April 22 is Earth Day, which is important for several reasons. For many, the sole purpose of this day is to seemingly remind them about the harmful impacts a variety of practices can have on their health. From sensationalized advertisements about cancer-causing pollutants, to statistics about food waste and crops dying, a lot of what we tend to focus on about Earth Day has one specific interest group: us. That isn’t ridiculous, of course, as we tend to care about things in our own lives before looking at the broader perspective, and it is important for us to understand how polluting our environment can hurt us. But this selfishness isn’t going to be helpful in the long run, both to the earth and all of its other inhabitants.
Humans are selfish creatures. To some extent, this is necessary for us if we are to hold our spot as the dominant intelligent species on this planet. We fill in wetlands to build neighborhoods, slash and burn acres of forests, drill for fossil fuels and corral animals into tiny cages to provide us with food to eat. All of these have massive environmental impacts, yet we continue to practice them daily. Why? Because we can’t see it or feel it harming us as we reap profits.
Activities that explicitly harm us are what worry people. When we literally used hairspray like there was no tomorrow back in the ‘80s, we soon learned about the impacts of volatile organic compounds and chlorofluorocarbons like aerosols on our health, and changed the problematic formulas. The study on it even won chemists Mario Molina and F. Sherwood Rowland a Nobel Prize, according to Understanding Science, University of Berkeley. When it was revealed that these chemicals caused ozone depletion, it was exposed to the public that it could cause cancer, cataracts and immune problems. Suddenly the ingredients, and the public’s opinion on hairspray, was drastically altered.
But why do things need to be put into the context of human harm before we care about it? With deforestation, entire forests are destroyed for the creation of products like paper, palm oil or towels, which benefit our daily lives. The destruction, however, doesn’t benefit the environment. When rainforests are cleared using slash and burn techniques to be utilized for agriculture, the land is only successful for a few seasons, because the nutrients in these natural ecosystems are trapped in the foliage, not the soil. In addition, our habits can have horrific and unpredictable impacts on animal life.
In the case of the palm oil industry, it is estimated that 90 percent of orangutans’ habitats have been destroyed over the past 20 years due to the harvesting of this ingredient, according to Say No to Palm Oil. Unfortunately for orangutans, humans really like peanut butter with palm oil, which gives it the classic, creamy texture we’re all used to, even though it can be made without it. Thus, because of this preference, we continue to harm orangutans and their habitat for our benefit.
Another example is that of microplastics. Microplastics are small particles of plastic that may come from the breaking down of bottles, exfoliating beads in facial cleansers and even glitter, among other things. More recently in the news, the use of microplastics has been scrutinized for its damaging impacts on marine ecosystems. We were aware that the plastic we use on a daily basis can get washed into the ocean and stays there for hundreds of years, and it should be common sense that this can harm fish and other marine life. However, it wasn’t until scientists found that humans have begun ingesting these plastics in the fish they consume that it became a problem. Why wasn’t the fact that it kills animals, ruins diverse and unique ecosystems and pollutes our water enough to convince the majority of our population that microplastics are bad?
Of course, not everyone out there is oblivious to environment issues — but the firepower of those who are just isn’t enough. Plenty of well-informed people make educated decisions about their habits and even dedicate their lives to protecting the environment, but unfortunately for Earth, these people cannot save the planet without global support. We as a species need to be more aware of life around us and realize that our selfish practices are ruining our planet, whether we can feel it or not.
