I do agree with the New Yorker’s article, when it said that Beavan could have taken other precautions to help out the environment. By him lobbying state lawmakers to make a better transit and by him talking to other’s in his apartment about making a better heating system he could help out the environment on a much larger scale. There are people out there who are not willing to go through the lengths that Beavan did, but they are still willing to make a few changes to help out the environment.
This being said, I still somewhat disagree with Kolbert, that Beavan did not do enough to help out the environment. The fact that he wrote a book, made a movie, and appeared on talk shows about his project shows that he went through great lengths for his No Impact Project. There are many people out there who are going through great lengths to help out the environment. With the way our society is now, it would be hard to go through lengths as great as Beavan’s, but just by doing a little bit you could make a big difference.
As the author of the Green as a Thistle blog said, “The point of all these green memoirs is more or less the same: We wanted to find out what happens when the average person tries to be as eco-friendly as possible, and what our struggles and triumphs ultimately say about the green movement in general. What should we be doing? What should we not be doing?”
Just by these two authors documenting their struggles through their projects, many readers out there are seeing what is possible for some human beings to achieve out there. I think that Beavan and the author of Green as a Thistle have done a good job of letting us know how we can help the environment. There is always more that can be done, but I think that we are off to a decent start. Change does not always come quickly, it’s a process that takes time and patience.
After reading the blogs of other students, in particular Christian Jones' blog, they all also mostly agree with me about whether Colin Beavan did enough to start something. I completely agree with Christian in that one individual person can make a difference because eventually everyone's efforts will make a bigger difference. I think many of us can learn from Colin Beavan and the author of Green as a Thistle.
