Modern Day Environmental Movement

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The modern day environmental movement in the United States has been a significant social movement for decades. It is quite possibly one of the longest running and more complex social movements the US has seen. The fight for a clean and safe environment has been an ongoing struggle. It encompasses multiple layers including the sustainability movement, environmental justice, and conservation movement. It is not just only a social movement but also a scientific and political movement as well. While my focus is on the United States this is a movement on an international scale with support on all levels from large organizations to private citizens. I chose to research the modern day environmental movement in the United States for several reasons. I was interested in learning more about the history of the modern day environmental movement here in the US. I feel as though in recent years the outcry for the environment has been growing on scale and I wanted to see what has been done throughout our history, and what the movement has accomplished so far. The significance and scale of this movement also is very interesting to me. There are over 6,500 national and 20,000 local environmental organizations within this movement as well as an estimated 20-30 million members. Additionally the beginning of this movement goes back to the 1960’s, I was interested to learn what it meant for a movement to be operating at such a large scale for so many decades. Its significance is not just limited to its longevity and grand proportions but also its motives. The argument that due to human action our planet is suffering and without action there will be only further decline is a strong one. The significance of our environment is unarguable. A... ... middle of paper ... ...ia. It is used as a symbol to help connect people with the life threatening issues we are causing our wildlife. Seeing a commercial with a polar bear stranded on a melting ice cap pulls on your heart strings and helps you see the urgency of an issue sometimes better than a fact sheet. The visual symbolism of the dire situation is relayed in a much more meaningful way when you see what all of this science actually means, in some ways this can be more useful that any activism or gathering, it stirs up concern in the common population’s conscience. “Save the polar bears” is now a common term used to help relate back to environment issues, specifically regarding global warming. Given that the modern day environmental movement her un the US has spanned decades and grown to such a large scope it has undoubtedly had its wins and losses in strategy and effectiveness.

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