A Terrible Thing to Waste
Environmental Racism and Its Assault on the American Mind
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Narrated by:
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Ron Butler
About this listen
A "powerful and indispensable book" (Gerald Markowitz) on the devastating consequences of environmental racism - and what we can do to remedy its toxic effects on marginalized communities.
Did you know...
- Middle-class African American households with incomes between $50,000 and $60,000 live in neighborhoods that are more polluted than those of very poor white households with incomes below $10,000.
- When swallowed, a lead-paint chip no larger than a fingernail can send a toddler into a coma - one-tenth of that amount will lower his IQ.
- Nearly two of every five African American homes in Baltimore are plagued by lead-based paint. Almost all of the 37,500 Baltimore children who suffered lead poisoning between 2003 and 2015 were African American.
From injuries caused by lead poisoning to the devastating effects of atmospheric pollution, infectious disease, and industrial waste, Americans of color are harmed by environmental hazards in staggeringly disproportionate numbers. This systemic onslaught of toxic exposure and institutional negligence causes irreparable physical harm to millions of people across the country-cutting lives tragically short and needlessly burdening our health care system. But these deadly environments create another insidious and often overlooked consequence: robbing communities of color, and America as a whole, of intellectual power.
The 1994 publication of The Bell Curve and its controversial thesis catapulted the topic of genetic racial differences in IQ to the forefront of a renewed and heated debate. Now, in A Terrible Thing to Waste, award-winning science writer Harriet A. Washington adds her incisive analysis to the fray, arguing that IQ is a biased and flawed metric, but that it is useful for tracking cognitive damage. She takes apart the spurious notion of intelligence as an inherited trait, using copious data that instead point to a different cause of the reported African American-white IQ gap: environmental racism - a confluence of racism and other institutional factors that relegate marginalized communities to living and working near sites of toxic waste, pollution, and insufficient sanitation services. She investigates heavy metals, neurotoxins, deficient prenatal care, bad nutrition, and even pathogens as chief agents influencing intelligence to explain why communities of color are disproportionately affected -- and what can be done to remedy this devastating problem.
Featuring extensive scientific research and Washington's sharp, lively reporting, A Terrible Thing to Waste is sure to outrage, transform the conversation, and inspire debate.
©2019 Harriet A. Washington (P)2019 Hachette AudioListeners also enjoyed...
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Critic reviews
"A Terrible Thing to Waste is a powerful and indispensable book for anyone who cares about a just and healthy future for all Americans. Harriet Washington asks the critical questions that get at the heart of racism and inequality in health, income, social welfare and power in 21st century America." (Gerald Markowitz, author of Lead Wars and distinguished professor, John Jay College, CUNY)
"In her groundbreaking new book, A Terrible Thing to Waste, award-winning science writer and bioethicist Harriet Washington explores how environmental racism damages young minds, particularly the minds of impoverished African American children who are exposed inordinately to toxins and pathogens in marginalized communities. She writes lucidly of how pollutants such as heavy metals and neurotoxins injure developing brains and recounts vividly case after case of the devastating cost to human brains and bodies. As she demolishes racist notions of inherited intelligence, she describes the medical consequences of horrific environmental catastrophes that have largely been forgotten or overlooked. Revelatory and compelling, Harriet Washington's A Terrible Thing to Waste is the Silent Spring for the 21st century." (Robin Lindley, JD, Features Editor, History News Network)
"It's amazing how far you can get if you just study the data. And have a keen analytical mind. And are a gifted reporter. With a sense of social justice. By which I mean, if you are Harriet Washington. She methodically indicts environmental racism and its catastrophic effects, particularly on the cognitive abilities of America's children, a reminder that what we're told is immutable - our social conditions, our 'intelligence' - is nothing of the kind. The news she brings is grim, but she leaves the reader feeling not paralyzed by despair but determined to act." (Randy Cohen, host of Person Place Thing and original author of New York Times Magazine's The Ethicist column)
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By: Ty M. Bollinger
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Medical Apartheid
- The Dark History of Medical Experimentation on Black Americans from Colonial Times to the Present
- By: Harriet A. Washington
- Narrated by: Ron Butler
- Length: 19 hrs and 2 mins
- Unabridged
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Medical Apartheid is the first and only comprehensive history of medical experimentation on African Americans. Starting with the earliest encounters between black Americans and Western medical researchers and the racist pseudoscience that resulted, it details the ways both slaves and freedmen were used in hospitals for experiments conducted without their knowledge - a tradition that continues today within some black populations.
