How will I affect change in the world

As I turn new page in the story of Brittany I remember a lot of what I have already been through but I still look forward to the future. As I said in my previous post I have found once again my passion for changing the world and is there a better place to take this on than a university? No! At university I will be meeting many new people and have the opportunity to join new groups and committees that will allow me to go explore even deeper into the issues I feel strongest about. I hope to educate people about the forgotten issues such as human trafficking and water scarcity. These are the issues that so wrong;y but so often get pushed to the side. I hope to take classes where I will learn about these issues and talk to the professors who are already experts on them. I guess I will just try and educate my self as much as I can and take every opportunity to pass my knowledge onto others. Education, I believe, is the key.

What have I learned about myself

Through out my world issues class I have learnt a lot about a lot of things but what have I learnt about my self?  I learnt that over the years I lost a lot of my "lets-go-change-the-world!" attitude in the past few years. In fact the only world issues that was constantly on my mind for Grade 10 and 11 was climate change and global warming. But in years before that I used to be a lot more into learning about other world issues like HIV/AIDS, human trafficking, water scarcity, poverty, and gender inequality. I guess you could blame it on high school. I started to care less about reading the news and more about friday night. In fact, I stopped caring so much that I didn't even notice that my life was taking a superficial turn for the worst. That is what I learnt about my self. Even though we didn't go into a lot of detail in some of these topics it was just enough for me to remember how much I care. I remember how angry I got when my parents used water lawn in the middle of the day in the summer and then leave it on all day. I remember how disgusted I am when I read articles and facts on human trafficking and how much I want to promote gender equality. So long story short I didn't learn anything new about my self through out this course, I just remembered something I shouldn't have forgotten.

Three Top Issues (I Have Learned About In Class)

Greece. Iran. Stereotyping. These are the three things I have learnt most about in my world issues class this year.
    Greece, or more widely - the EU,  has been the centre of attention for the past year because of their debt problem. Greece has dug them selves into a deep, dark, debt filled hole. The Greece government has not been regularly collecting taxes but they have been giving out pension to people who, in some cases, don't even live in the country anymore. It does not take a rocket scientist to do this math. Lots of money leaving + no money coming into the government = big problems. And that is exactly what Greece has, big problems. However, they are not the only ones on the verge of default, Spain and Portugal  are also walking a fine line. Also other countries who have been managing money a little better don't want to let Greece default and they can't really kick Greece out of the EU so they have been throwing money at Greece. But, wait, pump the brakes. With Greece going down and foreign investors losing confidence in the whole economy would this pose problems for the countries giving out the loans? Why, yes, yes it is. EU countries are getting tired of piggy backing Greece around so with these latest loans comes with a few strings attached. I could go into the whole thing but I won't because i can summarize it like this. The EU(especially Germany and France) are saying, "Greece, get you act together." This means big cuts in spending which the Greece people aren't to happy about. In fact, they are down right livid. Protesting in the streets have been taking a more violent turn in the past months. But hey, life isn't fair and in this world nothing is free.
      To all those people who praise themselves on being really smart, I have a question for you. Close your eyes and pretend you are running a country and you find out that another country with potential nuclear power plans on "wiping you off the map". What do you do? Get angry? Attack them first? Give up? Run around screaming bloody murder? It's a thinker isn't it. In fact, it is all Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has been thinking about because it is his country that will be at the blowing up side of the nuclear bomb. Iran has stated that they wish to "wipe Israel off the map" and with there growing nuclear facility this crazy plan might actually happen. Iran is "claiming" that their nuclear program is for "energy purposes only" but if that is the case they have a very large need for energy. Sanction have been put on Iran to try and stop or at least slow there progress in their program but they don't seem to be doing the job.
      The final top issue I learnt about it is one that may seem small, irrelevant, useless, stupid, silly, petty and trivial in the grand scheme of things, especially in comparison to the other two issues I previously talked about but that is not true. Don't get me wrong Greece's ergonomic downturn is a very big deal and Iran's nuclear program is nothing to be taken lightly (even though that may be how I made it sound. But that is what I do, joke about things to early to try and reduce tension. Rarely does it work). But this issue is one that has been laying behind the scenes and has been the cause of larger issues for years. The mother of examples is 9/11.  Everybody, without a doubt remember and knows about 9/11 I was only in grade 2 when it happened and I still remember big shuffled into the gym, confused and scared. Before 9/11 Islamic religion wasn't on anybody radar. Then 9/11 happened and now everybody knows about it. But what people don't know is that it was not that every Islamic person had a hand in the terrorist attack. The terrorist attack was done by Islamic extremists. Big difference. But now when ever anybody brings up Islam many people cringe, usually sub consciously. A majority of people know that it is wrong to lame an entire religion of the actions of one extremist group but we can't help it. The United States of America was a jewel of the world, untouchable. Then suddenly they were hit by an attack that rocked the world. The entire world stood and awe as the towers fell. Millions cried about the thousands lost. Because of this a majority of Islamic people have been wrongly judged. There daily lives they have to deal with hurtful, racist comments and stares and looks that show people distrust. Because of the actions of a relatively small group an entire religious community has been segregated. Now a decade later things are getting better but they are no where near perfect. This is one example of stereotyping. So now you see how stereotyping is a large issue.

