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Tom Hanks addresses America's future in Harvard speech

Harvard speech

By samyog kandelPublished 10 months ago 5 min read
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Tom Hanks addresses America's future in Harvard speech
Photo by History in HD on Unsplash

The Oscar winner, who received an honorary doctorate of arts, joked he was receiving the degree "without having done a lick of work" other than playing a Harvard professor in "The Da Vinci Code" movies.

"It's not fair, but please don't be embittered by this fact," he said.

"I don't know much about Latin. I have no real passion for enzymes, and public global policy is something I scan on the newspaper just before I do the Wordle," Hanks said. "And yet here I am closing — closing for Josiah, Pallas, and Vic," he quipped, referring to the three student speakers who proceeded him..Actor Tom Hanks delivers a commencement address during Harvard University commencement exercises on the school's campus, Thursday, May 25, 2023, in Cambridge, Mass. Steven Senne / AP

Hanks then pivoted to talking about "truth, justice, and the American way."

"Propaganda and bald-faced lies will erode over time," Hanks said. "Idolatry and imagery lose luster and effect."

He went on, saying, "Ignorance and intolerance can be replaced by experience in the wink of an eye, but indifference will narrow the vision of America's people and make dim the light of Lady Liberty's symbolic torch."

Hanks told the class there are three types of Americans and that they will have to make a choice between "those who embrace liberty and freedom for all, those who won't, or those who are indifferent."

The difference, he, added, is in "how truly you believe, in how vociferously you promote, in how tightly you hold to the truth that is self-evident — that of course we are all created equally yet differently and of course we are all in this together."

"We are all but human," Hanks said.

Hanks said that, "the truth, to some, is no longer empirical. It's no longer based on data nor common sense nor even common decency."

"Telling the truth is no longer the benchmark for public service. It's no longer the salve to our fears or the guide to our actions. Truth is now considered malleable, by opinion, by zero-sum end games," he said. "Imagery is manufactured with audacity, with purpose to achieve the primal task of marring the truth with mock logic to achieve with fake expertise, with false sincerity."

People "play fast and loose" with the truth, he stressed.

"Every day, every year, and for every graduating class, there is a choice to be made," he said.

He called post-graduation "the never-ending battle you have all officially joined as of today."

"If you live in the United States of America, the responsibility is yours. Ours. The effort is optional, but the truth is sacred, unalterable, chiseled into the stone of the foundation of our republic," he said."Plastics contain more than 13,000 chemicals, with more than 3,200 of them known to be hazardous to human health," the report explains. "Moreover, many of the other chemicals in plastics have never been assessed and may also be toxic. Recycled plastics often contain higher levels of chemicals that can poison people and contaminate communities, including toxic flame retardants, benzene and other carcinogens, environmental pollutants like brominated and chlorinated dioxins, and numerous endocrine disruptors that can cause changes to the body's natural hormone levels."

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"Without dramatic reductions in plastic production and eliminating toxic chemicals from plastics, we risk a significant global ecological disruption."

Dr. Therese Karlsson — a Science Advisor with the International Pollutants Elimination Network (IPEN), many of whose studies are featured in the report — spoke with Salon by email about its broader implications.

"The studies show that waste workers are exposed when they collect plastics, communities near recycling facilities are exposed from air and water pollution and consumers who use recycled plastic products face toxic exposures," Karlsson told Salon. "It's also important to note that the science shows that recycled plastics can be even more toxic than virgin plastics. Thus, the science directly contradicts strategies to resolve the plastics crisis through more recycling."

Karlsson pointed out that the chemicals and wastes pollution crisis is, along with the climate change crisis and the biodiversity crisis, one of the "three planetary crises" facing Earth because of human activity. "The evidence shows that we have exceeded the planetary boundaries for chemical and plastics pollution, meaning that production and emissions may be threatening the stability of the entire global ecosystem," Karlsson explained. "Without dramatic reductions in plastic production and eliminating toxic chemicals from plastics, we risk a significant global ecological disruption."

Recycling plastics does not solve this problem. Indeed, as the report breaks down, there are "three uncontrollable poisonous pathways of plastic recycling," including how virgin plastics made with toxic chemicals can transfer those chemicals into the recycle products, how plastics absorb dangerous chemicals through direct contact and absorption and how when "plastics are tainted by toxins in the waste stream and the environment and are then recycled, they produce recycled plastics that contain a stew of toxic chemicals."

"Many people think that more plastic recycling will resolve the plastics crisis, but plastics are made with toxic chemicals, and there is no magic recycling box that makes these chemicals disappear — so recycling plastic is recycling toxic chemicals," Karlsson pointed out. "We therefore urgently need to ensure that toxic chemicals are phased out from plastics and that the overall production of plastics is decreased."

Dr. Shanna Swan, a professor of environmental medicine and public health at Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York City, told Salon by email that she is "in complete agreement" with the report. Swan is a pioneering researcher in the subject of plastic pollution and human health; her book "Count Down: How Our Modern World Is Threatening Sperm Counts, Altering Male and Female Reproductive Development, and Imperiling the Future of the Human Race" broke new ground in documenting plummeting human fertility rates and their likely connection to plastic pollution. In particular, Swan has studied endocrine disruptors like phthalates and bisphenols, as well as other chemicals that seem to interfere with healthy human reproductive development.

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samyog kandel

MY name is Samyog KandeL, and I am an individual with a passion for personal growth, knowledge acquisition, and making a positive impact. With a background in the sciences and a love for everyone.

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