Our world is a sacred place. The Earth has been around for 4.5 billion years. As time goes on, humans are looking for more and more ways to improve their lives, but at what cost is it okay to make these changes when it is doing damage to our Earth? People can participate in harming the environment without even knowing it by just going about their everyday lives. From the carbon monoxide that is expelled from cars, to not recycling as well as people should. The use of plastic bags and the material needed to make these bags are using up a lot of our natural resources. It takes plastic a long time to decompose and when it is burned it releases harsh chemicals. These are only some of the harmful activities that can affect our Earth’s environment.
Using our natural resources at an alarming rate can’t have a long-term effect on the Earth. The ozone layer is thinning due to all the toxic chemicals that are being admitted into the air, and people just aren’t taking care of the environment. Recycling is a huge thing that people have issues with. It is not taken very seriously in some states. Getting rid of garbage and waste can not only expect our air but also our ocean life. We have heard of countless oil spills and garbage being dumped into our oceans affecting those creatures and their environment. Helen Lee Schifter talks about the importance of coming together as a nation created equal. Not only is it important to think about the environmental impacts but it is important to think about how we treat each other. “Health and wellness is an incredibly important part of all of our lives. Unfortunately, it’s also something that is consistently overlooked and even neglected. That has got to change.”
Another impact that humans have on the environment is overpopulation. People may not think about the effects of overpopulation because it is a natural thing to want to have a family. The more and more people you come into this world require the use of more and more natural resources. The amount of death is not compensating for the amount of people being born. Overpopulation has a huge impact on the environment.
Deforestation Is the process of taking our rainforests and turning them into paper or wood for housing and many other things. This is causing a huge impact on the wildlife as well as depleting our clean air. The trees are one of the biggest resources we have of our clean oxygen. Helen Lee Shifter is concerned that people may not realize they are hurting the environment because they are naïve to the facts. People need to get educated and find different ways to help the environment instead of depleting its resources. Teachers need to educate students about the importance of learning about the environment and what we can do to keep it clean. After all this is our Earth and we only get one chance to make sure it’s a habitable place to live.