Essay Cancer Ally and Basic Human Rights

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Essay Cancer Ally and Basic Human Rights

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Environmental Justice
Are our neighborhoods in the United States environmentally safe? I’m sure we know
that the answer to that is: not for everyone. Environmental justice (EJ) is the fair
treatment and meaningful involvement of all people regardless of race, color, national
origin, or income with respect to the development, implementation and enforcement of
environmental laws, regulations and policies. This means that no group of people
should bear a disproportionate share of the negative environmental consequences
resulting from industrial, governmental and commercial operations or policies.
If your water is contaminated and you’re lucky enough to have good financial resources,
you can move. But what if the air we all breathe is contaminated? There is no escape.
Industrial facilities send hazardous chemicals into the air. The government, with
environmental protections, should be working to keep our air clean and breathable. But
more and more places in the United States every day are designated as sites that
contain industrial polluters, leading the federal government to report that levels of air
pollution are unacceptable. Nearly 250,000 Americans live in “fenceline communities,”
adjacent to these industrial centers, which spot the entirety of the United States;
anywhere people live, there are fenceline communities.
The people living inside these hot spots are disproportionately Black. Research
provides decades of evidence showing that pollution is segregated: people of color are
exposed to far greater levels of air pollution than whites—a pattern that persists across
income levels. These disparities are rooted in racist real estate practices like redlining
and the designation of low-income neighborhoods and communities of color as mixed
residential-industrial zones. In cities like Houston, for example, all-white zoning boards
targeted Black neighborhoods for the siting of noxious facilities, like landfills,
incinerators and garbage dumps. Robert Bullard, a professor of urban planning and
environmental policy at Texas Southern University, has called the practice “PIBBY” or
“Place In Blacks’ Back Yard”—a spin on the acronym “NIMBY” (“Not In My Back Yard”).
Louisiana’s Cancer AlleyLouisiana claims the most infamous site of neighborhood environmental pollution in the
United States, called “Cancer Alley.” Cancer Alley runs for 85 miles along the
Mississippi River, an area that contains abundant oil refineries and chemical plants,
where residents of the area breathe in contaminated air every day. Without stronger
protections, many of the people living in fenceline communities along Cancer Ally worry
about becoming collateral damage. For residents of Mossville, Louisiana, it is already
too late.
Among the most polluted pockets of the country, Mossville has all but disappeared amid
the steady encroachment of the South African chemical giant Sasol. The company’s
most recent construction led to a buyout of more than half of the area’s remaining
residents. In the late 1990s, more than 500 people lived in Mossville. Residents say
only 50 or so remain.
Mossville was founded by formerly enslaved people in the 1790s, long before the Civil
War. Debra Sullivan-Ramirez, 67, remembers her childhood there as idyllic. She and
her family lived off the land, with its shady swamps and leafy orchards. They grew their
own fruits and vegetables, hunted and fished, and strained juice from Mayhaw trees to
make jelly. After church on Sundays, Sullivan-Ramirez remembers, she would fall
asleep on her grandma’s front porch to the soothing hum of the Conoco chemical plant
across the street.
But there had always been warning signs. Fluorescent ponds. Plumes of yellow smoke.
The occasional explosion in the sky. Not to mention all the sickness. Many of her
neighbors suffered from respiratory problems and heart disease. Her father had
diabetes, which may have been triggered by dioxin, a chemical that attacks the
pancreas. Her sister died of ovarian cancer at 61. Her neighbor died at 58 from an
8-pound tumor near her kidney. “It wasn’t one block that didn’t have cancer,”
Sullivan-Ramirez said.
Sullivan-Ramirez herself has struggled with nerve degeneration and scleroderma, a rare
condition that involves the tightening of the skin and connective tissues. While it can be
difficult to link specific cases of disease to pollution exposure, the evidence in Mossville
has accumulated: in a 1998 health survey conducted by the University of Texas, 84% of
Mossville residents reported having headaches, dizziness, tremors and seizures. An
EPA study from the same year found that the average level of dioxins in the blood of
Mossville residents was dangerously high—triple that of the general U.S. population.
Even small amounts of dioxin, one of the most poisonous chemicals released byfacilities, can cause developmental problems, damage the immune system and lead to
cancer. A 2007 report found that the types of dioxin compounds in the blood of
Mossville residents matched those emitted by local industrial facilities.
In an emailed statement, Sasol noted that its property buyout stemmed from direct
requests from Mossville residents and that the company offered owners more than the
appraised value of their homes. “Sasol and its predecessor have produced or handled
chemicals at our Lake Charles complex for more than 60 years. We understand the
science and have controls in place to ensure our operations are safe, protective of the
environment, compliant with regulations and sustainable over the long term,” wrote
Sarah Hughes, a spokesperson for Sasol. “Sasol is proud of our engagement with our
neighbors in Mossville and the positive impact it has had on many of its residents.”
Sullivan-Ramirez simply doesn’t want to hear it anymore. She says residents have
already been promised “fixes” for communities like hers, but over the years, she’s heard
it all from politicians, industry and other officials.
The people of Mossville are right to be skeptical. Dr. Matthew Tejada, Director of the
Office of Environmental Justice of the US Environmental Protection Agency, noted that
he “would be skeptical if [he] was from Mossville,” and added that, “[t]hey should be
skeptical until we actually show up and do the things that they’ve been asking us to do
for a long time. But there’s now a level of commitment to actually tangling with these
issues in a really serious, substantive way.”
Sullivan-Ramirez worries the industrial sprawl will one day overtake her home. To her,
Mossville is a warning of what the future holds for America’s other hot spots if business
continues as usual.
…Meanwhile, in Texas
Brittany Madison is also worried about the air. Madison, who is 31, lives in Baytown,
Texas, a city next to the Houston ship channel where the skyline is dense with the
glittering towers of chemical plants. Her apartment is also home for her partner and their
7-year-old son and her sister, niece, and nephew. They have to keep air purifiers
running round the clock. Brittany’s 3-year-old niece has suffered from debilitating
asthma attacks since she was born. Even on good days, the family tries to keep herindoors. On bad days, they must shut the windows. And about once a month, they rush
her to the hospital, where she’s given oxygen and injected with steroids.
Brittany is also pregnant and loves taking long walks and watching the kids at the
playground, but lately she’s been spending more and more time inside. Her home lies a
few miles north of ExxonMobil Baytown Complex, one of the largest refineries in the
world. Over the years, Exxon’s massive petrochemical operation has sent millions of
pounds of toxic chemicals into the sky during accidents, unplanned discharges and
fires. After one particularly smoky fire in 2019, Brittany came down with a migraine, her
first. Her son, who didn’t know the word for headache, told her that his brain was
hurting. She began to wonder if living near all these pipes and tanks and towers had
something to do with the health conditions that afflicted her neighborhood.
And Madison’s father, who worked at a nearby plant, died from a heart attack at 43.
Friends and family have died of cancer. “You wonder what causes it. Is it the air we
breathe? Or the food?” Madison asked. “There are just all these different questions that
no one has answers to.”
Brittany Madison can’t help but notice that when her family travels, her niece’s asthma
improves. “The first chance I get, I’m moving far away from Texas and never looking
back,” she said. “I love being outside. I love seeing the stars. I don’t want to feel like
someone is pumping gas onto our front porch.”
And in New Castle, Delaware…
When Clayton Joyce moved to New Castle County, in 2006, he was expecting a fresh
start full of opportunities. He would soon realize that his new home would be a danger
rather than a safe space, pa

