Abstract
Plastic Paradise: The Great Pacific Garbage Patch chronicles journalist Angela Sun’s journey to uncover the dangers that plastics present in our environment and to our health. The documentary also examines how the social norms we have grown up with since the introduction of plastic have perpetuated pollution of Earth’s oceans. Nearly 2.4 million tons of plastic enter the ocean every year (Ocean Cleanup 2018). Much of this plastic is being collected in the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, which is termed a gyre. A gyre is a natural ocean current that generates in a circular motion and traps debris. The Great Pacific Garbage Patch, centered on the Midway Atoll, located halfway between the west coast of the United States and the eastern coast of Japan, is considered the largest plastic buildup in the world (Ocean Cleanup 2018). Types of plastics found on the Midway Atoll range from truck tires to lighters to bottle caps, the majority of which comes from Japan and the United States.
Angela Sun travels to the “plastic island” to document the garbage patch and, through impactful images of beaches strewn with resilient plastics and the dead animals that have unwittingly ingested them, makes the problems that plastic has created clear. While all plastics are durable, they do inevitably break down over time. When on the island, Sun points out the difference between macro- and microplastics. Macroplastics refers to the larger pieces found, which are newer. Microplastics, on the other hand, have been lingering in the environment longer and therefore have broken down into very small pieces. Microplastics are typically less than five millimeters in length (National Ocean Service 2020). Fish and other wildlife ingest these microplastics, which then continue to move up the food chain, eventually to humans.
As part of the narrative, Angela Sun and her team conducted interviews with beachgoers; experts in the fields of marine biology, ecology, and chemistry; and representatives from plastic-producing corporations as well as advocates against the production of additional plastic for the protection of our environment. To gather basic information about how much the public knows about the impact of plastic products on the environment and about the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, Sun began with informal, impromptu interviews with individuals walking along a beach in her home state of California. Most individuals were either unaware of, or misinformed about, the true extent of the waste mass and the impact of plastics. To fill in missing information, Sun consulted a variety of environmentally minded experts. For example, Susan Freinkel, a freelance science journalist, explains how plastic use and disposal is “too embedded in daily life,” resulting in our often-unconscious decisions to use plastic products and then throw them away without thinking about the environmental impact. Another expert explains to viewers that “without our permission, [we] are being polluted.” This personal pollution is evidenced by the simple experiment in the documentary when Angela Sun experiences firsthand the impact of thermal paper, which contains bisphenol A (BPA). BPA is a common but harmful and carcinogenic chemical used to make plastic hard. According to Sun, 93 percent of Americans have BPA in their bodies. BPA carries endocrine-disrupting properties, which can cause side effects, including difficulties with human reproductive growth. Women have been reaching puberty earlier because of these estrogen-like properties. Besides the BPA found in food, these chemicals can leak from plastic products individuals use every day, including cash register receipts, old fax papers, or water bottles.
Sun also spoke with advocates for the reduction of plastic in the environment as well as representatives of plastic producers. The difference between their viewpoints is startling. Environmental protection advocates highlight the harmful effects of plastic products, while the focus of the American Chemistry Council and plastic producers is their employment of tens of thousands of individuals. Both issues are important sociological concerns. Plastic in our environment and exposure to BPA are harmful to everyone, regardless of race, gender, or socioeconomic status. However, political views and personal beliefs about the true nature of plastic’s impact on the environment can affect one’s motivation to take part in conservation efforts. This is especially true if, like the representatives from the plastic production industry, people do not believe the gravity of the problem. The conflict lies between deciding which is more important: a clean-planet campaign spearheaded by a reduction in consumer plastic waste or the employment of the thousands of individuals, which the plastic industry provides.
