Pink Stinks!

Why girls aren't pretty in pink by Susanna Rustin

Summary:

Two twin sister disliked the thought that certain toys are meant for boys and that certain stuff is meant for girls. The category which toys belong is easy to recognize, since everything is in pink or blue. The sisters set up a campaign to raise awareness of gender stereotyping of children. Their campaign struck a cord and very soon they were invited for television shows.

Firstly their main focus were toys, but now they are also focusing on make up products meant for young girls. The sisters find that giving make up and other beauty product to girls in primary school gives off a wrong sign to what is supposed to be important. They fear that girls are going to believe that everything evolves about looking hot and this trend, they fear, will also have a bad influence on boys.

The Guardian, Saturday 21 April 2012

Opinion:

I can totally agree with the thoughts of these two sisters. They discuss gender stereotyping happening concerning toys and beauty product. This is something that is done since the dawn of time. Boys are supposed to be adventurous and girls are supposed to be homey and domestical. Well, I do believe that boys and girls have different preferences in toys and other things concerning behavior and choices, but this does not mean that it is a good thing to emphasize these thoughts. The more these stereotypes are 'forced' on children, the more they will behave to it...

Drought Troubles

Heavy April rain 'not enough to end drought' by Fiona Harvey

Summary:

England suffers severe drought problems. Despite that, when there was heavy rain fall in the latest weeks, several flood alerts were issued. Although this enormous amount of rain that even threatened to cause floods, the problem of the drought throughout London is not solved yet. The rain was not enough to recharge reservoirs. 

England has had two exceptionally dry winters which cause drought in summer, since rain in summer is mostly absorbed by vegetation. It will probably have to rain for more than two weeks to restore the damage done.

Unfortunately the weather forecast does not predict a lot of rain. This way England´s water levels will be dependent on the rainfall in the winter of 2012/2013.

guardian.co.uk, Friday 20 April 2012 16.01 BST

Opinion:

This sounds like a serious problem. Certainly when considering that there have been exeptionally dry winters for two years on end now. What will happen if next winter is going to be dry as well? What will be the consequences for the environment, farmers and the people of England? If this kind of weather keeps up, water will be rationed? Crops will wither and die?

When talking about the weather I always think about my grandmother. She always says that all that talk about evironmental changes is just stupid, because concerning nature everything will be compensated. My grandmother would say to us to just sit still and wait for the floods to come, nature will always compensate....

A little Self Restraint

We're eating too much meat - any chance of a portion of self restraint?

Lately the meat industry has gotten out of hand. Eric Davidson of the Woods Hole Research Centre advised that we must cut back on portion size and the quantity of meat we eat.

Not only to improve our own health and to keep our weight within normal standards, but mostly to reduce the amount of fertilizers that is used nowadays. These fertilizers release nitrous oxide that causes climate change. All the crops that need to be grown to feed all the animals, produce so much greenhouse gases that it has become very damaging for the environment.

To get a good view on how much our meat intake has grown, we can take a look at the burgers from McDonalds. In 1955 the first hamburger weighed 1.6 ounces, now the largest burger weighs eight ounces!

Because of eating a lot more meat, we damage the environment, more and more people become overweight, this mean a need for bigger clothes, cars, airplane seats, a drain on health services so on and so on. In the end our enormous intake of meat has even more enormous damaging results.

We really should take this in consideration and change our lifestyle. Unfortunately, nobody likes to be told what they can or cannot eat...

http://www.guardian.co.uk/ Friday 13 April 2012

I think this article should a very interesting look on the way we are consuming nowadays. Most articles are talking about the fact that people are getting unhealthier and fatter,but indeed, how about the effects on the environment? It shows that the environment suffers from our enormous intakes as well. If you ask me, I think someting should be done, and fast! The only problem is; it's all about the money". As long as money can be earned by producing more and more food, it will stay this way and people will keep on consuming it...

Bird Population Threatened by Windfarms?

Windfarms do not cause long-term damage to bird population, study finds.

For many years it was believed that windfarms cause long term damage to bird populations. A study has been done by conservationists into the impact of windfarms to ten of the key species of Britain. The conclusion is that these bird populations are not harmed, but that they can co exists or even thrive with windfarms once operating. So this goes against the widespread allegations that windfarms would be "bird blenders".

What did come out to be negative in this research is the fact that constructing the windfarms does have a negative effect on birdpopulations. So it is very important that in future constructing of windfarms, constructers choose a suitable site so the damage to birdlife is reduced to a minimum.

guardian.co.uk, Thursday 12 April 2012

Many years it has been thought that windfarms inflict a lot of damage while operational, but now studies show that this is not the case. Windfarms are only damaging to birdlife while being constructed. Still the damage caused is irreversible.
This is a difficult dilemma. Windfarms are built to help the environment. Windfarms are supposed to produce "green energy", which supposed to be better than the traditional ways of producing energy. So maybe they do, but on the other hand while constructing these windfarms, a lot of damage is done to the birdlife. Considering this fact, do windfarms still produce "green energy"?