Book Review: A Terrible Thing to Waste

Image: The cover of the book is bright yellow with black and grey letters. The right side of the book has a silhouette of a person's profile in black with a cutout of a smokestack and biohazard symbol excreting smoke into the shape of a gray brain. The top half of the cover is "a terrible thing to waste" in capitalized stenciled letters, below that under 4 dashes is "environmental racism and its assault on the american mind." Below that is the author's name- Harriet E. Washington as well as "author of medical apartheid."

Harriet Washington is known by many as the author of the harrowing and important "Medical Apartheid" in which she details a long history of medical and scientific abuse of Black individuals and communities. I consider this mandatory reading for any US American. "A Terrible Thing to Waste: Environmental Racism and its Assault on the American Mind," brings a whole new dimension of horror of what it is like to be Black, Brown, and/or poor in the USA. She tackles everything from exposure to dangerous pollutants to lack of access to healthy options and astutely describes how they all fit together in the realm of environmental racism.

The book starts off fairly quickly in discussing IQ disparities among poor people and/or people of color and this remains a theme throughout the book. I did find this part to contradict itself a bit, though. Washington makes excellent arguments about and gives a detailed history of how flawed IQ testing is. Yet, she still uses IQ points as a measure of environmental racism. Her book actually stands well on it's own without inclusion of this metric, or at least without centering it as much as she did. She also repeatedly uses the r-word and seems to lack the necessary analysis of disability justice that would be appropriate for this work. I have a review copy, so this could be something that has been or will change in the future printing. But, someone should have picked up on or sought out the fact that "Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities," is the correct way to discuss what she was speaking about. There was also a slight air of "disabled people are a drain on their families and society" which contributes to the ableist notion that people with intellectual disability do not offer anything to society or have a purpose. I am not saying people should seek out or want their children to be born with I&DD, nor should they lack upset for the higher rate of preventable illness and/or disability in their communities. I just think Washington could have been a bit more careful with her words here and that she or an editor should have picked up on the reality that using r*****ed- a term known as a common insult that many I&DD and Deaf people connect with extreme trauma- was not appropriate. Her description of the flaws, pseudoscience, and racial bias involved with IQ testing was excellent and it becomes clouded by the flaws in delivery.

Washington's book is organized in such a way that someone can skip around if they need to. This does mean that sometimes there is repetition, but it also is valuable for people unfamiliar with the topic to be reminded or for people only interested in reading one section out of order. Topics covered in different sections include lead and other pollutant poisoning, the extreme differences between fetal, childhood, and adult reactions to exposure, food deserts with copious access to only convenience and liquor stores' attachment to environmental racism, lack of access to appropriate medical care, and what is possibly the most horrifying as far as the squick factor goes- "Bugs in the System."

The details of lead poisoning from the unethical and abusive lead exposure experiments on Black and/or poor children and families in Baltimore to the water crisis in Flint are written in an incredibly engaging way. Toxic exposure is not simply that the exposure exists, but also all of the corruption and predatory practices of governments, scientists, and corporations that not only allow things to continue, but often actively support the atrocities. Early lead exposure is also linked to future criminal behavior- behaviors that, in white supremacist society, are always blamed on a Black person's character rather than their circumstances.

The elements of misogyny/misogynoir and it's link to environmental racism are clear in the sections discussing fetal exposure. Poor women, mostly of color, have been penalized via everything from fines to forced sterilization and/or imprisonment by the criminal injustice system for "feticide" or "abuse" due to exposures during pregnancy- including ones that occurred before they knew they were pregnant. At times, it is used by anti-choice lobbies to further their fight against reproductive autonomy for women and others who can get pregnant. At others, it is a way for governments or corporations to cover their tracks.

If I wasn't already vegan, the "Bugs in the System" chapter might have turned me. The chapter details countless bacterial, viral, and parasitic infections that are dangerous for everyone, but end up especially concentrated in Black, poor, and/or other marginalized populations. The reason I mention veganism is that I learned how many parasites are in animal flesh and how easily one can contract them. I was already pretty terrified of parasites. Now, I'm ever more aware and disgusted.

Finally, Washington offers a large section with a wide variety of solutions and actions that people can take to fight against environmental racism's effects on their lives. The advice includes healthcare, food consumption, housing access, familial care, legal options, and organizing/activist advice. There are very good suggestions in this section. I'm white but have poverty line income, so I am a person who shops at Dollar Tree tree and cheap stores. I threw out a couple of dishes and won't be buying some foods again, after reading her section on how many dollar stores use imported food and pottery that may contain lead. We in Pittsburgh are already dealing with our own lead water crisis, I don't need even more in my system. 