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Sobering... but necessary.
- By Dr. Pepper on 10-27-16
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The Language of Life
- DNA and the Revolution in Personalized Medicine
- By: Francis S. Collins
- Narrated by: Greg Itzin
- Length: 10 hrs and 45 mins
- Unabridged
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A scientific and medical revolution has crept up on us, based on study after study, from hundreds of laboratories around the world. It is no longer just a theoretical shift: every one of us will be touched by it, and many of us already have been. The meaning of disease, our understanding of the human body, and crucial decisions about what we all need to know and what choices we make about our health are at stake. Welcome to the new world of personalized medicine.
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The future of medicine
- By Ronald E on 04-12-10
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Missing Microbes
- How the Overuse of Antibiotics Is Fueling Our Modern Plagues
- By: Martin J. Blaser
- Narrated by: Patrick Lawlor
- Length: 8 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
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In Missing Microbes, Dr. Martin J. Blaser invites us into the wilds of the human microbiome, where for hundreds of thousands of years bacterial and human cells have existed in a peaceful symbiosis that is responsible for the health and equilibrium of our body. Now this invisible eden is being irrevocably damaged by some of our most revered medical advances-antibiotics-threatening the extinction of our irreplaceable microbes with terrible health consequences.
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Very enlightening and information well supported
- By James on 05-03-15
By: Martin J. Blaser
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EMF*D
- 5G, Wi-Fi & Cell Phones: Hidden Harms and How to Protect Yourself
- By: Dr. Joseph Mercola
- Narrated by: Christopher Ragland
- Length: 8 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
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The hazards of electronic pollution may once have been the stuff of science fiction, but now we know they're all too real. And with the advent of 5G ultra-wideband technology, the danger is greater than ever. Dr. Joseph Mercola, one of the world's foremost authorities on alternative health, has mined the scientific literature to offer a radical new understanding of how electromagnetic fields impact your body and mind.
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Top 10 best books ever
- By Priscilla Ferguson on 04-02-20
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The Secret History of the War on Cancer
- By: Devra Davis Ph.D.
- Narrated by: Pam Ward
- Length: 19 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
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The War on Cancer was run by leaders of industries that made cancer-causing products and sometimes also profited from drugs and technologies for finding and treating the disease. Filled with compelling personalities and never-before-revealed information, The Secret History of the War on Cancer shows how we began fighting the wrong war, with the wrong weapons, against the wrong enemies, a legacy that persists to this day.
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Silly Book
- By Adam Smith on 12-24-14
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10% Human
- How Your Body's Microbes Hold the Key to Health and Happiness
- By: Alanna Collen
- Narrated by: Cat Gould
- Length: 12 hrs and 45 mins
- Unabridged
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You are just 10% human. For every one of the cells that make up the vessel that you call your body, there are nine impostor cells hitching a ride. You are not just flesh and blood, muscle and bone, brain and skin, but also bacteria and fungi. Over your lifetime, you will carry the equivalent weight of five African elephants in microbes. You are not an individual but a colony. Until recently, we had thought our microbes hardly mattered, but science is revealing a different story, one in which microbes run our bodies and becoming a healthy human is impossible without them.
