There are so many bad things in this world and the environment is one of them bad things. Our environment will never just go away but it’s definitely needs to change. It’s causing damage to our friends and family, it’s taking away all of our animals, and it’s hurting the world we know around us. If we don’t do something about it, will the world’s population go down because of a great amount of people dying? Will the animals become extinct and no one ever talk about them again? Will the oceans be able to hold their ground and keep producing the oxygen it’s giving us?
Throughout this essay, Sandra Steingraber does a great job using ethos, pathos, and logos while talking about the environment and the issues it is causing to the people and the world around us. In Steingraber’s essay “Despair Not,” she focuses on the environmental issues that have to do with our air pollution and the toxic chemicals getting thrown inside of our bodies. Steingraber explains to us, “In the absence of federal policies that protect child development and the ecology of the planet on which out children’s lives depend, we parents have to serve as our own regulatory agencies and departments of interior. (747) There are diseases flying around in the air outside. Steingraber discovered, “One in eight U. S children is born prematurely. Preterm birth is the leading cause of the death in the first months of life and the leading cause of disability. Its price tag is $26 billion per year in medical costs, special services, and lost productivity.
Preterm birth has demonstrated links to air pollution, especially maternal exposure to fine particles and combustion byproducts of the type released from coal-burning power plants” (746) The coal from the power plants are eleasing bad particles and getting to the wombs inside the women, which is causing the babies to have problems when they are born. It’s not even just premature birthing. It’s also having asthma, having a learning disability, and autism. These are all very costly things that not many people can afford without some help. Steingraber gave great example of ethos, pathos, and logos. Some of the ethical appeals she used were the tree branch example. Steingraber said, “One branch represents what is happening to our planet through the atmospheric accumulation of heat-trapping gases (most notably, carbon dioxide and methane).
The second branch represents what is happening to us through the accumulation of inherently toxic chemical pollutants in our bodies. ” When you follow branch number one, you find things going wrong with the world, you find drought or floods, you find oceans with bad chemicals in there destroying the animals we need most. Take Plankton for an example, they provide half of our atmospheres oxygen supply. When you follow branch number two, you find sick children. There are pesticides in their urine, you realize their hormone levels are funky and you see that tests scores are going down.
Steingraber is giving so much interest in these facts she has discovered. This shows the readers that she is determined to help this environment. She has a son herself and she doesn’t want her son going through these things. She is really grabbing the attention of parents in this essay. Parents who have kids will find this as a good read for them. It informs them of what’s going on as to whether they see it or don’t see it. The second way Steingraber increases her credibility among the readers is by writing an essay specifically focused on the environment and all the issues it is causing.
The main reason for this essay is to notify parents of what is going on. “We feel helpless in the face of our knowledge, and we’re not sure we want to know anything more” (747) Steingraber says. What she means by that is the parents what to know what’s going on but they know that whatever is going on isn’t good, especially for their children. Those children are their babies no matter what and they don’t want anything bad happening to them. Pathos was another great one she used. Pathos is the emotional appeals, which she has plenty in this essay.
When my son Elijah, at age 4, asked to be a polar bear for Halloween, I sewed a polar bear costume – and I did so with the full knowledge that his costume might outlast the species. ” Steingraber tells us. She tells this because one in every fourmammal species is now threatened with extinction. That is because of our environment. She questions, “What will we say when our grandchildren ask us the names of the departed? When bats, bees, butterflies, whales, polar bears, and elephants disappear, will children still read books about them?
Will they want to dress up as vanished species? Or, by then, will the loss of favorite animals be the least of their worries? ” (746) This breaks the readers hearts. Soon this horrific environment that we are living in will kill all of the animals out and they will all be forgotten. Another example of pathos that kind of gets to peoples hearts is the fact that she has had cancer. She is a cancer survivor and she had a child after she was cured. Many people are not able to have children after having cancer.
Her son is her world, so when she has knowledge of all these things not good for Elijah, she isn’t very happy. Steingraber tells us, “One in ten U. S. white girls and one in five U. S. black girls begin breast development before the age of eight. On average, breast development begins nearly two years earlier (age 9) than it did in the early 1960’s (age 11). A risk factor for breast cancer in adulthood, early puberty in girls is associated with increasing body fat as well as exposure to some hormonally active chemical agents known as “estrogen mimickers. We have no cost estimates for the shortened childhoods of girls. ” (746-747)
Which is why she wants to help the environment. She wants everyone to come together and realize that change needs to happen because that is the cure. The way Steingraber uses logos really attracts the readers to her essay. People are reading this to look at the facts. She did a great job making sure that there are plenty of facts to back up that what she is saying is true. She not only tells what other people are saying but she herself has done a lot of research, as she is an ecologist as well.
She did go in and do more research because there are more people than just her worried about the environment. This is starting to effect our future generation coming up. Statistic says, “Risks for asthma are related to transportation and energy policies” (748) Another Statistic that Steingraber is using is about the money chronic childhood diseases are costing us because of these toxic chemical al exposures. “Preterm birth is the leading cause of death in the first months of life and the leading cause of disability.
Its price tag is $26 billion per year in medical costs, special services, and lost productivity,” Steingraber says. (746) That’s not the only prices that she gave us. Overall, Steingraber did a great job explaining her ethos, pathos, and logos. She connects really well with the audience and she really got her point across to those she was talking to. She did a good job putting in facts and it definitely helped her case that she was an ecologist because it made her essay more credible and believable.
