Hello dear followers. This week Professor Ferguson asked us to read a book by Giles Slade entitled, "Made To Break". After reading the first 3 chapters, I have decided that we as a people highly contribute to technological waste. In our world every day people throw away lots of valuable technology waste. We create a lot of waste and turn our world into a dirty place. According to Slade, we are always in search of the latest model; we in turn participate in what he calls, "the annual model change" (29). In 2004, 315 million working PCs were thrown out in North America alone, and in the following year over 100 million cell phones joined them on the trashheap. That's tons of electronic equipment with non-biogradable components and toxic waste-filling up garbage dumps around the world.
What drives this rush to trash? According to Slade, it obsolescence, rather than failure. Your last computer likely didn't wear out-you junked it because a faster, lighter, and spiffier one came out. We don’t repair things, we throw things away. It appears that a throw-away society. We throw away household appliances, cell phones, computers and yes, even cars rather than repair the broken item. Even when we want to repair or recycle an item we learn we can’t do it.
While American history is often portrayed as the history of innovation, it is also the history of waste. Made to Break is the history of an industrial strategy that has come to define this country; a strategy that has taught us to buy, throw away and buy again, and that now must change because we have run out of room to safely dump all our unwanted, used-up or obsolete possessions. This book examines the issue of "planned obsolescence" and its role in causing Americans to buy more products than what they could have done if companies were more committed to quality. Planned obsolescence leads to a product having a "death date." Slade's book also looks at how such developments as annual models of cars led to consumers getting rid of good vehicles for more trendy replacements. Both company advertising and consumer's love of the new have helped lead to an explosion in both sales of new products and also the amount of garbage that is disposed of every year.
This is all very true. Items are made cheaply, most part made out of plastic, where as it would have been made out of metal in the old days. I've noticed that even car bumpers are made cheaper, this is bad since serious injuries and even death can be avoided if things are made to last and protect humans. Also were are getting limited rights to what we can and can't buy. For example next year normal light bulbs will be ban, and florescent ones will replace them. Florescent light bulbs are replacing them, since the normal ones produce about 70 percent heat and only 30 percent light. Florescent gives off more light and less heat but contain Mercury. Will this mercury also reside in our nations landfills? How can we get a voice as a people.
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