Alessandra Lopez
Nora Cisneros
CLS 3770-08
September 22, 2019
Color for Environmental Injustice
When you leave the city the air feels fresh, clean, gives you a feeling that your lungs are
being purified. Ever wonde
...
Alessandra Lopez
Nora Cisneros
CLS 3770-08
September 22, 2019
Color for Environmental Injustice
When you leave the city the air feels fresh, clean, gives you a feeling that your lungs are
being purified. Ever wondered why? In the city when you step out the house in the afternoon the
sky isn’t blue, instead it is orange with purple hues Ever wondered why? In the early 1980s a
new concept emerged in the United States, environmental justice. To put it simply,
environmental justice emphasizes that your health should not suffer because of the environment
where you live, work, play or learn regardless of one’s race, color, national origin, or income.
The term environmental justice protects those who are burdened by environmental pollutant,
hazard or disadvantages that compromise the health of a community or its residents.
Environmental injustice affects either minority groups or people of low socioeconomic status,
basically why the term environmental racism exists today. Environmental racism developed in
the United States in the early 1980s. Cities like Kettleman city, California, Chester, Pennsylvania
and Buttonwillow, California created powerful movements to fight the environmental injustice
occurring in their community.
El pueblo is a movement created in Kettleman City to fight environmental injustice.
Kettleman city at the time had a population of 1,000 residents the majority of the population
consisted of latinx, monolingual spanish speaking people. El pueblo unido jamas sera vencido
(Cole and Foster, 2001), a famous motto for El pueblo that in English translates to, the people
united will never be defeated. A company called Chemical Waste Management wanted to build
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