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Must read for anyone that wants to be healthy
- By T. Kalinowski on 06-05-21
By: Alanna Collen
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Between Hope and Fear
- A History of Vaccines and Human Immunity
- By: Michael Kinch
- Narrated by: Mel Foster
- Length: 15 hrs and 59 mins
- Unabridged
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Between Hope and Fear tells the remarkable story of vaccine-preventable infectious diseases and their social and political implications. While detailing the history of vaccine invention, Michael Kinch reveals the ominous reality that our victories against vaccine-preventable diseases are not permanent - and could easily be undone. Between Hope and Fear relates the remarkable intersection of science, technology, and disease that has helped eradicate many of the deadliest plagues known to man.
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Enjoyed
- By Minsi Zhang on 05-03-20
By: Michael Kinch
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Panic Attack
- Playing Politics with Science in the Fight Against COVID-19
- By: Nicole Saphier
- Narrated by: Nicole Saphier
- Length: 10 hrs and 1 min
- Unabridged
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Medical doctor and national bestselling author of Make America Healthy Again Nicole Saphier reveals how politicization of the COVID-19 pandemic has baffled the public by creating distrust, fueling conspiracy theories, and making it harder for Americans to understand the necessary path forward. The pandemic has resulted in a failure of government, much of which is unavoidable in a unique disaster scenario. However, the rampant politicization of science has hopelessly muddied the water and knee-jerk anti-Trumpism made it all worse.
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Very disappointed
- By K. Green on 07-29-21
By: Nicole Saphier
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Radiation
- What It Is, What You Need to Know
- By: Robert Peter Gale, Eric Lax
- Narrated by: Robert Fass
- Length: 7 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
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The essential guide to radiation: the good, the bad, and the utterly fascinating, explained with unprecedented clarity. Earth, born in a nuclear explosion, is a radioactive planet; without radiation, life would not exist. And while radiation can be dangerous, it is also deeply misunderstood and often mistakenly feared. Now Robert Peter Gale, M.D. - the doctor to whom concerned governments turned in the wake of the Chernobyl and Fukushima - in collaboration with medical writer Eric Lax draws on an exceptional depth of knowledge to correct myths and establish facts.
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A great and accessible introduction to the field o
- By Neuron on 04-12-13
By: Robert Peter Gale, and others
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The Future of Nutrition
- An Insider’s Look at the Science, Why We Keep Getting It Wrong, and How to Start Getting It Right
- By: T. Colin Campbell PhD
- Narrated by: Dan Woren
- Length: 11 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
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Why, despite the many advances in science and technology over the past few decades, does our health only seem to be getting worse? Why, despite so much time and energy spent studying the foods we eat, are we more confused than ever about nutrition - what good nutrition looks like, and what it can do for our health? The Future of Nutrition offers a fascinating deep-dive behind the curtain of the field of nutrition - with implications both for our health and for the practice of science itself.
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His problem is the problem he has with others
- By abatista on 02-10-21
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An Epidemic of Absence
- A New Way of Understanding Allergies and Autoimmune Diseases
- By: Moises Velasquez-Manoff
- Narrated by: Chris Sorensen
- Length: 17 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
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An Epidemic of Absence asks what will happen in developing countries, which, as they become more affluent, have already seen an uptick in allergic disease: Will India end up more allergic than Europe? Velasquez-Manoff also details a controversial underground movement that has coalesced around the treatment of immune-mediated disorders with parasites. Against much of his better judgment, he joins these do-it-yourselfers and reports his surprising results.
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The point of view from a Veterinarian immunologist
- By rtgymnast on 11-03-17
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Chronic
- The Hidden Cause of the Autoimmune Pandemic and How to Get Healthy Again
- By: Steven Phillips MD, Dana Parish, Kristin Loberg
- Narrated by: Teri Schnaubelt, Thomas Allen
- Length: 10 hrs and 42 mins
- Unabridged
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In this timely book, Steven Phillips, MD, and his former patient, Sony singer-songwriter Dana Parish, reveal striking evidence that a broad range of common infections, from COVID-19 to Lyme and many others, cause a variety of autoimmune, psychiatric, and chronic conditions. Chronic explores the science behind what makes them difficult to diagnose and treat, debunks widely held beliefs by doctors and patients alike, and provides solutions that empower sufferers to reclaim their lives.
