CONSTRUCTED RESPONSE PARAGRAPH: Describe the similarities and differences between Gore’s and Chief Seattle’s points of view as t
hey relate to the environment. Support your answer with details from BOTH passages.
I NEED THIS DONE ASAP!!!!!
by Al Gore, 1992
1 One of the clearest signs that our relationship to the global environment is in severe crisis is
the floodtide of garbage spilling out of our cities and factories. What some have called the
“throwaway society” has been based on the assumptions that endless resources will allow us to
produce an endless supply of goods and that bottomless receptacles (i.e., landfills and ocean
dumping sites) will allow us to dispose of an endless stream of waste. But now we are beginning
to drown in that stream. Having relied for too long on the old strategy of “out of sight, out of
mind,” we are now running out of ways to dispose of our waste in a manner that keeps it out of
either sight or mind.
2 In an earlier era, when the human population and the quantities of waste generated were
much smaller and when highly toxic forms of waste were uncommon, it was possible to believe
that the world’s absorption of our waste meant that we need not think about it again. Now,
however, all that has changed. Suddenly, we are disconcerted—even offended—when the huge
quantities of waste we thought we had thrown away suddenly demand our attention as landfills
overflow, incinerators foul the air, and neighboring communities and states attempt to dump their
overflow problems on us.
3 The American people have, in recent years, become embroiled in debates about the relative
merits of various waste disposal schemes, from dumping it in the ocean to burying it in a landfill
to burning it or taking it elsewhere, anywhere, as long as it is somewhere else. Now, however, we
must confront a strategic threat to our capacity to dispose of—or even recycle—the enormous
quantities of waste now being produced. Simply put, the way we think about waste is leading to
the production of so much of it that no method for handling it can escape being completely
overwhelmed. There is only one way out: we have to change our production processes and
dramatically reduce the amount of waste we create in the first place and ensure that we consider
thoroughly, ahead of time, just how we intend to recycle or isolate that which unavoidably
remains.
Letter to President Pierce, 1855
by Chief Seattle (chief of the Duwamish Tribe)
1 We know that the white man does not understand our ways. One portion of the land is the
same to him as the next, for he is a stranger who comes in the night and takes from the land
whatever he needs. The earth is not his brother, but his enemy, and when he has conquered it, he
moves on. He leaves his fathers’ graves, and his children’s birthright is forgotten. The sight of
your cities pains the eyes of the red man. But perhaps it is because the red man is a savage and
does not understand.
2 There is no quiet place in the white man’s cities. No place to hear the leaves of spring or the
rustle of insect’s wings. But perhaps because I am a savage and do not understand, the clatter only
seems to insult the ears. The Indian prefers the soft sound of the wind darting over the face of the
pond, the smell of the wind itself cleansed by a mid-day rain, or scented with the pin˜ on pine.
The air is precious to the red man. For all things share the same breath—the beasts, the trees, the
man. Like a man dying for many days, he is numb to the stench.
3 What is man without the beasts? If all the beasts were gone, men would die from great
loneliness of spirit, for whatever happens to the beasts also happens to man. All things are
connected. Whatever befalls the earth befalls the sons of the earth.
4 It matters little where we pass the rest of our days; they are not many. A few more hours, a
few more winters, and none of the children of the great tribes that once lived on this earth, or that
roamed in small bands in the woods, will be left to mourn the graves of a people once as powerful
and hopeful as yours.
5 The whites, too, shall pass—perhaps sooner than other tribes. Continue to contaminate your
bed, and you will one night suffocate in your own waste. When the buffalo are all slaughtered, the
wild horses all tamed, the secret corners of the forest heavy with the scent of many men, and the
view of the ripe hills blotted by talking wires, where is the thicket? Gone. Where is the eagle?
Gone. And what is it to say goodbye to the swift and the hunt, the end of living and the beginning
of survival? We might understand if we knew what it was that the white man dreams, what he
describes to his children on the long winter nights, what visions he burns into their minds, so they
will wish for tomorrow. But we are savages. The white man’s dreams are hidden from us.
