Environmental Protection: Are You Actually Helping? Or Are You Letting The Real Culprits Get Away?

What have you done to reduce your carbon foot print? What has your neighbor done? Your parents? Your friends? Anyone? You have probably been asked this at least once in your life, if not multiple times. The issue of global warming and carbon emissions has been a huge political topic for quite some time now. Naturally, you have those that laugh at it and think it isn’t true, and then you have others that exclaim that it is and that we should be walking to work – or at the very least, carpooling. The science doesn’t lie, our environment is in danger. How much in danger, tends to be the main question.

Social activists, governments, politicians and corporations continually ask what YOU can do to reduce your negative impact on the planet. They tell you to drive a better car, take the train, or to reduce your use of electricity and water. The list of improvements is endless it seems. But to what end? Are you really making a difference? According to the comic As the World Burns: 50 Simple Things You CanDo To Stay in Denial, the answer is a big fat no. But more on that in a second.

As the World Burns by Derrick Jensen and Stephanie McMillan is an excellent example of how a comic can utilize both pictures and words toward emphasizing a specific ideal or goal. As Scott McCloud mentions in his work UnderstandingComics, “[t]he idea that a picture can evoke an emotional or sensual response in the viewer is vital to the art of comics” (121). Through this comic’s use of simplistic style of art, the reader can utilize those visuals toward a greater understanding of the main point the authors are trying to illustrate. Through the use of words, the reader will be able to understand the main points, of course. However, humans are visual are we not? We love looking at things. To be able to read AND look at pictures is a surefire way to gain the readers complete attention – and hold it.

As the World Burns focuses primarily on two little girls. One is excited to try all these different ideas about how she can change her everyday life in order to help the planet. For example, she tells her friend that “[y]ou can install a low flow showerhead to save 350 pounds of CO2 per year, and wash your clothes in cold or warm water to save 500 pounds per year” (Jensen & McMillan 9). Her counterpart, however, dismisses her idea by saying “[o]r you could knock out the water supply to a factory. That would save a lot of energy, and water too!” (Jensen & McMillan 9). This sort of interaction is repeated numerous times: one mentions what SHE can do, and the other challenges her to consider the true culprit of environmental harm: corporations.

As the World Burns does an excellent job of incorporating the standard PC answers that business and government give to its people and then meeting those answers with a sarcastic comment about its futility. This comment is often followed up with evidence to support its claim. For example, to continue the shortage of water, the realistic little girl comments that “[w]e’re always told that the “solution” to the “water crisis” is that we should take shorter showers. But what we’re not so often told is that more than 90 percent of the water used by humans…is not actually used by humans at all, but by agriculture and industry. And of the water used by cities, as much water is used for gold courses as is used by human beings” (Jensen & McMillan 20). In utilizing here such logic and –presumably accurate – facts, the authors are attempting to educate their readers about the environmental impact that large industries have on the planet, rather than focusing on the small things that we can change, that will have very little impact.

What is so impactful about this comic is the way it utilizes logos and pathos (logical and emotional appeals) toward getting people to see the truth about the world. Rather than buying into the corporate jargon, people should pay closer attention to who is delivering them these useless ways to fix the planet and why.  As the World Burns illustrates the interactions of many business interactions as well and how they prioritize their own bottom line over the health of the environment. For example, one business man claims that “[t]he energy needed to manufacture 14 plastic grocery bags could power a car for one mile” (Jensen & McMillan 22). Here, the comic is illustrating the ridiculous amount of energy it takes to produce a product that in and of itself, is harmful to the environment. Again, another businessman argues against changing the way they do business in order to help the environment by exclaiming “[y]ou’re eating into my profits even talking about this stuff” (Jensen & McMillan 23). This, and many other examples within the comic, emphasize the author’s push against large corporations that are run by greed.

So what does this comic teach us? Why does it matter? Well for starters, you can stop listening to the garbage that the government and corporations tell us. Sure, do what you can to make your daily life more advantageous for the planet. But do it because you want to. Not because some politician or corporate junkie told you it would make a difference. Instead, focus on what THEY are doing; what THEY can do to help alter or control the amount of waste that corporations produce.