it comes to discussing sustainability.  There is just so much, that I need lots of time to form arguments/thoughts in my head. I need to work on that. :)

So here is a question that I would like to pose to anyone who reads this and may have a response...

Now that people FINALLY generally agree that climate change is fact, there is another type of nay-sayer.  Today is not the first time it has happened to me, but it happened to me today, and I just don't know how to react. In discussion with friends, I made a comment (poking fun) that if we took a trip all the way to the Florida Keys (longer than we would normally drive for our annual function) to see the coral reefs because they are diminishing due to climate change (and other factors) that we would in fact be adding more to their degradation by driving that much farther than we normally would.  So the response I got back from my friend was that the degradation of our Earth is already happening, and we can't stop it, so we might as well. (not directly quoted).  And to that friend, I am not criticizing, just commenting on an argument that I have heard MANY times and really got me thinking today.

I have talked to so many people that have already decided that we are in way too far, and there is no way out so we might as well keep living as we are. I get so frustrated at these comments, but I don't know how to rebut them.  I want to sit and formulate an argument, but every time I try I feel like my head might explode.  There's just too much. Too many unknowns, arguments for both sides (I guess) and all of my emotions/tree-hugging side swirling around.

So I pose this to you.  What would you say to someone who has decided that it is simply too late to make a difference, so why try? Or your thoughts on the topic...

The Trash Vortex

I found this visual online, Greenpeace calls it the Trash Vortex, it is also called The Asian Trash Trail or the Eastern Garbage Patch.  If you follow the link, it brings you to the Greenpeace site.  What the Trash Vortex is, is an area (the size of Texas) north of Hawaii where a significant amount of our trash travels to. Because of the currents in the Pacific Ocean, the trash from the US west coast and from Japan collect in two main areas.  If you click on "The Journey of Trash" you can see the timeline that it takes our trash to collect in this vortex.

Not only does our trash make for choking hazards for ocean wildlife, but it is also full of chemicals that are released into the water.  It would be near impossible to stop all of the trash getting into the ocean, but I think that this is a great opportunity and potentially a way to open eyes to how many chemicals and toxins we allow in the products that we buy.  As consumers start to realize this, and look for products with less toxins, companies will make the products to meet our wants. So start looking at what goes into your products and what happens to them when you're done with them.

Green Products

I was Stumbling the other day, and came across a website that does green ratings for products.  The website is called Good Guide, and helps you "Find healthy, green, ethical products according to scientific ratings." You can type in a product, and it will give you ratings of different products from best score to worst.  There are scores for  Health, Environment and Society, and then an overall score.  You can search for specific products; "Head and Shoulders," or broad categories; "Shampoo."

Check it out! It looks like they have a pretty comprehensive list of products, from cleaning supplies to appliances, from electronics to pet food.  It also seems that you are likely to see the same companies popping us as the top runners (Seventh Generation and Samsung, etc.)

The Blind Men and the Elephant

A couple posts today, to catch up on everything I have been learning and finding out.  First of all, in my Industrial Ecology class today, we had a guest speaker, Professor Leslie Paul Thiele, who teaches in the Political Science field, as well as a course called Facets of Sustainability which is an intro class into sustainability, for those thinking about applying for the major or minor at the University of Florida. Anyway, there was one part of his lecture that I would like to repeat.  And that is the way that he defined the term 'sustainability'.  He compared the test of defining 'sustainability' to the old Indian legend, The Blind Men and the Elephant, where each blind man approaches the elephant from a different side and each comes away with a different version of what the elephant is.  I definitely suggest reading the version above.  And here is the image that goes with that version...

Professor Thiele talked about how sustainability means something different to us than it would to someone in Africa who is just trying to sustain their family one day at a time.  He also spoke about sustainability in different dimensions of time, and this is what sparked my interest most of all.  Sustainability could be sustaining our culture and land for the generations in our graspable future, in which case with help, we definitely can sustain.  However, if we think of cosmological time, the Earth cannot be sustained, since in a few billion years, the sun will have expanded enough to swallow the first three planets, and Earth will be a cease to exist as we know it, or as it has ever been. Each person has the opportunity to view sustainability in their own way and it really can mean something different to each person.


So here begins my search to find out what exactly sustainability means to me...

Costa Farms and Household Plants

In an effort to help my friend, Jessica, get some extra credit in a class, I went to the class with her, last week.  The class is called Plants and You, or something of that sort.   For the class, there was a guest speaker from Costa Farms,  located in SE United States, originated in Miami, Florida.

She spoke about household plants and mostly marketing the company, since marketing was her area of knowledge.  However, in her presentation she spoke a little bit about the benefits of household plants and mentioned a NASA study on the topic.  They suggest one house plant for every 100 square feet of space in your house.  Through 2 years of studies, it was found that plants help combat Sick Building Syndrome and are able to pull out up to 98 percent of toxins from the air.

So think about buying a few, and keep your house clean in a way maybe more significant than dust and clutter.