2. Transition
5. Conclusion
1. Reiterate main points
6. Works Cited Page
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what I expect to see:
Additionally, if you want more help with MLA, you can:
● Send your paper to Smarthinking Online for a free review. There’s a link on
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First Person Writing
You are required to include a significant amount of FIRST PERSON writing. I will be
looking for your ability to take a position and defend it. This means using your own voice
to explain how you think, feel or believe about the issue and then using credible, reliable
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an afterthought. Some ways to ensure you’re incorporating enough first person:● Write your thesis as a personal statement (something like below, or craft your
own):
○ “I think that….”
○ “The (situation) is (acceptable or unacceptable); evidence I’ve
uncovered supports my position.”
● For each main point, include a few sentences that clearly show your own
thoughts on the topic.
● For the conclusion, you could also include a healthy dose of first person
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Draft Review
Since you have the opportunity to send in a draft, NO REVISION work will be accepted,
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● Always check your submission: PULL UP your assignment and make sure
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Use of ReferencesThis assignment requires the use of references.
You are required to use a minimum of THREE EXTERNAL and TWO INTERNAL
references. Select ANY two (or more) of the following as your internal references:
● Lesson: Got Ethics?
● Review: Foundations in Critical Thinking
● Lesson: Elements of a Good Argument…
● Readings:
○ Your text book
○ The Promise
○ The Problem of Social Order
○ America’s Knowledge Deficit
When you refer to the information from a course lesson, your citation for the works
cited entry will be as follows (9th Edition MLA):
In the above example, you will change the date to your semester, add the URL in place
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For the in-text citation, based on the citation above, you’ll have:
…your sentence here (Marshall).If you cite more than one source from the course, your in-text citation would need to
include clarification, thus for the citation above, your in-text would be:
…your sentence here (Marshall “Lesson: Got Ethics?”).
This means that the minimum number of distinct references I should see on your works
cited list is FIVE (three external, two internal). Of course, a good writer will also consider
how additional reference materials can highlight important passages of their writing.
Utilizing additional high quality materials will ensure that you earn the maximum points
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standard MLA format (9th edition is preferred; if you learned a different edition, email
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you must include a works cited page that properly connects to your in-text citations.
Remember to refer to your syllabus for more information on the use of references and
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Word Count
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Essay Cancer Ally and Basic Human Rights