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A must read book
- By Amazon Customer on 03-01-21
By: Steven Phillips MD, and others
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Trick or Treatment
- The Undeniable Facts about Alternative Medicine
- By: Edzard Ernst, Simon Singh
- Narrated by: Dennis Kleinman
- Length: 12 hrs and 33 mins
- Unabridged
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Whether you are an ardent believer in alternative medicine, a skeptic, or are simply baffled by the range of services and opinions, this guide lays to rest doubts and contradictions with authority, integrity, and clarity. In this groundbreaking analysis, over 30 of the most popular treatments - acupuncture, homeopathy, aromatherapy, reflexology, chiropractic, and herbal medicines - are examined for their benefits and potential dangers. Questions answered include: What works and what doesn't? What are the secrets, and what are the lies?
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Well researched
- By Erik J. Rasmussen on 09-09-20
By: Edzard Ernst, and others
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In Infectious Madness, Washington presents the new germ theory, which posits not only that many instances of Alzheimer's, OCD, and schizophrenia are caused by viruses, prions, and bacteria but also that with antibiotics, vaccinations, and other strategies, these cases can be easily prevented or treated.
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NOT Medical Apartheid
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Medical Apartheid
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Sobering... but necessary.
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Carte Blanche
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Carte Blanche is the alarming tale of how the right of Americans to say "no" to risky medical research is eroding at a time when we are racing to produce a vaccine and treatments for COVID-19. This medical right that we have long taken for granted was first sacrificed on the altar of military expediency in 1990 when the Department of Defense asked for and received from the FDA a waiver that permitted it to force an experimental anthrax vaccine on the ranks of ground troops headed for the Persian Gulf.
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Another pristine scholarly publication!
- By Daliah E., MFT on 11-24-24
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Toxic Communities
- Environmental Racism, Industrial Pollution, and Residential Mobility
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From St. Louis to New Orleans, from Baltimore to Oklahoma City, there are poor and minority neighborhoods so beset by pollution that just living in them can be hazardous to your health. Due to entrenched segregation, zoning ordinances that privilege wealthier communities, or because businesses have found the "paths of least resistance", there are many hazardous waste and toxic facilities in these communities, leading residents to experience health and wellness problems on top of the race and class discrimination most already experience.
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Excellent Exposure of Prejudice When It Comes To Environmental Factors
- By lighten79 on 07-11-24
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Clean and White
- A History of Environmental Racism in the United States
- By: Carl A. Zimring
- Narrated by: Colleen Patrick
- Length: 9 hrs and 41 mins
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When Joe Biden attempted to compliment Barack Obama by calling him "clean and articulate", he unwittingly tapped into one of the most destructive racial stereotypes in American history. This book tells the history of the corrosive idea that whites are clean and those who are not white are dirty.
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I will not think about clean the same way
- By Scott on 02-01-23
By: Carl A. Zimring
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As Long as Grass Grows
- The Indigenous Fight for Environmental Justice, from Colonization to Standing Rock
- By: Dina Gilio-Whitaker
- Narrated by: Kyla Garcia
- Length: 7 hrs and 8 mins
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The story of Native peoples’ resistance to environmental injustice and land incursions and a call for environmentalists to learn from the indigenous community’s rich history of activism.
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Unbalanced Information
- By J. Scott on 08-30-22
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Infectious Madness
- The Surprising Science of How We "Catch" Mental Illness
- By: Harriet A. Washington
- Narrated by: Robert Petkoff
- Length: 9 hrs and 14 mins
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In Infectious Madness, Washington presents the new germ theory, which posits not only that many instances of Alzheimer's, OCD, and schizophrenia are caused by viruses, prions, and bacteria but also that with antibiotics, vaccinations, and other strategies, these cases can be easily prevented or treated.
