The Journey of Stuff

Since my mom is getting out of the girl scout business, we spent last Thursday with all the girl scout families cleaning out and moving all the girl scout stuff out of our garage. My mom decided that since it was also Earth Day on Thursday, April 22nd, we could also show them a short documentary called The Story of Stuff by Annie Leonard. It is about where our stuff comes from, what happens when we throw it away, how it is affecting the environment, and how we are on a dangerous path which is using up all our resources. If you haven't seen this film, and you also have a lot of stuff, you can  watch it free on the Internet at : http://www.storyofstuff.com/. We also have her new book, The Story of Stuff, which includes all her research on the subject for 10 years.

The first problem with our ways of making stuff, is the fact that we are running out of natural resources to make the stuff with. Almost one third of the worlds natural resources have already been consumed and thrown away. I would really like to know how long it will take to consume the rest of the world's resources at this rate. It is obvious that our way of making stuff needs to stop. It is even more vital that we stop putting so many chemicals in our stuff.

Some products have been known to have up to one hundred thousand synthetic chemicals in them of which none have been tested with other chemicals we use in day to day life. Pillows, some blankets, and mattresses are good examples of this. They are doused in B.F.Rs (Brominated Flame Retardants), otherwise known as a Neurotoxin, otherwise know as a toxin that kills brain cells. A pleasant thing to rest your head on for eight to ten hours a night! Adding chemicals to products also ruins the environment. Although a lot of the chemicals leave the factories in the form of products, even more chemicals leave as pollution. The United States alone admits to releasing more than 4,000,000,000 lbs. of pollution each year.

The next part of the journey of stuff, is actually buying the stuff. This is often no problem for the average American as they buy stuff all the time, but who said we were really buying the stuff. Part of the documentary was about how we don't really pay for the stuff we buy. One day she was walking to work and wanted to listen to the radio so she went to Radio Shack and bought a radio, for five dollars. As she listened to it, she began to wonder how the radio could cost her five dollars. She learned that the metals were likely mined in South Africa, The Plutonium was drilled in Iraq, the plastics were probably made in China, and the whole thing was probably put together by some fifteen year old in Mexico. Either way, it made me think that I can't even get a bus ticket that would take me to the next city with five dollars let alone across several countries! I wonder how they have enough money to pay the workers.

The final problem with the journey of stuff is how we are getting rid of it. Corporations have long ago mastered the art of scamming customers. Two of their most useful ones are planned obsolescence, and perceived obsolescence. Planned obsolescence is when the corporations try to make an object break, become archaic, or useless as fast as they can. The sad part is, it works. Ninety-nine percent of all the stuff we throw away was purchased less than six weeks ago. Perceived obsolescence is when the corporation tries to convince you to throw away perfectly good stuff by making it look out of fashion. In other words both planned and perceived obsolescence means "designed for the dump." After the corporations have convinced you to throw away an item, it is then dragged out to the curb where it spends the night with all the other junk awaiting its fate. Our unfortunate can of garbage is then taken to a landfill that is just a big hole in the ground. The junk then gets either buried in the landfill, or burned in an incinerator and then buried in the landfill. Although both methods are extremely dangerous to the environment because of the possibility of any water in the landfill becoming leachate (an extremely toxic material made as water trapped in the landfill is blended into the toxic chemicals) and flowing into ground water supplies and poisoning them. Incinerating trash before burial is even more dangerous to the environment. Do you remember all those toxic chemicals that were in all that stuff that was just thrown out: the Neurotoxins and the B.F.Rs in the pillows, mattresses, and blankets? Well, they were just incinerated and the chemicals were changed into the super toxin called Dioxin (deadliest toxin known to science) under the high heat. So just throwing away stuff is not as simple as it seems.

In her new book about the story of stuff, an example of one of the things she does for school presentations is she takes a soda can, places it on the table, and asks the students, "What is it?" If the can is on the table, they say, "It is a soda can." Next, she throws the soda can in the trash can and asks the students, "What is it now?" If the same can is now in the trash can, they say, "It is trash."  She pulls it out...it's a can. She puts it back in...its trash. So trash isn't the condition of an object, it is whether or not it is in the trash can. Another way of explaining this theory is that what one person thinks is trash, may not be considered trash by another person. Also in her book, she talks about being in Bangladesh and seeing an old shampoo bottle she threw in the trash later the next day pulled out of the trash and with the addition of wheels it was now a child's toy car. When my mom looks in my room, all she sees is "trash." My favorite Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows poster = trash to her. My dad's slightly battered acoustic guitar = goodwill item or garage sale item or dumpster contents. Plans for a hydraulic engine system that I plan to earn a million dollars with = fire place food. Kirby pinata I made out of paper mache = art box, garage or any other place on earth (or not) where she will never have to look at it again. These are only a few examples. If I were to list all of the stuff she has an urge to give away, throw away, or light fire to, I would have to start a whole other blog.

However, this blog is about what our family is doing in our homeschool "mystery." So what we are doing this month is trying to figure out how we can stop environmental problems. We also went to Earth Day at the Chandler Environmental Education Center and International Migratory Bird Day at the Rio Salado Habitat Restoration Area. I think it would be nice if people would celebrate Earth Day past April 22nd.