The film successfully depicts the importance of removing plastic waste and preventing it from further permeating the environment while also emphasizing our social responsibility to be agents of change toward a cleaner environment. Plastic Paradise: The Great Pacific Garbage Patch emphasizes the importance of decreasing our use of harmful plastics and forces consumers to contemplate and evaluate their ecological footprint. Sun stresses, “It has taken us a long time to understand what we throw away does not really stay away.” Importantly, the producer gives viewers viable solutions in addition to informing them of the problems created by plastics. She highlights the negative impact of using single-use plastic products over more reusable options. Sun and those she interviewed advise individuals not to accept plastic bags when buying food or other products, ultimately reducing the number of single-use plastic bags being put into oceans. They recommend instead using cloth bags, which are readily available at grocery and department stores. To address this concern, some cities have begun taxing those who use these plastic bags to increase economic pressure on consumers and hopefully force them to think twice about using them. Reusable water bottles are proposed as an alternative to single-use plastic bottles. Even though they are likely made of plastic, reusable bottles can be used numerous times, thus lowering the multitude of plastic bottles added to the enormous mass of the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. Every plastic bag we refuse and every single-use water bottle we replace has a significant role in improving the marine environment.
The environmental crisis experienced in recent years is often discussed outside the classroom as a social issue. However, this common discussion lacks the inclusion of larger societal and structural influences. In consequence, material such as this can dampen introductory conversation around environmental sociology as a subfield, which has unique sociological theories and broader implications for the field (Lewis and Humphrey 2005). While a focus on agency is important, emphasis on how agency works within a larger picture is needed. Through appropriate and critical pedagogy, it is possible to bridge the connection of individual agency and broader sociological and environmental social theory. Obach (2009) offers a great discussion of how to bridge these two themes specific to environmental concerns like the one presented in this film. Obach’s Teaching Sociology note can serve as a great resource for individuals interested in teaching about environmental sociology.
While the film stresses the importance of individual behaviors, it can also teach students about the impact of advocacy efforts on changing social behavior and the importance of collaboration to combat a pressing social issue that affects us all. Angela Sun stresses, “It’s not one country’s problem over another, but it is all our problem intertwined.” This documentary would be appropriate for introductory sociology courses in high school and college but could also fit into upper-level sociology college courses, such as Environmental Sociology, Population and Society, or Social Problems. The subject matter of the film is very broad, and since environmental concerns are imbedded in so many other areas of society, it is possible to incorporate this film into courses in multiple disciplines, such as environmental science, public health, or political science. Discussion of social norms in an individual’s life and how norms change and influence different aspects of the environment could encourage more students to appreciate the broad applicability of the field as well as make students aware of the vast opportunities for working in sociology. The film would also work well for introductory courses that address agents of socialization, or those factors in an individual’s life that influence their beliefs and actions. As educational systems, family values, and social norms are changing, an environmentally friendly push may impact many individuals’ way of thinking. Sun was affected by her love for the ocean and, by extension, her location in California. The section of the film where Sun speaks about how she gained interest and became an advocate would work well as a catalyst for a discussion about where students think their current passions originated.
Demography and population study courses that address policy, population issues, and global trends would also benefit from including this film. There are currently 70 cities in the United States and 40 countries that have banned plastic bags (National Conference of State Legislatures 2020). These policy changes will affect the economy, the environment, and social norms as a global matter. Link and Phelan (1995) address how social policies such as this are linked to diseases and in turn affect populations. Showing the film in conjunction with this article, or a similar reading, would work well as the foundation for a class discussion about how social policy can impact health more broadly. For example, one interesting topic could be about how a reduction in BPA could improve overall health.
Another activity that could be used in conjunction with this film is to ask students to fill out an environmental impact report. In the environmental impact report, students can track each activity they perform on a given day and assess how each action either positively or negatively impacts the environment. A score can be assigned to each action based on how impactful it is on the environment (e.g., using a reusable water bottle may equal an addition of five points, but by using a plastic bottle, the student would lose five points). At the end of the day, students would evaluate their actions and be able to quantify their individual impact. To increase the potential for learning and appreciating the collective impact, students could combine their total scores to find a final aggregate action influence score. Students will be able to see not only how their individual actions affect the environment but also how the negative actions of some and the positive actions of others can work with or against each other to spark real social change. Overall, Plastic Paradise: The Great Pacific Garbage Patch is a thought-provoking documentary that can be used across a wide variety of courses.