The Dangers Of Pesticides In Rachel Carson's Silent Spring

In December 1960 the world was largely unaware that in slightly less than two years it would be engaged in a fervent debate about the merits and risks of pesticides. This debate would be spurred by a woman who was just now becoming aware of a rapidly metastasizing cancer that would tragically cause her death four years later. Rachel Carson’s battle with cancer was just one of the many that she was forced to fight; which included a fight for legitimacy as a woman scientist without a Ph.D. and as a courageous individual who had the strength to push back against what was accepted as truth. The controversy surrounding her was and is largely because of the assertions she made in her most widely read book, Silent Spring. It proposed the -then radical- idea that pesticides, especially the commonly used DDT, had profound effects on our environment and should be used with reserve. It cautions that many pesticide’s abilities to reduce populations are not limited to insects and that a more accurate name for pesticides would be biocides. The book outlines the effects of these man-made pesticides on …show more content…
It can be compared to books like Uncle Tom’s Cabin and The Jungle which both had enormous impacts on public opinion and led to eventual changes in laws. The most obvious legacy of Silent Spring is the banning of DDT eight years after its publication, but it can also be tied to environmental victories like the creation of the Environmental Protection Agency and the Clean Air and Water Act. These are hard to confirm, but there is little question that Silent Spring brought conservation and chemicals to the mainstay of public discourse. While hardly as important on a large scale (or verifiable), my family associates Silent Spring with the return of Peregrine Falcons to Beacon Rock State Park in Washington State, a small thing that makes the world a little less