Apologies

In the article, “Wave of Toxic Sludge Reaches the Danube River” from MSNBC demonstrates the egocentric way of life some people live. In Hungary, one of the byproducts of making metal is a red “toxic sludge”. It has a pH level of 13, making it highly acidic, and burns human skin. This company knew the effects of it but continued making it for decades. Inevitably, the damn they were keeping the 185 gallons of sludge in collapsed. Initially, this flooded a town making it a “dead town”; eventually it made its way to the Danube River, threatening aquatic life.

            Why did this company keep producing this waste when they fully knew what it could do to a human body? Some say it is because it was fast, efficient, and cheap; well at the time at least. Now they are facing compensation charges for the town of 800 that is now proclaimed a “dead town”. Maybe it was because they had to compete with countries like America and couldn’t waste time fretting about long term effects; only how they could get their product out the fastest. Does this happen in our own lives? People seem to take the easy way out, including me. Skipping steps and precautions sometimes works; but are you willing to risk what will happen if it doesn’t?

This company is responsible for at least 4 deaths, and many more serious injuries. If they had just harmed their profits, then that is one thing; they killed not only a few people, because the liveliness of many more is lost. Some of their whole lives were about farming, and now their land is radioactive. Think about how many times you have ruined something for yourself; then think of when you have ruined something for somebody else and knew about it before. You might apologize perfused and try to fix it; we need to learn to do what is best for everybody in the first place to avoid the apologies later.