Summary Of Why Bother By Michael Pollan

Almost anyone who will read this essay has undoubtedly heard of the climate phenomenon Global warming. Global warming is a topic that gets discussed very often nowadays, most notably during political debate and discussion. Politicians use certain stances on global warming to appeal to voter’s emotions and logic in order to gain votes and support for their campaign, however climate change is nothing new, during the past several hundred thousand years the Earth has heated up and cooled down and even experienced so called “ice ages”, which is a period where glacial deposits located at the northern and southern hemispheres have grown due to dramatic global cool downs. Don’t be confused by climate terminology though, the global warming so widely

In his essay “Why Bother?” Pollan echoes many of the ideas of perhaps the most famous of all environmental intellectuals, Wendell Berry. Berry advocated getting off “The Grid”, growing gardens and providing sustenance for one’s self. Berry’s motivation however to move back toward self reliance was motivated more by principles of localism, and traditional living than curbing and slowing global warming, however one can easily recognize similar ideas and concepts between these two men. Pollan asserts that by making small changes in ones day to day choices, perhaps that if multiplied by the millions of global consumers would make a positive difference in slowing or reversing global warming, Pollan however does not take in to account the many Factories, Plants, Airlines that contribute ten fold more to Co2 emissions that cause global warming in the first place, or the fact that contributions to political action and legal groups, contrary to Pollan’s assertions, are very important in affecting change, and finally while planting your own food is great, perhaps it’s too passive

I don’t believe a reader could rationally disagree with that assertion, however in order for corporations and the big environmental perpetrators to change there must be economic and legal pressure placed on them, global citizens must in fact contribute their money to political groups and advocate for widespread change. Proffesor Pollan seems to believe that growing a garden and getting progressively more off the grid is the most effective approach, however there are bigger players in the game, and in order to make them change there must be powerful legal and legislative action