Whew. Finals are at last done, if somewhat belatedly so (I turned in my final paper Dec. 12th, though finals week officially only runs through the 8th.) I churned out 47 pages in about two weeks, and learned my lesson about starting my paper writing earlier in the quarter (or was it the lesson that one shouldn’t actually treat Thanksgiving weekend as a holiday? I’m not sure). My mind is only now slowly releasing itself from all the pressure, meaning I haven’t had the ability to enjoy any of the fun reading I’d set aside for the break. My capacity for taking in words has been limited to other blog postings, and the news; I spent quite awhile yesterday working through the Sunday Tribune (though, notably, yesterday was Saturday, but it seems that doesn’t matter anymore).
There was some interesting stuff, though, on the main page of the Trib. Most notably, there was a long feature on how the increase in purchases of cashmere here in the U.S. are causing desertification of already-arid lands in China, as goat herders on the edge of the Gobi desert attempt to raise larger herds for more profit, thus depleting the grassland there. This has led to a dust-bowl-like situation and massive dust storms that pick up huge amounts of loose dirt and carry it through the air. The somewhat ironic kicker to the situation is that these storms combine with air that is already highly polluted (due to the Chinese’s heavy use of coal) and then carry both the dust and pollutants to other nearby countries and even all the way across the Pacific to the U.S. , causing heavy amounts of air pollution in cities across the West Coast, which appears as something of a large “brown cloud” draped over the landscape. This of course causes major health problems; the article mentions that one such dust storm caused millions of South Koreans to seek medical help in 2002.
The lesson should be obvious: our over-consumption not only depletes the obvious natural resources from which the products we purchase come, but can lead to vast amounts of environmental damage, both in the places where the products are made and even thousands of miles away. The dream that we can leave the consequences of our destructive consumer habits elsewhere is really only a dream, a myth. The immediate application may be not to purchase any cashmere items as gifts this Christmas, but we should also realize that merely because the media hasn’t illuminated how our other choices cause such destruction, doesn’t mean it doesn’t happen. Perhaps no cheaply-purchased gifts at all is the answer? No petro-chemical stocking stuffers, maybe?
This report on cashmere was only the first part of a series that the Tribune is doing on the impact of China’s presence around the globe both as a provider and consumer of goods; Monday and Tuesday will address the increase of destructive logging and then the growing demands for oil in China. I want to give props to the Tribune, though, for starting off this series with a piece that demonstrates that it’s not just other developing countries that are causing a strain on resources world-wide; it is in fact our reliance on resources and cheap goods from these countries that began this whole process. We cannot merely blame the increasing population of other countries (as was attempted at the Earth Summit in Rio in 1992); we must realize our creation of this model of consumption came first.
Right, so that’s the “light” reading I’ve been doing over break. I think it may be time for my annual reading of A Christmas Carol to serve as a nice reminder that it is possible for those focused only on their own financial and personal well-being to be transformed, even if takes other-worldly spirits to do so. (The remembrance of Scrooge’s turn-around is also particularly warranted by the other leading article in the paper, about the absurdly ludicrous wealth of Goldman Sachs employees.)
