Beauvilliers+-+Annotation+-+Homo+Toxicus

Homo Toxicus
An annotation by Evan Beauvilliers

1. Homo Toxicus: Directed by Carole Poliquin, Released 2007

2. The focus of this film is the shocking number of chemicals that are accumulating and running through our bodies all the time as a result of modern day industrial society. The producer actually gets her blood tested relatively early in the film and the report is shocking. She had over 100 contaminants in her blood including mercury, PCBs and many other substances that have known ill effects. The movie goes about systematically showing many of the ill effects that these chemicals can have on human health, even at the low levels that the government would have you believe are safe. For example, in Inuit tribes, mercury levels have been linked to high levels of ADD in children as well as weakened immune systems. On one particular Indian reservation near a series of chemical plants, there are over twice as many girls born as boys, and there is a disproportionately large number of miscarriages. In rural areas where pesticides are sprayed in mass for agriculture, lowered sperm count and quality have been discovered. The correlation between all these factors and their respective contaminants is unquestionable, and yet the U.S. government would have you think you are safe. In the EU however, many of the chemicals known to cause issues have been banned. The U.S. on the other hand has actually fought this banning claiming it put unnecessary restriction on trade (illegal per the WTO).

3. This film points to several sustainability problems, but two in particular. The first and most immediate would be the technological problem. Our society is very reliant on chemicals for agriculture, medicine, research, etc. but the technology to keep these materials out of our bodies and the environment has not been sufficiently developed. As such, the aforementioned problems develop where chemicals accumulate and have unforeseen consequences. These leads into a smaller sustainability problem. This chemical burden is not equally shared among all people. As is clear from the examples in the film, it is those in the poorest areas that suffer the greatest because they are the ones living near the plants and the farms etc. where the chemicals are most prevalent. This may be part of the cause for the problem when related to the other major problem: the political problem. The constituency that gets the greatest say is usually the wealthiest, and since they are not the ones suffering, the suffering of the poor does not appear on the public agenda. As such, the suffering continues while the government denies that there is a serious problem. Additionally, the government, with pressure from large companies, has gone so far as to try to get chemicals unbanned in other nations that have acknowledged that they are harmful instead of recognizing the danger and forcing businesses to adopt safer practices.

4. One of the nice aspects of this film is that it is full of a combination of facts and figures and real human examples. It does not simply show on a piece of paper that some percentage of people born within X miles of chemical plant Y get disease Z, but rather it tells you the statistics and then talks to some of the people in the community. In this way you do not just see that bad things are happening, but you get a real sense of the total damage it is having on communities besides making people ill. You see the numbers and the people, and the combination is much more effective than either could be individually. Additionally, the movie had some experts speak to give context to the politics and the chemistry of the problem leaving the viewer confident that they have some idea about what is going on.

5. The only thing that was really wrong with the film is that it made it seem like we should just ban all of the chemicals causing problems. While that may seem all well and good, the economy and modern society functions on a lot of these chemicals and if they were suddenly banned before alternatives were developed, then the modern economic system, including food production, would likely collapse, What the film should have done, and did not so, is try to advocate for research into alternatives as well as technologies to keep these chemicals out of our bodies and the environment while phasing out the old chemicals a little bit at a time.

6. On that note, this film makes one want to discover what technologies are out there to try and defeat these problems and if the industry is doing any kind of self-regulation at all. It was not mentioned above, but one of the problems, and the film addresses this, is that many chemicals are not tested. Part of the information the viewer would like to know after finding out that so many common chemicals are harmful, is just how many other chemicals could be having ill effects that we do not even know about. More research in this area would be very valuable, and perhaps with enough backing, the U.S. government could be persuaded to start restricting and banning these chemicals.

7. This film addresses most audiences. It is scientific enough to intrigue academics. It has enough personal story to interest the general public. It is both simple enough but wide enough in scope to satisfy almost any party (except perhaps the chemical companies themselves). The film is even general enough to be valuable to non-U.S. audiences even though it is very clearly U.S. based.

8. As previously mentioned, the film does not actually give particular solutions though it excellently describes the problem. However, again as before, it seems to suggest that the appropriate solution is the banning of the harmful materials, which could greatly detriment the economy, to the point that it causes an overall greater problem for people (such as starvation) than is trying to be addressed. The problem of unintended consequences comes into play (see ).

9. Incorporating current solutions that are coming into or have come into practice including laws and technologies would have been nice. It would give views a place to start when trying to figure out if there is anything they can do in particular (other than avoiding plastic baby bottles). That way viewers would be less depressed and might feel more empowered to do something even as simple as writing a letter to congress in support of one solution or another and similar small scale approaches. Without such solutions and/or suggestions, the viewer is aware of the problem but may choose not to act on it because they feel a sense of hopelessness of the issue. After all, it does seem enormous in scope and the U.S. government clearly is not on the side of the people if they are trying to get chemicals unbanned!