Exercise 4: Documentary Reflection

August 22, 2024 By: Jiaqi(Ryan)Shi

Jared Hayes of EWG reported in March 2024 that ‘Forever chemicals’ from landfills is threatening the environmental justice communities.The report shows us a serious environmental problem whic is “forever chemical” contamination was found in 11,000 closed landfills in the United States. This contamination seriously threatens the health of about 13 million people living in low-income communities and communities of color near landfills. This pollution brings different health risks to different communities due to different landfills. According to EWG, landfills that receive sludge and industrial waste have higher levels of PFAS. At the same time, older landfills lack the means to deal with PFAS. All these factors ultimately lead to more harm to communities of color and low-income communities.  I hope people can face up to the fact that the disadvantaged are being hurt more by the environmental problems caused by everyone in the world. It is sad that people are experiencing different treatment under the environmental problem because of their skin color or low-income. I believe that through the environmental movement, we can fight for fairer treatment for everyone. 

Renee Skelton and Vernice Miller of NRDC report on “The Environmental Justice Movement”. This movement was initiated by blacks, Latinos, Asian Americans, Pacific Islanders, and indigenous peoples. The reason is very simple. The racism and inequality patterns since the founding of the United States have led to the interests of the marginalized communities are always being ignored. It is even worse that these marginalized communities may face multiple environmental threats at the same time. The Environmental Justice Movement began to rise in the late 1970s, and hundreds of grassroots environmental justice organizations have been established so far. This movement has successfully held many events, representing the strong determination of vulnerable groups to contribute to community environmental protection. The current progress is also gratifying, pushing the federal government to set a number of policies to protect environmental justice. We can foresee that the concept of environmental justice is gradually gaining popularity with the efforts of “The Environmental Justice Movement”. 

Links for the Reports

https://www.ewg.org/news-insights/news/2024/03/forever-chemicals-landfills-threaten-environmental-justice-communities

https://www.nrdc.org/stories/environmental-justice-movement