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NOT Medical Apartheid
- By RLM on 08-06-18
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Medical Apartheid
- The Dark History of Medical Experimentation on Black Americans from Colonial Times to the Present
- By: Harriet A. Washington
- Narrated by: Ron Butler
- Length: 19 hrs and 2 mins
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Medical Apartheid is the first and only comprehensive history of medical experimentation on African Americans. Starting with the earliest encounters between black Americans and Western medical researchers and the racist pseudoscience that resulted, it details the ways both slaves and freedmen were used in hospitals for experiments conducted without their knowledge - a tradition that continues today within some black populations.
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-
Sobering... but necessary.
- By Dr. Pepper on 10-27-16
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Carte Blanche
- The Erosion of Medical Consent (Columbia Global Reports)
- By: Harriet Washington
- Narrated by: William DeMeritt
- Length: 4 hrs and 26 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
-
Story
Carte Blanche is the alarming tale of how the right of Americans to say "no" to risky medical research is eroding at a time when we are racing to produce a vaccine and treatments for COVID-19. This medical right that we have long taken for granted was first sacrificed on the altar of military expediency in 1990 when the Department of Defense asked for and received from the FDA a waiver that permitted it to force an experimental anthrax vaccine on the ranks of ground troops headed for the Persian Gulf.
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Another pristine scholarly publication!
- By Daliah E., MFT on 11-24-24
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Toxic Communities
- Environmental Racism, Industrial Pollution, and Residential Mobility
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From St. Louis to New Orleans, from Baltimore to Oklahoma City, there are poor and minority neighborhoods so beset by pollution that just living in them can be hazardous to your health. Due to entrenched segregation, zoning ordinances that privilege wealthier communities, or because businesses have found the "paths of least resistance", there are many hazardous waste and toxic facilities in these communities, leading residents to experience health and wellness problems on top of the race and class discrimination most already experience.
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Excellent Exposure of Prejudice When It Comes To Environmental Factors
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Clean and White
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When Joe Biden attempted to compliment Barack Obama by calling him "clean and articulate", he unwittingly tapped into one of the most destructive racial stereotypes in American history. This book tells the history of the corrosive idea that whites are clean and those who are not white are dirty.
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I will not think about clean the same way
- By Scott on 02-01-23
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As Long as Grass Grows
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The story of Native peoples’ resistance to environmental injustice and land incursions and a call for environmentalists to learn from the indigenous community’s rich history of activism.
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Unbalanced Information
- By J. Scott on 08-30-22
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This is a no-holds-barred response to the liberal and conservative retreat from an assertive, activist, and socially transformative civil rights agenda of recent years - using a Black feminist lens and the issue of the impact of recent legislation, social policy, and welfare "reform" on Black women's - especially poor Black women's - control over their bodies' autonomy and their freedom to bear and raise children with respect and dignity in a society whose white mainstream is determined to demonize, even criminalize their lives.
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Terribly sad but very informative. Highly recommend.
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How Europe Underdeveloped Africa
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Guyanese intellectual Walter Rodney emerged as one of the leading thinkers and activists of the anticolonial revolution. In 1980, shortly after founding of the Working People's Alliance in Guyana, the 38-year-old Rodney would be assassinated. In his magnum opus, Rodney incisively argues that grasping "the great divergence" between the West and the rest can only be explained as the exploitation of the latter by the former. This meticulously researched analysis of the repercussions of European colonialism in Africa remains an indispensable study for grasping global inequality today.
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A Superb must read for everyone
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From the United States and Britain to continental Europe and beyond, liberal democracy is under siege, while authoritarianism is on the rise. In Twilight of Democracy, Anne Applebaum, an award-winning historian of Soviet atrocities who was one of the first American journalists to raise an alarm about antidemocratic trends in the West, explains the lure of nationalism and autocracy. In this captivating essay, she contends that political systems with radically simple beliefs are inherently appealing, especially when they benefit the loyal to the exclusion of everyone else.
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Modern Dictators & President who wants to be them
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Why Are All the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria?
