Poverty-Stricken areas and their liability towards climate change

 Nicholas Conjelko 

Kingsolver Blog Post 

The “Bystander Effect” occurs when the more people there are in an emergent situation, the less likely it is for any one of them to provide any actual assistance. The Earth and its climate is changing drastically on an annual basis, and a majority of the people inhabiting it are merely bystanders. This reigns true in the city of Feathertown, Tennessee where Flight Behavior and its story takes place. The town is not education-centric, instead allowing for their star athletes to take the place of many jobs around town. A higher education does not interest many of them, for they are put in situations where a higher education serves very little purpose due to lack of opportunities. This lack of opportunities results in a resounding amount of the residents living in poverty. This reality brings up an interesting argument regarding the “Bystander Effect” and who should be responsible for taking affirmative action in the dire situation of our Earth and climate change. The residents of Feathertown are forced to worry nearly every day if they will have enough income to provide for themselves and their families. Dellarobia and Cub have to fight over nearly every item in the store and if it fits in their tiny budget or not. When shopping for Christmas presents, Dellaboria finds an extremely cheap toy and thinks how “tempting to buy a horrible thing you could afford… you could pretend it worked, and make your kids shut up and do the same” (Kingsolver 167). This being the case, many people in poverty are not worried about climate change and its effects, for they do not have the luxury to look months or even years into the future. They need to focus daily on surviving through the tribulations poverty can give a family. This raises the question: should the poverty-stricken places be held as liable as the wealthier-locations when it comes to these environmental issues? Wealthier locations have more means to produce carbon emissions in the atmosphere, for they have items that cause a great deal of these emissions: cars, planes and other forms of travels. The poor-stricken areas are more likely to not own these, and therefore less likely to produce as much pollution into the air. It is important as a population to do what we can in order to help save our planet from an ominous future, but this help does vary depending on socioeconomic status. However, it is only through educating the population that people will understand the circumstances we are in and for areas undertaken with poverty, this education is hard to come by. A movement focusing on increasing educational opportunities would be essential, along with these educational programs having elements of environmental awareness within them. This is not an easy fix, and decades would be needed in order to see shifts in the general population. Although many have worked towards this goal, it might be too late for our world. This being said, there is no use in giving up.