Category: Speaking

Speech

INTRODUCTION:

Today I want to bring your attention to the issue of Plastic… one of the most ignored problems of our generation. So What is plastic? Is it a chemical? A useful resource, pollution, a material? Or is it just an everyday item that has become normal for us? But what do we actually know about it? Can our generation survive without plastic? Or have we become so addicted to it that we find unexplainable excuses to keep producing an enormous amount of plastic every day. So how did we manage to get ourselves in this mess?  How did this all begin? Plastic was first made from organic cellulose in 1862 by Alexander Parkes, he demonstrated Parkesine which could be heated, molded then cooled to keep its form. In the 1960’s plastic became very popular and very quickly became very useful and was every manufactures need for their product. The demand for plastic is constantly growing and so is the amount being produced but the amount being washed into our oceans and seas is not decreasing, it’s only increasing and it’s getting worse. Plastic is a huge topic and affects so many aspects of the world and our lives but more specifically today I want to focus on how it affects the marine life and look at the perspectives of environmentalists and manufacturers as well as fishermen.  Have you ever thought about where your plastic actually ends up? Or what effects it has on our environment? When you throw a plastic bottle out your window or even if you put it in the been, that bottle that you bought isn’t gone, it’s going to end up in either the landfill or the ocean. Now either way that’s not good for the environment is it? If it goes to sea then a bird or a fish or some form of living organisms could end up digesting it, or it could end up floating at the top of the surface adding to the other thousands of plastic bottles in the ocean, although if the bottle ends up in the landfill there is a high chance that some living organism will digest it or it will add to the thousandths of other plastic bottles in the ground. So either way it’s not being disposed of properly and it’s impacting the environment negatively. But then there is recycling… which is such a great idea but 91% of plastic is NOT recycled for example 899 tonnes of plastic PET bottles were recycled, but more than double that wasn’t. This leads me to our households and the amount of waste we produce, more than 60% of what we put in our bin can be recycled but isn’t that is around 40kg’s of recycled plastic being thrown away in the average household yearly. If these recyclable plastics didn’t end up in the ocean, we could save 60% of the energy that is put into manufacturing these plastic items and save the marine life. In a 2006 report, Greenpeace stated that at least 267 different animal species are known to have suffered from entanglement and ingestion of plastic debris. According to the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration, plastic debris kills an estimated 100,000 marine mammals annually, as well as millions of birds and fishes, And this is all because of us. Humans. For example look at this (picture) whale that was found dead after it had swallowed around 29 kilograms of plastic. It was killed by a gastric shock to its stomach and intestines due to the debris consumed.

 

Everyone has different perspectives on this global issue and Greenpeace is a worldwide environmental  organization that uses a “non-violent creative action to pave the way towards a greener, more peaceful world, and to confront the systems that threaten our environment.” From a report written last year, they wrote that “humanity’s footprint is very clear,” and that the Antarctic is not just wilderness as we may think or have seen on the television.  This organization along with many others and individuals wants to make a positive difference in our consumption of plastic and the out of hand pollution produced. Take the information form an environmentalist, his perspective is that  “Plastic is not a bad material…it saves lives in hospitals. If used for the right application it’s wonderful for our civilization, but using a material that is designed to last forever for single-use, throwaway products is nonsense,” he says. In my opinion, I totally agree, plastic is so useful and makes our lives easier but I think that we do need to rethink how we use it and how we dispose of it because if we don’t, the generations to come won’t have a home or place to live in. However the manufacturer’s perspective is a wide range, some think it’s not their problem how consumers dispose of their product, meanwhile, lots of companies are planning to change the way their product is sold weather that’s reducing the amount of plastic in their product or making their products recyclable and more sustainable. For insistence, Mcdonalds has spoken out and has said that they want to be “part of the solution, not the problem” by making their packaging worldwide more sustainable by 2025. This means that all straws, bags, packaging, and cups will come from recyclable or renewable resources. This is just one of many companies that have signed to help reduce plastic waste, other companies include Nestle, Countdown, Loreal, Coca-Cola, New Zealand Post, and many others.

 

CONCLUSION:

(notes)Teach kids about plastic what it does and educate them about the impact because they are the ones that will be affected, more people need to be aware and educated, we proved that we can live without we survived for ….. Years  

Imagine if u were one the people that lived in a village with plastic and litter everywhere how would u feel? We are lucky to live here but is it really fair that we get to experience such a beautiful environment meanwhile there are people suffering from our pollution somewhere else in the world?

The primary issue that influences our marine life and ocean health is the extensive production of plastic. The large-scale extent to which “plastic” is being used for almost anything, is spoiling our clean oceans and creating a sea of unobtainable waste.  The perspectives of environmentalists and manufacturers influence how each of you (audience) embrace this issue. Single-use plastic or cardboard items such as coffee cups, juice bottles, and straws are some of the largest contributors to the well-being of our ocean.

The illusion of FooD Speech….

Imagine if more than 60% of the food you consume daily is processed, or has been factory farmed. Well… this is the reality for most of us. You may not know but a lot of the food we consume is really bad for us and is slowly killing our bodies. The majority of us want to eat healthy food that fuels our bodies in a positive way, yet we still have these cravings for sweet, salty and fatty foods. These foods all get advertised to look healthy and inviting, to cover up the fact that they are filled with horrible chemicals, artificial flavourings, sugars, and fats. But it is even worse what is put into or on these food to make them more appealing to us.

