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Excessive Junk Mail and Deforestation
ABSTACT INTRO
Knowledgeable combatants against social injustices around the world, use
rhetoric to create curiosity and attachment to an idea or movement. Visual
stimulation is very affective in this as well however if you watch a video about
Bsing rhetoric that effective informs people about the problem. Effectiveness falls
under 3 categories vocabulary, tone, and style of writing to B How can Spreading
effective literature aoub If we stop and think about the techniques of written about
……. shedding light on how people and/or organizations combat the problem using
different forms of literature.
END ABSTRACT INTRO
Knowledgeable combatants against social injustices around the world, use
rhetoric to create curiosity and attachment to an idea or movement. The individuals
that are dedicated to stopping, preventing, or slowing the acts of various injustices
around the world use keywords, phrases, and rhetoric to educate the public of the
problem. As the first two weeks passed I thought of many different social justice
problems such as the absurd incarceration rate and over crowed jails due to minor
drug offenses, which is, tied with the “war on drugs”, homelessness in Santa Barbara,
and feeding the poor. All of these topics interest me and need to be address but I
wanted to think outside of the box and choose a topic that is rarely addressed and
sincerely bugs me! Every time I receive a piece of mail, I get a stack of unwanted
junk mail. You may be asking yourself, “How is junk mail a social injustice?” After
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reading this paper you’ll have a better understanding as to how this intrusive form
of advertising has a devastating impact on the environment. The next time you
recycle the junk mail that accumulates in your mailbox, you’ll have a disturbing
feeling of the wasteful nature attached to them. According to greendimes.com, a
website devoted to stopping this wasteful social injustice, it’s estimated that 100
million trees are cut down each year to create 4.5 million tons of junk mail. Upon
further research on this topic, I began to realize the organizations that combat this
problem are solely focused on deforestation. In essence, junk mail has a direct
correlation to deforestation. Greendimes.com offers mind-blowing statistics but
lacks the financial backing to truly stop this problem. However I did find one
organization that lightly discusses the problems of junk mail but is fully devoted to
slowing and potentially stopping the exponential rate of deforestation by creating
recycled paper for many uses. Frank Locantore who has over ten years experiencecombating deforestation by selling recycled paper directs the Green America Better
Paper Project, which is located in Denver, Colorado. His efforts to slow and hopefully
stop deforestation have been backed by many prestigious organizations such as
National Wildlife Federation, Canopy, and Rainforest Action Network. The Better
Paper Project uses consumer education such as carefully placed logos and an
effective website to educate consumers of the dangers of deforestation
however they could .
So when did junk mail start contributing to the rapid destruction of our
number one oxygen source? According to Greendimes, “the first recorded piece of
mail sent to multiple recipients with advertisement purposes caused a negative
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reaction than a positive one, and that was in 1864” (2014). Considering the
population of the United States was roughly 31 million in 1864 and the current
number is around ten and a half times that (318.9 million) the notion that junk mail
is a realistic practice for the 21 century is foolish. It’s not just a domestic problem
either. “30% of all the mail delivered around the world,” (2014) is considered junk
mail. However, the statistics for the junk mail we receive here in the stats is mind
blowing. “American households receive a total of 104.7 billion pieces of junk mail a
year” (2014). That’s 848 per home. “It takes more than 100,000,000 trees,” (2014)
to produce all that ad mail. That would be the equivalent of “clear cutting the entire
rocky mountain national park every four months” (2014). Instead of measuring this
based off of speculative ideas, lets look at the real damage this is causing. Two of the
forests suffering from this devastating impact are the Canadian Boreal Forest and
Indonesia’s tropical forests. Canada’s lush Boreal Forest is being logged “at a rate of
2 acres a minute, 24 hours a day to produce junk mail and other paper products”
(2014). 1,100 miles ways, in the humid rainforests of Indonesia, the effects of
deforestation are rampant causing 8% of global carbon emissions. The manufacture
of junk mail releases more greenhouse gas emissions per year than the emissions
released by 9,372,000 average passenger cars. The CO2 emissions from 41 pounds
of advertising mail received annually by the average US consumer is about 47.6
kilograms (105), which has a large footprint on the environment (Greendimes,
2014). Does this large footprint on the environment benefit anyone? Are there
people out there that find junk mail useful?