I also really appreciate how carefully Washington approached this section. She made sure not to give in to pseudoscience hype like that of anti-vaxxers, anti-any-fluoride, anti-all preservative movements. Yet, she still leaves room for new research and for people to make the decisions about these things that work for them. She acknowledges and validates the reasons why Black people especially may distrust the medical system. She is also firm that vaccines do not cause autism and that mercury that is linked to disease is no longer in most vaccines. She is clear that fluoride's benefit for dental health- especially for those without dental care access- may outweigh any costs or risks involved. She offers a long list of preservatives generally recognized as safe (GRAS) and stresses that these preservatives are healthier than it would be to contract diseases they prevent, but acknowledges that some preservatives are unhealthy and thus avoiding processed foods is always a good idea. Her tips for organizing and activism offer a brief catalogue of the lack of Black and other people of color representation in environmental organizations, despite them being the biggest human targets of many of the problems tackled. This has changed somewhat, but not enough.

Overall, A Terrible Thing to Waste is a well written, well researched, and very necessary look at environmental racism. Despite its flaws in disability analysis and representation, it still offers an great amount of important information in a relatively small package (300 pages for all of this info is not very much.) The book hits shelves in July 2019 and is definitely worth picking up. 

This review is also posted on my goodreads 

Book Review: A Song for a New Day

ImageL The cover of the book is mottled light blue fading into a yellowish green. It has the feel of a concert flyer with it's monochromatic image of a woman holding a guitar and belting out a song. The top half of her faceis covered by the title that fills the first half of the book- A Song for a New Day- in capital letters. Along the side of the singer is the author's name- Sarah Pinsker- in a font that resembles words scratched into the side of a bathroom stall.

A Song for a New Day by Sarah Pinsker is a near future dystopian cyberpunk speculative fiction novel (is that a redundant group of labels?) that centers women musicians and technology experts existing within an unjust society. This review will contain some information about the plot and characters, but I will attempt to keep it relatively spoiler free.

The story is told from the perspectives of two queer women: Luce, who is a musician and composer of what seems to be some amalgamation of rock music genres, and Rosemary, who is a computer expert stuck working for mega-corporations- Superwally and SHL- in order to survive. Live music gatherings, among other things, are illegal and Luce is doing everything in her power to keep the real-life music interaction alive. Rosemary becomes entangled in all of this when she begins working for a music corporation- StageHolo Live (SHL)- which organizes virtual concerts which can be experienced via "hoodies"- a sort of virtual reality technology that is worn by the user, allowing them to become integrated into the simulation.

I enjoyed this book and found it captured my attention and interest well. I do have to say that one thing that was difficult to follow while reading was the timeline. It seems to be set in the future. But, then there are mentions of the 30-something characters having seen Neil Young and other older artists in concert. I kept thinking, wait, are we in an alternative reality to today? Or is this a very very near future in which someone my age could have witnessed these bands and also exist in this repressive anti-music regime? It was also not clear to me exactly why music gatherings were illegal. There are some dangerous occurrences such as bomb threats and disease outbreaks at the start of the novel that I assumed would be further explained later, but the story just sort of passes over them on to the story surrounding seeking out live music in a world where it is illegal. When I started the book, knowing this premise from the blurb, I assumed that the illegality of live music was some sort of repression of free expression by an authoritarian government. However, it is explained that music itself is not illegal, only gathering for live music (as well as protests.) So, I now wonder if it is promoted to "protect" from bomb threats or plague outbreaks. This is never really made clear to me aside from the fact that the illegality is real and oppressive.

This is an acceptable way to create a dystopian environment, don't get me wrong. I don't necessarily need everything to be spelled out for me. But, when it is not, I prefer the world building to be a little more immersive than it was in this book. That said, I still felt drawn into the story. The environments that were created around live shows and everything surrounding them as well as Rosemary's lived experiences were very immersive.

Something I really enjoyed about this book was the centering of queer women as main characters. Often a story that dares to put a queer women near the center will be too afraid to center more than one woman and will supplement with less marginalized characters. This author was brave enough to build the story around the lives of two queer women. It is not entirely clear if queerness itself is also illegal along with live music, but the weaving of queer and occasional trans characters into a story with oppressive governments and corrupt megacorportations obviously says something about both backgrounds. There was a bit of the assumption of universal whiteness- characters of color were introduced by their race while other characters are assumed to be white by default. So, the handling of race could have been better. But, overall, I enjoyed the character make up in this book a lot.

In order to make this review as spoiler-free as possible, I won't say too many specifics about the plot. I will say there are some interesting twists and turns fitting in nicely with the classic cyberpunk genre (which I love.) The characters are well written, imperfect, relatable, and believable. The book is interesting with a premise I have not read about before. There are so many books in the world that I cannot say for sure whether the whole music take on the dystopia has been done before. But, it was original as far as my own experience goes.

A Song for a New Day comes out in September of 2019 and is definitely worth a read. It will likely appeal to many audiences, but it is extra special for those of us who are LGBTQ to see ourselves represented in a story in such immersive ways. The story is not about being LGBTQ as much as the characters just happen to be. Thus, it is appropriate for anyone into dystopian stories, stories surrounding musicians, and/or cyberpunk fans.