Analytic

The environment has had its fair share of problems. Pollution in the past has created many problems, and while none of the polluting we did in the early era of the industrial revolution was on purpose, the polluting we did later in the 20th century is what is creating permanent damage to the earth. Because people were not aware of what they were doing to the environment, their actions in a sense, were justified. The problem is it became largely undeniable of what people were doing to the earth once Rachel Carson projected the truth out into the public with her book Silent Spring. She is the one that told people of the real harmful effects of DDT, and the fact that it hurts more wildlife than what it was designed to kill. This is one of the main events that sparked the environmental movement, and then the conservation movement as people realized that, “for the first time…every human is now subjected to contact with dangerous chemicals from [birth to death]..” Around this period in time is when people also came to the realization that natural resources are not going to be around forever, and that they now had a responsibility to protect those resources and use them wisely. Responsibility. This is what was thrust on Americans as they realized their obligations to the environment and that their actions affected everything. Rachel Carson is definitely a person that made the issue of the environment more important and prevalent for the whole nation to hear. What she wrote is still an issue for Americans today as the struggle to reduce pollution in order eliminate green house gases is on. Global warming is the side effect of pollution from the population. The government, like in Jimmy Carter’s State of the Union Address, tried to instill laws and programs to stifle pollution. There is much debate about whether these did anything, as well as the ethics behind creating these programs. For example, it was rumored that Jimmy Carter only created the Alaska conservation act to boost his popularity. Regardless, as much as it did help, it did not fix everything as it still allowed a lot of natural resources to be pumped out continuously. This continued a present problem. In his speech he realized that earth is an important place and it supports the lives of humans. "...we shall protect the habitat and the existence of our own species on this earth." Although it took a while, people began to notice what was going on around them and this helped back up what Rachel Carson had to say. Around the time of his acts, more groups were producing environmental actions that helped the earth. These programs need to constantly be put out and created to fix dilemmas that are produced because of our lifestyles. The environment and the problem of pollution still play an important and prominent role in American society. The environment is where we live and function, it is very important that it is taken care of as a connotation of the negative effects on the human race that occur because of pollution.