Saturday, April 30, 2011

grim piñata

Just a little something I've been pondering from running around Ghana

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Some folks get rid of trash like this:














(I know it doesn't seem like much, but I took this picture on short notice so I wasn't able to find a good place that had a representative amount of trash. Also, every square inch of the ground here is covered in this thin layer of trash here. real picture from northern Ghana)

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Others get rid of trash like this:


















(massive volume, extremely concentrated. stock photo)

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In one case, a few suffer intensely (people who live near landfills). In the other, everyone suffers mildly (people also usually burn their trash, which includes plastic). In one case, the pollution is extremely concentrated, in the other, extremely widespread.

Although it is impossible to control for the sheer volume of waste in the second situation, in order to ask this question, can we still ask: which is worse?

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