I was one of those girls who had a massive Barbie collection. I’m talking three full shoeboxes for dolls alone, then another case full of their oh-so-age-appropriate clothing and modest footwear. But I remember the day I got my Pocahontas Barbie complete with hut accessories was a special day for me.
As a child, I saw myself as a real-life Pocahontas in that I loved being outdoors, wandering through the pine trail forests of my backyard (but staying away from those “sunsweet berries of the Earth” per my parents’ instruction). So when Disney introduced the Pocahontas movie, I became mildly obsessed. I first had the Barbie and then moved on to the Pocahontas Animated Storybook for the computer and then a giant stuffed animal of Meeko. I enjoyed all things Pocahontas because she was, in a way, like me.
Last Saturday night I was reunited with my childhood fixation when my friends and I watched the movie, which I hadn’t done since I was about seven. But as we sang along to “Colors of the Wind” as adults, a thought repeatedly appeared in my head: have we learned nothing? I still enjoyed watching and listening, but I also realized there’s more to this favorite song of mine than pretty words to pretty music to a pretty picture. And as cheesy as some Disney movies can be, I feel there is much truth to what those pretty words mean. I feel as though we have learned nothing from the conquest of other nations, the destruction of land and people and the ignorance of the fact that our Earth is finite.
That’s the bottom line right there: our Earth is finite. We have to acknowledge the fact that eventually we will have touched every corner of our planet. Once we’ve done that, where do we go? Let’s take a listen to what Pocahontas has to say.
“You think you own whatever land you land on / The Earth is just a dead thing you can claim.” The Earth is a living thing. Regardless of how you think it came to be, it is still alive and moving. Our planet exists in itself. If humans were not on it, it could still exist, but it is not the case otherwise. We need to stop thinking we as humans have any ultimate ownership and start thinking about how to respectfully borrow (and return) from our environment.
“Come roll in all the riches all around you / and for once, never wonder what they’re worth.” This does not equate to “Let’s dig up all the Earth’s resources, sell them for lots of money, and make a profit off of something that isn’t ours to begin with.” It means we can and should enjoy our natural environment, but need to stop putting a price tag on it. Numbers are just symbols, arbitrary things that help us communicate with each other. Let’s explore and appreciate nature for its personal experiential benefit and not for monetary compensation.
“And we are all connected to each other / in a circle, in a hoop that never ends.” People say this all the time. We know we are all connected. But I am sick of people saying things when they don’t mean it. Yes, we are all connected, but what the hell are you going to do about it? Connected means staying within the loop, not changing things that would alter our circle.
With all the natural disasters going on, I have to wonder if it is has something to do with our disruption of the natural cycle. Who knows, maybe all these cancer-related deaths are due to us eating this jacked-up genetically modified food. Maybe depression is somehow linked to the chemicals in sunscreen.
I guess my frustration comes from the fact that not everyone thinks about these things and the reality that there are some things we will just never know. We continue living as though our planet will be here forever, that it will somehow fix itself, or that it is not our problem. Think about this: Would you bring a child into this world if you knew he or she would face the problem of not having enough food to eat? This is a possibility! Or think about the fact that we are living longer, but is our quality of our lives better? It seems like it is the minority of people who care about these things. What does this say about us as a society?
I don’t know if I would call myself a “Pocahontas girl” anymore, but rather one who truly cares about our natural world and our lives in it. And as to not leave you Readers on a pessimistic note, I’d like you all to challenge yourselves to think more about these issues and more importantly, to act on them. How do you want to live in this world? Maybe watch Pocahontas for yourself. We do have a pretty amazing Earth here, with some pretty amazing people, and I for one would like to see it continue.
I think one of the important aspects you have noted here is that many people go about their lives, encountering a variety of issues that they believe is ‘not their problem’. Someone else will fix it, never mind fix itself.
My pet hate is rubbish being thrown onto the road or walkway. For someone else to pick up? If each and every one of us picked up their rubbish and disposed of it in the best possible way, never mind just putting it into the nearest rubbish bin, the result would not only be a cleaner environment, it would be a more conscious environment. Being conscious of “Reducing, Reusing, Recycling” as the saying goes, is being far more aware of just keeping the pavement tidy.
Invariably too, Government is seen as the one that must fix it. Herein lies the very core of our dilemma. Government. The more we make government responsible for our lives the more we abdicate from our own responsibilities and ultimately the ability to think and act for ourselves.
Developing our own knowledge levels has to be easier than ever before with the advent of the internet. Also, taking everything at face value that you are told in the news, in marketing or advertising, or read on labels, has to be challenged. Take sunscreens as an example you have used. Some sunscreens are said to contain endocrine disruptors which leads to hormone balance disruption, which most likely will lead to depression!
We need to increase our own levels of knowledge, wake up to our own core instincts and take on greater responsibilities for everything around us, starting with our own back yard.