Jessica Irish: This Mortal Plastik

Event 2:

This week I had the honor of listening to Jessica Irish and watching her documentary titled This Mortal Plastik. Jessica Irish created her documentary about plastics and how much they are used in society. A lot of things that humans buy use plastics to wrap them, and even worse, these plastics are single-use plastics, meaning that people just throw them away after. 

Koop, Fermin. “Your Recycled Plastic Might Be Ending up in a Landfill. Here's Why.” ZME Science, 19 Feb. 2020, https://www.zmescience.com/science/your-recycled-plastic-might-be-ending-up-in-a-landfill-heres-why/.

While watching the documentary, one of the most interesting things that I found was that Plankton generates over half of the Earth’s oxygen. In school, we learn that oxygen comes from the earth, but I can not remember a time when I was taught that plankton generates over half of the Earth’s oxygen. Planktons are tiny organisms that can not even fully swim well enough on their own and it is crazy to think that these tiny organisms are the reason for over half of the world's oxygen. 

Photo by: Nasa

Plastic, especially single-use plastics has become more and more prominent in society. Companies like to use more and more plastic on their products, but put the responsibility of trying to save the planet on consumers. Companies tell consumers that they need to recycle to save the planet instead of reducing the amount of plastic that they use when packaging, and or creating their products. 

“Atlanta, GA.” Recycling Information | Atlanta, GA, https://www.atlantaga.gov/government/departments/public-works/recycling-program#!rc-cpage=284395.

These recycling campaigns do not actually lower the amount of plastic in the world that is being used, it just lowers the amount of plastic that may end up in landfills and in our oceans.

Work Cited

1. US Department of Commerce, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. “What Are Plankton?” NOAA's National Ocean Service, 27 Mar. 2020, https://oceanservice.noaa.gov/facts/plankton.html.

2. Irish, Jessica. “Film - This Mortal Plastik.” This Mortal Plastik - a Film by Jess Irish, 14 Oct. 2021, http://thismortalplastik.com/.

3. National Geographic Society. “Plankton.” National Geographic Society, 30 Aug. 2019, https://www.nationalgeographic.org/encyclopedia/plankton/.

4. “Plankton - NatureWorks.” New Hampshire PBS, https://nhpbs.org/natureworks/nwep6d.htm.

5. “5 Advertising Campaigns That Make You Want to Recycle.” Eco Sustainable Solutions, 29 Nov. 2020, https://www.thisiseco.co.uk/news/5-advertising-campaigns-that-make-you-want-to-recycle/.

6. Sullivan, Laura. “How Big Oil Misled the Public into Believing Plastic Would Be Recycled.” NPR, NPR, 11 Sept. 2020, https://www.npr.org/2020/09/11/897692090/how-big-oil-misled-the-public-into-believing-plastic-would-be-recycled.