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Yes, there are people that use junk mail on a daily basis. Based off of the junk
mail that I started collecting at the beginning of this semester, 8 out of 10 pieces of
junk are in the form of a coupon or advertisement. It could be argued that certain
junk mail is produced to privilege customers with discounts to get them in to the
store. This method helps people a dime here and there and may add up in certain
households. For the most part though, “44% of junk mail is discarded without being
opened or read, equaling 4 million tons of paper waste per year, with just 32%
recovered for recycling,” and to add more fuel to the fire, “the Ohio Office of
Compliance has state that ‘250,000 homes could be heated for a single day’s junk
mail” (2014). For the families that are coupon kings and queens, they should be able
to sign up for these forms of ‘discounts’ and receive them electronically to conserve
paper. The Better Paper Project would approve this idea.
Frank Locantore is the director of operations for the Better Paper Project.
This organization focuses on the massive impact on the environment caused by
deforestation. This is closely linked with junk mail considering it’s “estimated that
100 million trees are cut down each year to create the 4.5 million tons of junk mail
in the United States alone” (2014). Locantore’s “normal work day” doesn’t involve
combating junk mail first hand. However the Better Paper Project does create
different forms of rhetoric to educate individuals about the problems of
deforestation. Their website, http://betterpaper.ning.com/, gives specific
instructions on how to slow the influx of junk mail filling your inbox. Locantore
believes that junk mail “is a problem” however “there are bigger problems to solve”
(Locantore, 2015).
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Frank’s day consists of many different responsibilities such as “meetings
with publishers and magazine staff,” time “spent on the phone,” and some days “that
are a mish-mash of phone calls with colleagues, researching, creating incentives for
publishers to buy recycled paper, countering bogus myths and on and on”
(Locantore, 2015). These bogus myths are difficult to control considering different
lobbying firms wage a war against the better paper project. Big business has their
protocol and tries to continue the use of paper obtained by unsustainable means. It’s
the Better Paper Projects mission to educate the public on the means of sustainable
paper options. On the Better Paper Project of America’s website, the mission
statement is clearly stated on the About section.
“The Better Paper Project empowers the magazine industry to go green. For over
ten years, we've helped magazine publishers choose sustainable papers (recycled
and certified) and give them a leg up in the green economy through our special
promotions and other benefits. Explore our partners who help us protect forests,
climate and communities.
Join now to start enjoying the economic and environmental rewards of participating
in the Better Paper Project.
Contact us with questions or for more information.”
The website, which is a key writing artifact connected to the Better Paper
Project needs to have a clear layout to allow the audience to navigate and educate
themselves about the problem at hand. It was easy to go to the About section and
learn all about the mission statement for the group. In the short synopsis about the
group, the Better Paper Project strengthens their ethos by creating a hyperlink to
“explore [their] partners who help [them] protect the forest, climate and
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communities” (2015). As stated in Crafting Messages for Electronic Media,
“communicating with personal style and an authentic voice,” (20___) this allows the
Better Paper Project to hit home when talking about saving our forests. This
strengthens the logos and pathos appeal. Their websites, as well as numerous links
such as these three writing artifacts provided by Mr. Locantore – video and
transcription of recycled papermaking, EPN global common vision, and a specific
focus on the deforestation of Indonesia – stregtehtn the emotional appeal and
reinforcing logical understanding that we need forests to survive on this planet!
The online medium is highly effective considering changes to stats are made easily
as well as updates to educate people about the problem is not labor intensive.
Conclusion
Considering our class is on the study of writing I gauged my questions
accordingly. I defined many terms as they pertain to our class for him such as genera
and conventions.
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1. Take me through your "normal" work day with the Better Paper Project.
There is no “normal” work day. Some days are spent on the phone a lot. Others
are full of meetings with publishers and magazine staff. Then there are the days
that are a mish-mash of phone calls with colleagues, researching, creating
incentives for publishers to buy recycled paper, countering bogus myths, and on
and on. All in the service to our mission to solve social and environmental
problems through economic actions.
