Van Jones is an American news commentator, author, and non-practicing attorney. In this hard-hitting talk, he shows us how our throwaway culture hits poor people and poor countries “first and worst,” with consequences we all share no matter where we live.
Van Jones – TED Talk TRANSCRIPT
I am honored to be here, and I’m honored to talk about this topic, which I think is of grave importance.
We’ve been talking a lot about the horrific impacts of plastic on the planet and on other species, but plastic hurts people, too — especially poor people.
And both in the production of plastic, the use of plastic and the disposal of plastic, the people who have the bull’s-eye on their foreheads are poor people.
People got very upset when the BP oil spill happened, for very good reason. People thought, “Oh, my God. This is terrible, this oil — it’s in the water. It’s going to destroy the living systems there. People are going to be hurt. This is a terrible thing, this oil is going to hurt the people in the Gulf.”
What people don’t think about is: What if the oil had made it safely to shore? What if the oil actually got where it was trying to go?
Not only would it have been burned in engines and added to global warming, but there’s a place called “Cancer Alley,” and the reason it’s called “Cancer Alley” is because the petrochemical industry takes that oil and turns it into plastic and in the process, kills people. It shortens the lives of the people who live there in the Gulf.
So oil and petrochemicals are not just a problem when there’s a spill; they’re a problem when there’s not. And what we don’t often appreciate is the price that poor people pay for us to have these disposable products.
The other thing we often don’t appreciate is, it’s not just at the point of production that poor people suffer. Poor people also suffer at the point of use.
Those of us who earn a certain income level, we have something called choice. The reason why you want to work hard and have a job and not be poor and broke is so you can have choices, economic choices.
We actually get a chance to choose not to use products that have dangerous, poisonous plastic in them. Other people who are poor don’t have those choices.
So low-income people often are the ones who are buying the products that have those dangerous chemicals in them that their children are using. Those are the people who wind up ingesting a disproportionate amount of this poisonous plastic in using it.
And people say, “Well, they should just buy a different product.” Well, the problem with being poor is you don’t have those choices. You often have to buy the cheapest products. The cheapest products are often the most dangerous.
And if that weren’t bad enough — if it wasn’t just the production of plastic that’s giving people cancer in places like Cancer Alley, and shortening lives and hurting poor kids at the point of use — at the point of disposal, once again, it’s poor people who bear the burden.
Often, we think we’re doing a good thing: You’re in your office, drinking your bottled water or whatever it is, and you think to yourself, “I’m going to throw this away. No — I’m going to be virtuous. I’m going to put it in the blue bin.”
You think, “I put mine in the blue bin.”
And then you look at your colleague and say, “Why, you cretin! You put yours in the white bin.” And we use that as a moral tickle. We feel so good about ourselves. If we — well, OK, I’m just … me. Not you, but I feel this way often.