week of 2/25 (social & physical environments)
This week, our discussions revolved around how different aspects of social and physical environments play into the mental and physical well-being of different people. Prior to the discussions, I watched an episode called “Recycling Sham” from a documentary named “Broken”. In this episode, the notion that single-use plastic products aren’t as recyclable as people believe is investigated, in which lots of plastic waste ends up in landfills in SE Asia. China used to buy all the plastic scraps in the world for resell and recycling, until it became a pollution problem and they banned the import of plastic, so now Malaysia has taken on that role which has become a problem. More plastic is flowing into the country than recyclers can keep up with, and the emergence of illegal recycling operations which include dumping grounds and factories isn’t making the situation any better. Amidst all the activist efforts, the government can’t completely say no to plastics because they want to continue the industry. This really opened my eyes to the implications that incorrectly recycling and overusing plastics can have, especially in developing countries like Malaysia where the government isn’t as strong to maintain these practices. The documentary turns to America, specifically El Paso and Houston to display two different scenarios of pollution and how they effect different communities. In Houston, ExxonMobil has a 50 mile long waterway of gas and oil infrastructure that directly affects the communities around it, with pollution from chemicals and gas fumes being detrimental to the health of the majority already living in poverty. In El Paso, plastic bags were banned to try and limit the amount of litter around the city to improve the quality of health, but was quickly struck down by the state of Texas for economic reasons that are puzzling for me. These scenarios made me rethink what I can do to limit use of plastic (using reusable bags, using reusable water bottles). Our class discussion focused more on the social aspect, as my reading focused on asthma and how it is effected socially by socioeconomic status and inequality, but also physical aspects such as pollution like that we saw in Houston. I feel like segregation into lower income housing with higher instances of smoking, mold, and bugs plays a huge role into that, as activist groups focus on those types of community for advocacy and education. Another concept in the discussion that I really understood and could apply to my life was the impact of social relationships on mental health. For example, if you start to become distant with close friends or a relationship starts to go downhill, mental well-being starts to diminish as depression and anxiety increases.