2. What is your roll in this organization?
I direct the Green America Better Paper Project
3. In our class we discuss the importance of genera and conventions. My
interpretation of your genera would be global warming/protecting the
environment. Conventions are the means that make up your genera (i.e.
genera = horror movie / conventions of horror movies are suspenseful
music, dark lighting, popping out ect.). How would you define your genera
and conventions?
Genera: social and environmental responsibility
Conventions: economic strategies combined with consumer education and
organizing, supply chain collaborations, and life-cycle assessments.
4. Who is your audience?
Magazine publishers are the primary audience. Their supply chain is our
secondary audience. The tertiary audience is consumers.
5. What is the best way to inform people of how wasteful junk mail is / what
is your message?
I don’t talk about junk mail.
6. If there was one piece of information/statistic you could share with
everyone about how terribly wasteful junk mail is, what would it be?
N/A
7. Do you believe junk mail is intrusive on personal privacy?
Not particularly – relative to all other info about us that we likely submit ourselves
on FB and other social media, junk mail isn’t really intrusive.
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8. I notice there a couple different organizations that focus on the
eradication of junk mail (41 Pounds, Greendimes, Better Paper Project)
Why not join together to fight the same cause?
That is an important question. Though I don’t deal with junk mail, I have been
part of efforts that bring organizations together to work together. Perhaps 41
pounds and Greendimes are all ready working together. If not, they could follow
the model we created at the Environmental Paper Network.
9. We believe that junk mail is wasteful to precious resources - such as
trees and water just to name a few. We stand for something and have an
argument against companies exploiting these resources using junk mail,
how does the Better Paper Project use ethos, pathos, and logos in their
stance against these corporations?
Since we’ve established that we don’t work on junk mail issues, I would answer
in this way. We try to use words that people understand and that resonate with
them. For example, “genera” and “convention” are horrible words that have no
meaning to the public (I know you weren’t asking the public to explain them,
however, why not understand your audience a bit and use words that don’t
require you to explain?).
We demonstrate our “ethos” by clearly defining our mission, the strategies we
employ, and the experience and expertise that we have on the issues. We also
build alliances and collaborations with other organizations and/or people that can
help augment our standing or fill in a gap where we may not have deep
expertise. We demonstrate the solutions that exist and have already proved to be
effective. Having the science of what is fact is important to support the message.
Our “pathos” depends on the audience we are speaking to. If it is the general
public we think about what people see and experience in their lives. We ask
ourselves, what do they care about? Can pictures be used to create an
immediate image and story? For the magazine staff and supply chain audience
they rarely care about the environment. If they do care about the environment,
then we use the same tactics all ready mentioned. But, even in those cases we
still have to talk to them about what they really care about: costs and revenue.
They mainly want to spend less than what they are currently spending and they
want to increase their revenue. If we can speak to them on that level, then they
are more likely to listen.
Finally, logic rarely has anything to do when profit motives are involved. In my
experience it would be “ethos,” “pathos,” and “force" or “pressure” as the troika.
The pressure tactics are basically a way to damage their financial bottom line or
brand so that they will be more receptive to the greater social and environmental
good that would come from changing their practices. Such tactics only come after
ethos and pathos fail. (It was just last year that National Geographic began using
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recycled paper after years of “ethos-ing” and “pathos-ing” them. We had to
threaten to run a public campaign of embarrassment before they switched.)
Dirk suggests “ learning about genres and how they function is more
important that mastering one particular genre” (2010, p.2)
Introduces a new paragraph – singular focus of the paragraph – idea anchor for the
paragraph
On average, I receive around two pounds of junk mail per day.
Intrusive nature, stats, tie in with better paper project and thesis
P1 - If junk mail is necessary use BPP paper
What is the BBP and who runs it?
P2 – Introduce Frank Locantore
What are his ties with the org
P3 – How does Locantore and BPP use writing artifacts to spread awareness
ETHOS, PATHOS, LOGOS
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Conclusion
Wrap up BPP awareness techniques, tie back in with junk mail and how
wasteful it is
Working – is an idea but may be general, provides usufeul info but isn’t an argument
or debateable
Thesis – can be argued and backed up