Joshua Popielarczyk
PAEP individual reflection
Ben and Jerry’s, a trademark name built from hard work
and an ethical structure. To explain the
success of such a company, I looked to its history. Ben Cohen and Jerry Greenfield founded their
business with a combined twelve thousand dollars, consisting of life savings
and a four thousand dollar loan. They
began churning out delicious ice cream loaded with all their favorite nuts,
cookies, and candies. But what made them
known? What made them stick out? Their environmental consciousness and more
so, support of environmentally friendly policies. Buyers feel good when they know their buck
goes to a company who helps the place we live on stick around longer. Ben and Jerry’s are actively involved
fighting global warming, reducing paper consumption, recycling waste for
energy, creating energy-efficient freezers and even committed to sourcing
non-GMO ingredients for all their products everywhere by midyear 2014.
With
such undeniable evidence that Ben and Jerry’s continually advocates and lives
by environmentally friendly policies, I feel it’s necessary to explore the
implications of this as it pertains to both the environment, and ethics. Ben and Jerry’s addvocation of awareness and
action relates to the concept of “deep ecology” that we read about in chapter 9
of Environmental Ethics. Deep Ecology
focuses on the fundamental aspects that cause
issues such as resource exploitation and depletion rather than just address
these issues on the surface. Realizing
that a cause of deforestation is the use of paper materials such as ice cream
pints, Ben and Jerry’s transitioned to FSC certified pint containers. This means the pulp in the paperboard comes
from forests that are managed to promote protection; wildlife, biodiversity,
and the sustainability of the forest. By
addressing causes of such environmental destruction, Ben and Jerry’s can
actively reduce their handprint on nature, saving the earth and hopefully
getting others on board too.
Ben
and Jerry’s have always been front loaders in the environmental awareness game,
organizing protests and even taking tours across the country. Constantly promoting and taking actions, Ben
and Jerry’s, in my mind, have created their own “mother culture”. Ishmael defines mother culture as the media,
propaganda, and any other societal influence we experience during our
lives. However, if you scale that down
you can see Ben and Jerry’s impact. By
using their well known name and associating that name with environmental
activism, they have helped significantly in spreading knowledge of how to
help. If more company’s made this
mentality a part of their business, I believe we would see a lot of
progress. After learning such shocking
facts from this class, I can honestly say Ben and Jerry’s has made it a mission
to help change the way we think, and more so, treat our planet.
In
chapter 5 of Environmental Ethics on page 119 Desjardins says “Environemntal
ethics requires more than a simple concern for individual animals of a certain
type. At a minimum, we need to consider
questions about the morals status of a diversity of plant and animal life”. I see a connection between this theory and
the way Ben and Jerry’s promotes itself.
As we discussed in class, to make change, you need to make people want
change. So the question becomes, how can
one create an association between the environment and some fun or
positive. Ben and Jerry’s found a
solution! In 2002 they released an ice
cream called one sweet whirled. They
advertised an environmental action website on their ice cream, and even named
the ice cream after the movement! To me,
this is an extremely progressive way to get people to not only recognize the environment
as important, but learn how to help save it.
Overall,
the whole process of creating this poster has been enjoyable. Our group made a great decision in picking
Ben and Jerry’s, we knew that they were an environmentally friendly company
with plenty of information about them.
As we guessed, there was a plethora of information right on their website
which made our research very effective.
The factory, about 40 minutes from Burlington, was yet another great
resource for us. We used their many
information posters to gather a more detailed explanation for how they promote
saving the planet and green energy. What
made the whole thing better was that I actually love Ben and Jerry’s ice cream,
have since I was a young kid. Therefore,
getting to learn about all the ways they actively help sustain our planet was
very rewarding. A company that gives a
crap about the place we live is a good quality when deciding on whose ice cream
to buy! As far as how we interacted
individually, the sailing was equally as smooth. We all expressed an urge to work hard and do
well on this poster, so having four like-minded attitude was very helpful. I will say, at one point I was worried that a
group member would try to dictate the creation of poster too much, however I found
this to be just that, a worry. Our group
collaborated on many occasions, including three to four group meetings and a
trip to the factory. Meeting as much as
we could drastically increased our productivity and content as we were able to
have four minds working rather than one at a time. This project was a truly great way to end the
most enjoyable core class I’ve had. Dr.
Williams, you are a fantastic teacher who really connects with the materials
you teach. I feel you not only have a
great deal of knowledge about the subject, but furthermore “walk the walk” in
your everyday life. I found it very easy
to come to class and learn, hopefully that will be evident in our final
project!
WORKS CITED:
"Ben
& Jerry's Ice Cream." Ben & Jerry's.
N.p., n.d. Web. 01 Dec. 20
"Core
230: Ethics and the Environment." Core 230: Ethics and the Environment. N.p., n.d. Web. 01 Dec. 2013.
DesJardins,
Joseph R. Environmental Ethics: An Introduction to Environmental
Philosophy. Belmont, CA:
Wadsworth, 1993. Print.
Quinn,
Daniel. Ishmael. New
York: Bantam/Turner Book, 1995. Print.
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