Wow. Very eloquent, very respectful, and very insightful. I admit that I didn't know much about environmental justice; But Dr. Ali has given us a terrific overview, and an excellent example in the work being done in Spartanburg. As a relatively new South Carolinian, this makes me proud, and I hope that Spartanburg's initiatives can shine a light on the rest of our state. Thank you!
I notice that conveniently ignored by critics of northward mass migration (and maybe of the migrants themselves) is that many are fleeing global-warming-related extreme weather events and chronic crop failures in the southern hemisphere widely believed to be related to the northern hemisphere’s chronic fossil-fuel burning, beginning with the Industrial Revolution.
Many newcomers are rightfully despondent, perhaps enough so to work very hard in cashless exchange for food. But all of that no longer matters when they die in their attempt at arriving. Like in January 2022, when a young family of four from India froze to death trying to access the U.S. via sub-zero southern Manitoba, Canada, near the U.S. border.
Meanwhile, I see many migrants [a.k.a. 'illegals'], new and old, in my home city, which comes close to bordering Washington State. I know that growing numbers of people, regardless of their origin, requiring housing only increases the market-value pressure on the rent rate I pay for my old one-bedroom apartment unit.
I also know there’s greater pressure on the publicly-funded health services here that were already stretched thin. Still, it would be wrong, if not hypocritical, of me to criticize often-desperate people for doing what I [and many others] likely would do in their dreadful position and if brave enough.
I furthermore have a hard time believing that migrants and refugees in general willfully and contentedly become permanent financial/resource burdens on their host nation. Quite likely they desire to pull their own weight via employment, even if only to prove their critics wrong. I know I'd much want to if I was in their unenviable position.
Obstacles to environmental progress were formidable pre-pandemic. But Covid-19 not only stalled most projects being undertaken, it added greatly to the already busy landfills and burning centers with disposed masks and other non-degradable biohazard-protective single-use materials.
In large part due to Earth’s enormous size, there is a general obliviousness, if not a willful carelessness, towards the vast natural environment. There’s a continuance of polluting with a business-as-usual attitude. Societally, we still discharge pollutants like it’s all absorbed into the environment without repercussion.
Also, here in the Far West, if the universal availability of a renewable energy alternative would come at the expense of the traditional ‘energy’ production companies’ large profits, one can expect obstacles, including the political and regulatory sort. If something notably conflicts with corporate big-profit interests, even very progressive motions are greatly resisted, often enough successfully.
It all must be convenient for those fossil fuel interests — particularly when neoliberals and conservatives remain overly preoccupied with vocally criticizing one another for their relatively trivial politics and therefore divert attention away from some of the planet's greatest polluters and pollution, where it actually very-much should and needs to be sharply focused.
Not that long ago, Alberta's government (via its Utilities Commission) suddenly announced its decision to delay, or “pause”, all approvals for new renewable-energy infrastructure for about seven months, citing concerns over logistics and potential end-of-life clean-up costs. Yet, the same government fails to force fossil fuel companies that have left behind major contamination sites in Alberta to clean up after themselves as they formally agreed to do.
So-called conservatives generally do not mind polluting the planet most liberally — unless, of course, it happens to blacken their own backyard. And many drivers of superfluously huge and over-powered thus gas-guzzling vehicles seem to consider it a basic human right, perhaps because it's an extension of their phallic ego. It may scare those drivers just to contemplate a world in which they can no longer readily fuel that extension, especially since much quieter electric cars are for them no substitute.
Worsening matters is the large and growing populace who are too overworked, underpaid, worried and rightfully angry about food and housing unaffordability for themselves or their family, to have the vital-energy left to criticize big industry for the environmental damage it causes/allows, especially when not immediately observable.
Wow. Very eloquent, very respectful, and very insightful. I admit that I didn't know much about environmental justice; But Dr. Ali has given us a terrific overview, and an excellent example in the work being done in Spartanburg. As a relatively new South Carolinian, this makes me proud, and I hope that Spartanburg's initiatives can shine a light on the rest of our state. Thank you!
So wonderful to see this comment. We agree. Thanks Dory!
I notice that conveniently ignored by critics of northward mass migration (and maybe of the migrants themselves) is that many are fleeing global-warming-related extreme weather events and chronic crop failures in the southern hemisphere widely believed to be related to the northern hemisphere’s chronic fossil-fuel burning, beginning with the Industrial Revolution.
Many newcomers are rightfully despondent, perhaps enough so to work very hard in cashless exchange for food. But all of that no longer matters when they die in their attempt at arriving. Like in January 2022, when a young family of four from India froze to death trying to access the U.S. via sub-zero southern Manitoba, Canada, near the U.S. border.
Meanwhile, I see many migrants [a.k.a. 'illegals'], new and old, in my home city, which comes close to bordering Washington State. I know that growing numbers of people, regardless of their origin, requiring housing only increases the market-value pressure on the rent rate I pay for my old one-bedroom apartment unit.
I also know there’s greater pressure on the publicly-funded health services here that were already stretched thin. Still, it would be wrong, if not hypocritical, of me to criticize often-desperate people for doing what I [and many others] likely would do in their dreadful position and if brave enough.
I furthermore have a hard time believing that migrants and refugees in general willfully and contentedly become permanent financial/resource burdens on their host nation. Quite likely they desire to pull their own weight via employment, even if only to prove their critics wrong. I know I'd much want to if I was in their unenviable position.
Obstacles to environmental progress were formidable pre-pandemic. But Covid-19 not only stalled most projects being undertaken, it added greatly to the already busy landfills and burning centers with disposed masks and other non-degradable biohazard-protective single-use materials.
In large part due to Earth’s enormous size, there is a general obliviousness, if not a willful carelessness, towards the vast natural environment. There’s a continuance of polluting with a business-as-usual attitude. Societally, we still discharge pollutants like it’s all absorbed into the environment without repercussion.
Also, here in the Far West, if the universal availability of a renewable energy alternative would come at the expense of the traditional ‘energy’ production companies’ large profits, one can expect obstacles, including the political and regulatory sort. If something notably conflicts with corporate big-profit interests, even very progressive motions are greatly resisted, often enough successfully.
It all must be convenient for those fossil fuel interests — particularly when neoliberals and conservatives remain overly preoccupied with vocally criticizing one another for their relatively trivial politics and therefore divert attention away from some of the planet's greatest polluters and pollution, where it actually very-much should and needs to be sharply focused.
Not that long ago, Alberta's government (via its Utilities Commission) suddenly announced its decision to delay, or “pause”, all approvals for new renewable-energy infrastructure for about seven months, citing concerns over logistics and potential end-of-life clean-up costs. Yet, the same government fails to force fossil fuel companies that have left behind major contamination sites in Alberta to clean up after themselves as they formally agreed to do.
So-called conservatives generally do not mind polluting the planet most liberally — unless, of course, it happens to blacken their own backyard. And many drivers of superfluously huge and over-powered thus gas-guzzling vehicles seem to consider it a basic human right, perhaps because it's an extension of their phallic ego. It may scare those drivers just to contemplate a world in which they can no longer readily fuel that extension, especially since much quieter electric cars are for them no substitute.
Worsening matters is the large and growing populace who are too overworked, underpaid, worried and rightfully angry about food and housing unaffordability for themselves or their family, to have the vital-energy left to criticize big industry for the environmental damage it causes/allows, especially when not immediately observable.