Plastic Paradise Essay

Earth Science 2

October 3, 2016

“Plastic Paradise” Essay

     I have never thought much about plastic, other than the convenience of it.  So I found the “Plastic Paradise” documentary to be very interesting and informative.  I suppose I knew that plastic doesn’t ever go away, but I never thought about the cause and effect of the amount we produce every year.  I felt that the documentary was very well done and thought provoking.  Although I care about our environment and do the simple things like recycle, I would never really consider myself to be green; I just never thought through the bigger picture of something like using a plastic shopping bag instead of bringing my reusable tote to the grocery store.  But watching this film made me realize how important the plastic issue is, and will actually make me think about changing my behaviors.  

     If Angela Sun’s goal was to get people to understand the consequences of the amount of plastic we use every day, I think she accomplished that.  I do believe that it was important to hear her say that “just to be clear, plastic isn’t evil”, because it’s not.  It does have many positive aspects, and it does create thousands of jobs.  But do we really need all of the single-use plastic items?  It was incredible to hear how much plastic is produced each year, and how much of it ends up in the ocean.  Unfortunately, we live in a culture of convenience because time is so valuable these days.  So even when we try to make a change like using reusable shopping bags,

it’s still hard to not walk out with a plastic shopping bag because it’s so ingrained in us; it has clearly become a very bad habit, and one we need to change.  

     The other part of the film I found to be the most troubling is the repercussions the fishing nets have on the coral reefs.  The decline in the coral reef systems is devastating, and the thought that it will only get worse is unbelievably scary.  It was quoted that “if the reefs are in trouble, the oceans are in trouble, and if the oceans are in trouble, then we are in trouble”.  But no one seems to know to what extent or what type of impact it will have it if it continues to decline.  It is amazing to me how the ocean can self-regulate itself and spit out what we put in it.  But the fishing nets are a double whammy because they not only affect the marine life, but also the entire ecosystem in the ocean’s attempt to rid itself of them.