ISU Reflection

      My world issues class has now finished all of the ISU presentation. Through out the presentation weeks we learned about a variety of issues that deserve attention including global warming, racism, biodiversity, economic downturns, conflict, and many more.  The one I found most interesting was human trafficking. I have researched about it before but I found that I got a deeper understanding when hearing it though the presentation. I think that human trafficking deserves more media attention than it has ever gotten. People constantly forget about human trafficking because it is not something we see in our daily lives. It is not an issue that is often reported on the news or put into newspaper articles because of this it is often a issue that is forgotten. Also because we do not see the effects of human trafficking in our daily lives we often over look it. The presentation gave me a deeper understanding of the issue and the discussion allowed me to see other people points of view, which I also found informative. 

What Is The Biggest Threat Facing Canada In The Next 50 Years

    The bigest threat that Canada will face in 50 years is water scarcity. This will be a big problem not only for Canada but also the world. Due to pollution and contamination drinkable fresh water is decreasing but because of rising population and increase in global temperature the demand for fresh water in increasing. This will have a huge affect on the world. Landlocked countries and countries with limited or no fresh water will face the biggest challenges. This will affect Canada largely because we have the most plentiful source of fresh water than any other country. Most of the rest of the world considers fresh water as a basic human right but Canada does not. This means we do not think that it is necessary to share water with other countries even if they really need it. But because the rest of the world does this may make us a target   for other countries who are desperate for water. What we can do to try and stop this is to find alternative ways to collect fresh water. For example, instead of taking water from the ground communities in certain areas are turning to cloud harvesting, also known as fog catching. Communities that are able to will put large nets on places of high altitudes, such as mountain peaks. Then when fog and low clouds roll in the moisture of captures on these large nets and runs into large water tanks. But there are many things that you can do here at home. Some of these things include talking shorter showers or scatter showers. Scatter showers are when you turn the water off as you are putting shampoo and conditioner in your hair then turning it back on to rinse. Better yet you can take baths. Baths use less water because you are using the same water but when you are showering then the water use is continuous. Also you can water your lawn later in the day or at night. If you water your lawn in the middle of the day then all of the water is evaporated. Also low-flow toilet and shower head are another popular solution to conserve water. Finally, don;t pollute the water. The less pollution means less contamination of fresh water. It doesn't matter what you and and the more the better. The important thing is that you do it.

Interesting Fact: Many scientists say that it is possible the the next world war will be fought over water.

European Elections - Austerity Rejected

     Big things are happening in the EU. Greece is reorganizing their government and France is taking a backwards approach to solving their economic issues to the chagrin of Germany. Lets start with Greece. They received a bail out earlier but it came with a few strings. Greece must demonstrate major cutbacks and raise taxes, both must be accomplished by mid-June, and time is running out. Greece's president tried to unite the parties to create a collation, which failed, so the Greece people are heading back to vote once again. Greece has to clean up it's act because they are running out of time and eventually other countries are going to stop giving out money. Uh oh. Greece you are running out of bridges.
     Now lets move a little to the north and west and come upon France. What do you do when you are in an economic downturn? Well the first thing that comes to mind is to cut spending and raise taxes. Not France. France's new president Francois Hollande went to Germany to speak with German Chancellor Angela Merkel and said that he was taking different handle, he called for government spending to try and "jump start" the economy. The only catch is France is already in debt if this plans doesn't work then France will be even deep hole. Crazy? Maybe...not? Greece raised taxes and cut spending and the people protested like their world was ending (which it was).
      So in conclusion things are going a little backwards. But who knows, sometimes an upside down outlook on the world is the exact outlook you need.

Biodiversity

   Biodiversity is the variety of plants and animals that live in the environment of a habitat. Biodiversity also includes the relationship between the plants and animals living there. In our world everything is sitting in a delicate balance, where everything relies on each other in order to survive. The tree grows from the earth and the bug eats the leaves or fruit from the tree. The bug is then the prey of the bird and the bird's eggs can be the prey of a racoon. When that racoon dies it eventually decomposes into the earth again where the tree was once born. That is basic, but effective, example of biodiversity. Everything is in balance and needs to stay in balance. Human's have had a large impact on biodiversity and this is why we are seeing animal populations either grow greatly or greatly decline. Remember the example that I just used, imagine what would happen if a city was put there. This would cause many of the trees to be cut down. Without these trees the bugs do not have the leaves or fruit to eat causing them to die and without these bugs it would cause a decrease in the birds that relied on the bugs for food. Or another possibility that could happen is that the urban sprawl would cause the racoons to have to move habitats. Without the racoons then there would be more birds causing a decrease in bugs. See how quickly things get out of control. That is biodiversity. This is why we as humans must take it upon our selves to make sure that things don't get out of hand because we rely on these habitats for food.