 

Advertising is a huge factor for popular food companies such as Macdonald’s, Pizza hut, Subway and many other businesses in the food industry. Companies such as these tend to advertise their product on television, billboards, social media and magazines. They use these platforms to target their audiences, such as teenagers and younger kids. The food industries make it their main goal to produce food which contains a good balance of sugar, salt, and fat that will leave us wanting more. This is because food with the right balance of these three things:  fat, sugar, and salt, tend to be the most ‘delicious’ and addicting.It is all an illusion, just like the advertisements you see on television. Have you ever looked at an ad on tv and thought… “that looks so good?” Well did you know that vast groups of editors, photographers, chefs, and designers spend hours! making just one burger look perfect. They create an illusion for their product to be seen as delicious, fast, fresh and healthy, whereas in reality, the burger you buy does not look the same. Most companies would not advertise food that gets served to you. Because imagine if you saw an advertisement with the food you actually get served… Would you still buy that ‘fresh’, ‘delicious’,’healthy’ burger? Probably not!

 

The second point of my speech is why we crave food and what fuels these cravings. We want food such as chocolate, chips, pizza, doughnuts, fizzy drinks and so on because they have sooo many bad chemicals and artificial flavours in them. But why do we desire these foods so much? It is because, for most of us, we have been eating processed food all of our lives, therefore it makes it hard to stop eating sugary foods because our bodies and brains have gotten so used it. This can be backed up by science, according to studies: when you put food high in salt, sugar or fat into your mouth, your taste buds send a signal to the lower part of your brain, which stimulates neurons or endorphins that perceive a rewarding experience. This means that because our brains like the endorsements that get released whilst eating these foods, our brain wants more sugar, salt, and fat. We want to go back for more, once you take a bite of a cookie, you want to keep eating it.

 

 

Ever wondered what’s in your food? or what it actually means by ‘natural flavourings, ‘natural colourings’, ‘sugar-free’, or ‘fat-free’? They all mean soo much more than what it seems and as it goes for your food, well the majority of the food you consume is probably chemicals and antioxidants. In order to protect themselves and their company, the big manufacturing companies have kept a low profile for the past decade, hiding behind the faith of commercial confidentiality, claiming they can’t reveal their recipes because of competition. Anything that comes in a box, tin, bag, carton or bottle has to be labeled with a list of its ingredients. But many of the additives and ingredients that once jumped out as fake or manufactured have slowly disappeared. In some cases it means that the contents of the product have improved, but not for the majority of the labeled food. Over the past few years, the food industry has invested in a new idea called: “clean label’, the purpose of this is to remove the most glaring industrial ingredients and additives, only then to replace them with substitutes that sound more benign and natural. The same chemicals and additives are still in your food, apart from they are just being labeled differently to sound more friendly and eatable. When the companies label their product with ‘natural flavourings’ there is actually a very little difference between natural and artificial flavourings. They are both made using the same physical, and enzymatic,  processes. This is the same for ‘Natural colourings’ since their only difference is that ‘natural colourings’ start with pigments that occur in nature.But then both colourings are made using the same highly chemical industrial processes, including extraction using harsh solvents. 

 

I hope this has made you realise just how little we really know about the food that sits on our supermarket shelves, in boxes, cartons and bottles – food that has had something done to it to make it more convenient, ready to eat, and last longer for better sales. The advertisements often seen on television are fake because they portray their real image of the food they serve to their customers, which could be you. In the food industry, the majority of companies try to get the perfect balance of fat, sugar, and salt when making their product since these three things can be addicting. More importantly, we all need to try to be more aware of what the labeling says on our product and what is really in it because some of the chemicals and antioxidants that are put in our food can be deadly and can even cause things such as cancer and diabetes.Just think, before you take a bite of that delicious looking piece of food, is it worth feeding yourself poison?

The illusion of FoooooD

  • Illusion of “eat a rainbow of vegetables and fruit”
  • What is put into our food : “fat-free” “sugar-free” – means more other bad chemicals and more preserved products
  • “Vegetables are good ” – not unless they are organic or home-grown, because the chemicals used to grow supermarket vegetables are BAD!!!
  • The illusion of how food is advertised, “Healthy” “dietitian, doctor  approved”, Or how food looks ‘fresh’  on adverts but in reality it doesn’t get served to you the same
  • The illusion of food advertisement, for example mashed potatoes are used to advertise ice cream….
  • What really happens in the meat industry and factory farming….. “organic”

Illusion of eating disorders…

  • How the media influences body image and eating disorders such as anorexia.
  •  How people try to hide their eating disorders by saying that they are “ok”
  • The illusion of more people have an eating disorder than you know, it is more common than the society may think.

What eating disorders are…..

Describe what each of the ‘common’ disorders are…

“Even the models we see in magazines wish they could look their own images”

“You don’t have to look like you have an eating disorder to have one”

“Not everyone wiht an eating disorder: is skinny, goes to hospital, gets diagnosed, is anorexic, goes to therapy, exercises, makes them selves sick, or doesn’t eat.”