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The classic, New York Times best-selling book on the psychology of racism that shows us how to talk about race in America. Walk into any racially mixed high school and you will see Black, White, and Latino youth clustered in their own groups. Is this self-segregation a problem to address or a coping strategy? How can we get past our reluctance to discuss racial issues? This fully revised edition is essential listening for anyone seeking to understand dynamics of race and racial inequality in America.
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Key Takeaway: Everything is White People's Fault
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The New Jim Crow
- Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness, 10th Anniversary Edition
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- Unabridged
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Seldom does a book have the impact of Michelle Alexander’s The New Jim Crow. Since it was first published in 2010, it has been cited in judicial decisions and has been adopted in campus-wide and community-wide reads; it helped inspire the creation of the Marshall Project and the new $100 million Art for Justice Fund; it has been the winner of numerous prizes, including the prestigious NAACP Image Award; and it has spent nearly 250 weeks on the New York Times best seller list.
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Shocking, Important and Brilliant
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The 1619 Project
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- Unabridged
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The New York Times Magazine’s award-winning “1619 Project” issue reframed our understanding of American history by placing slavery and its continuing legacy at the center of our national narrative. This new book substantially expands on that work, weaving together 18 essays that explore the legacy of slavery in present-day America with 36 poems and works of fiction that illuminate key moments of oppression, struggle, and resistance.
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Comprehensive and Cutting
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What listeners say about A Terrible Thing to Waste
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Deon Temne
- 02-03-20
Extremely Informational
Should be mandatory reading for any parent, most importantly parents of African American children. We must understand how the system of racism affects all..well racism and financial greed.
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3 people found this helpful
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- L
- 12-18-20
Great writing, pleasant voice, very informative
Harriet A. Washington is an outstanding medical writer - her view on this topic was very insightful
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- Cuvvy
- 02-12-23
thorough and enlightening research
The research and the stories bring so much information to the issues of environmental justice in America today.
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- Steve H
- 03-02-21
Read this now
Everyone should read this. What we don’t know can literally kill us. Especially people in minority communities.
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1 person found this helpful
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- Trell
- 06-29-21
Washington does it again!
This book, no matter what race its readers are, touches on the treatment of minorities. African Americans continue to be targeted in unimaginable ways. The warfare will never end. Awareness is key!
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- Amazon Customer
- 02-19-22
Highly informative
As always, excellently researched with data backed facts that provide detail into the scope of the brains infinite struggles battling infection and chemicals. Brilliant.
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- Nibs
- 02-07-22
Informative and Well-Written
A thorough essay on the poisoning of principally minority communities by for-profit companies and the government. Fact-based and well-researched. I’m taking off points because I really think this book should have been narrated by a black woman, if not by the author herself.
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- Sam P
- 02-15-23
Book misuses problematic IQ measure
You can't have IQ as your backbone without talking about racial implications. The author admits that IQ is an imperfect measure of intelligence, especially across different countries. However, this book still relies on IQ to measure differences in intelligence across communities within the United States. Numerous studies have shown that it is inaccurate for all but rich, white, Western communities. I believe that the environmental racism outlined in this book is real, important, and damaging. However, using a racist measure correlated with the effects of environmental racism the author aims to quantify is necessarily problematic. If IQ is mismeasuring the intelligence of marginalized populations, we can't safely use it to measure differences in intelligence due to environmental racism.
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- Laura
- 02-21-21
ABLEIST
THIS BOOK IS ABLEIST AND PERPETUATES SYSTEMIC ABLEISM. VERY BIGOTED AND HARMFUL. STIGMATIZES THE EXISTENCE OF AUTISTIC PEOPLE.
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- Dreamer
- 12-03-20
Wish this was read by a black WOMAN
I found this really jarring to listen to. Ron Butler is an excellent narrator, but this is written by a black WOMAN. This isn't a piece of fiction where the narrator needs to assume multiple voices of multiple genders to tell a story.
I was only able to make it through the first hour or so - hearing a male voice speaking a woman's story was too jarring. I am now reading the paper copy and attempting to return the audiobook.
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5 people found this helpful