Okay, so I am knee deep in a final revision of my teacher book, which is due July first. Almost every computer minute is devoted to that (and with my 4 year old in a very mommy needy place, these are fleeting hours here and there and many, many late nights). I am sorry my posting has been a bit slow this week.
But alas! There is a lot of green news to check out this week. My intrepid researcher and devoted online news junkie (my mom) sent me some interesting reading this week.
Take this article, about how Americans are duped by greenwashing. I've talked about the confusion here and at Eco-Child's Play before, when words like "non-toxic" "environmentally friendly" and "natural" are thrown around with reckless abandon. According to this article from the Guardian, Americans have been seriously misled by companies hoping to cash in on the green wave, our good intentions, and the confusion over certain terms. And we know that manufacturers don't even have to include all the ingredients in something (I still can't believe this is true), so something could be loaded with phthalates, or dioxane, or other chemicals and you would never know it.
A study that revealed "4,000 consumer products found "greenwashing" in nearly every product category – from a lack of verifiable information to outright lies," was presented to Congress. That's hopeful, maybe with our new administration we might be able to make some headway here. But with the super strong manufacturer lobby, well, I might just be dreaming.
Here's an article about the evolutionary and health reasons humans are better off as vegetarians (I will TRY not to say I told you so). It details the science behind why the human body is better suited to consume fruits and vegetables than meat. Check out the article (with a great title) Shattering the Meat Myth: Why Humans are Natural Vegetarians.
And here is an article about mom's vegetable garden, Food, Inc., and industrialized farming from one of my favorite New York Times writers, Nicholas D. Kristof.
Happy reading! What are you readers finding interesting this week?
