Healing the Earth, Healing Ourselves;
How being environmental stewards is the healthy human decision"
Crystal Graber
Topic: Environment and Human Health
Purpose: To inspire the audience to be environmental stewards based on their own health needs
Thesis: Being environmentally responsible eliminates sources of sickness in human beings.
Introduction
Body
So first, food choices.
You are what you eat, or so they say. So, what do we eat? If you’re like the average American, you eat a little bit of everything: fast food, tv dinners, some home made foods and once in a while dip into that organic stuff—depending how trendy you feel. If you’re a college student, you most likely rely on an outside food provider, like Sodexho. Either way, most of our food comes from hundreds and thousands of thousands of miles away, from huge production farms around the world. The transport of food is an environmental cost, but the production and use of chemical fertilizers and the land degradation which occurs in industrial farming are also tremendous environmental costs, polluting the air and waterways, and eroding rich soil. The University of Chicago published a study showing how the average person produces more CO2 emissions from their food choices than from driving their cars.
For human health, the problem with eating mass produced food lack of nutrition it has, when compared to local, sustainable farm food. Journalist Michael Pollen, in his book The Omnivore’s Dilemma, writes about his experience on a grass farm in Virginia, explaining some of the complexities of food production, particularly meat. Just like humans, animals are drawn to certain kinds of foods because those foods have certain nutrients. When we need iron, we crave meat or spinach. When cows have upset stomachs, they crave foods with antibiotic compounds, like plantain. So when animals are raised on a grass farm, they self-medicate by choosing the food with the nourishment that they need. They are healthier and then their meat has more nutrients in it and when we consume it, we are healthier.
In direct contrast to this natural self-medicating system run the industrial farmed foods. Mass production of food requires a monoculture: only one kind of nourishment for the plants and animals, and so they cannot choose for themselves the healthiest options. Instead, they have to be constantly filled with medications that keep them from getting sick or going rotten, but do not make up for the lack of nutrients. Crops make it to market with plenty of calories, but not enough proteins and amino acids to make us actually feel satisfied when we eat. So we keep eating, because we crave vitamins which are lacking in our food. This overeating to compensate for non-nutritious food leads to obesity and disease in us as human beings. But it is this physical urge to eat more to gain more nutrients that can be avoided by choosing food that is grown naturally on sustainable farms in our community.
Choosing food that is produced naturally and sustainably is choosing food that is nutritious and filling; food that nourishes our bodies with the proteins and vitamins we need more than just calories. Eating sustainable food is then good for the earth, and good for our bodies.
Along with eating sustainably produced foods, reducing air pollution from traffic also increases human health.
Many of us involved in environmental stewardship are well aware of the dangers of air pollution to the broader environment. Particularly CO2 emissions are considered by the International Panel on Climate Change to be contributing to global warming which will, in the worst case scenario, melt the arctic ice cap, disrupt the gulf stream and throw the earth back into another ice age.
However, there are more personal dangers from air pollution as well. Isabelle Silverman from the Living Cities Program reports that in New York City, the closer a person lives to a road, the more likely they are to have breathing related illnesses. This seems like common sense, and Environmental Defense has compiled multiple research studies that document the increased health risks related to traffic emissions. Breast cancer and lung cancer have been correlated with increased exposure to nitrogen dioxide—a primary emission from cars. The likelihood of dying from a heart attack tripled for people living in high pollution areas. And let’s not forget children, who are so vulnerable in their development to the onset of asthma and lower immune systems, both of which are increased by growing up in high pollution areas.
The detriments of traffic air pollution to human health are clear, as are the benefits of keeping our cars off the road. First and most obviously, when we are not driving, we are walking or bicycling a lot more. Not only is the exercise itself physically healthy and stress-reducing, but the time outside reconnects us with nature in a spiritually significant way, and natural sunlight exposure stimulates endorphins in our brain which make us happy. Additionally, taking the time to walk or bicycle is a way of making space in our lives, space for our souls to catch up, as they say in Brazil. I recently completed a project where I interviewed MCC workers in Cambodia. One of them commented to me that he decided part way through his term that he would wash his own clothes, just to give himself some space in his life, time to think and let his mind wander while he did something physically active. Choosing to walk or ride bicycle whenever possible, rather than driving, is a deeply healthy activity for us human beings, as well as the earth.
Conclusion
It’s not always easy to make these decisions, but we don’t have to be absolutist about it. Just because you are a student who buys a meal plan does not mean you can’t walk downtown to get more laundry detergent. Just because you live in the countryside and have to drive into town for work doesn’t mean you can’t have your own vegetable garden. I encourage each of us to make environmentally responsible decisions, to the best of our ability in our own situation. Food and transportation are choices that everyone faces, so I urge each of us to make environmentally responsible decisions, not only for the earth’s wellbeing, but for our own human wellness.
