Into the Wild

I thought Into the Wild was a very interesting film, but thought that the main character Chris McCandless, aka Alexander Supertramp was a bit foolish. I understood why he wanted to venture off into the wild, to escape from society and enjoy the beauty and pureness of nature. However, I thought that he had this ideal of what his experience was going to be like from reading all of his books, and he went about his adventure in the wrong way. He seemed to think that everyone else in the world had been corrupted by society, and the only way to fix that was to return to the pureness of the wilderness. He seemed to think that the only way to find true happiness was by being completely alone in the wilderness, so he could form his own ideas about the world. When he was traveling he met many people whom he started to become close to, but he seemed to run away from those relationships, as if he was scared that getting too close to people might change his views on how the only way to be happy is to be by himself in the wild. I also thought that he was so determined to have this grand adventure that would change his life that he was a bit unpractical in how he went about it. He burned all of his money and identification, and did not take much time to learn how to properly survive in the wilderness that was much more harsh and unforgiving than Chris had anticipated. While he learned a lot on his adventures, it took him until the very end to realize that true happiness is shared with others.

Another thing I thought was interesting is that Chris was never truly and completely in the “wild”. There is hardly any place in the world that has been untouched by man. Even when Chris was on his own in Alaska he was living in a bus that had been abandoned there. Also, many of the “wild” places that people can venture out into require permits and proper training before people are authorized to explore them. People can’t just climb mountains or raft down rivers anymore, they need permission because the “wild” is now under human control.

The Cove

Before watching The Cove I had no idea that in Taiji Japan, dolphins were being rounded up and sold to aquariums, and that those who did not fit the “flipper” profile were slaughtered for meat. The way they are rounded up and slaughtered can in no way be viewed as ethical. If the people involved thought that it was, they would not be trying so hard to cover up their actions every step of the way. They lied about the way the dolphins were killed, saying it was painless and instantaneous when in actuality they drove around in boats stabbing the dolphins at random. They also said that eating dolphin meat was part of their culture, but when Japanese citizens were interviewed, they said their culture does not eat dolphin meat, and that they had never heard of the situation in Taiji Japan. The fact the dolphin fishing industry and the Japanese government are mislabeling the meat, and selling it to citizens with high levels of mercury is also highly unethical. Even if people do not believe animals deserve rights, most believe that humans do, and the citizens of Japan are unknowingly consuming contaminated dolphin meat that could seriously harm them. If the people in Japan who are part of the dolphin slaughter in Taiji thought that what they were partaking in was in any way ethical, they would not be fighting so hard to hide and cover up what they were doing.

I know that we cannot end the killing of all animals, that different animals will be killed for food, and which animals are killed will always be argued over. However, even if we continue to kill animals for food, I believe that they at least deserve respect, and that they deserve to live out the lives they have with some comfort and decency. There are much more ethical and painless ways to raise and kill animals other than stabbing them at random until they eventually bleed to death while flailing around in their own blood. That is simply ridiculous and unacceptable.

The Land Ethic

How did your childhood shape your relationship with the environment?

I grew up in Sartell, which is a nearby city of about 16,000 people. I lived in a small house, in a quiet neighborhood, with a nice backyard that my parents always took good care of. While most of the backyards around us were somewhat plain, my parents worked hard to turn ours into somewhat of an escape. We have large oak, cottonwood, and maple trees surrounding our house, providing plenty of shade in the summer, and tall bushes along the back to enclose our yard from the others. My dad has always been enthusiastic about feeding the wildlife, so we get every species of bird in the area, including a pileated woodpecker that likes to stop by from time to time, and every once in a while we see a hawk. There is usually an overabundance of squirrels and chipmunks, some rabbits, a woodchuck, and a couple of times we have even seen a deer in our yard. Growing up I chased chipmunks around in my mom’s flower garden, watched the birds, and examined burrows of rabbits and chipmunks. My mom grew up on a farm in Albany where my grandmother lived until recently, and my uncle lives on a farm in Richmond, so I also visited them often and got a chance to learn about and interact with the animals on their farms. In addition, my family went on many vacations to cabins located along lakes, and every summer we go camping with my mom’s entire side of the family, so I spent a lot of time outdoors experiencing nature growing up. I was also a big fan of watching animal planet, and I would go around telling everybody that I would be a veterinarian when I grew up so that I could help the animals.

All of this has influenced me and has carried over into my ethical thoughts and opinions about the environment. I care deeply about the environment, especially the animals and their habitats, and try to respect nature as much as possible. I sometimes have a hard time understanding how others can treat the environment so carelessly, as if it means nothing to them, because to me it means so much. Even walking around campus from day to day I can’t help admiring and just taking in the beauty of the nature that surrounds us. (as cheesy as that may sound) I believe that every living thing has its role in the balance of nature and the environment, and that changing or harming one thing essentially has a domino effect on everything else. I think that everything in nature has a right to live, and that we should try our best to keep what we can alive and healthy, and protect it as much as possible. I realize that we cannot turn the world into one giant nature preserve, but I think that even if we just try to respect the environment a bit more, it will do some good.