How to write a reaction essay: example from "The Story of Stuff"

Here is a 60 minute reaction essay.

I begin working at 8:40 a.m. I decide I will write about the film we saw in class about stuff.

I start by going on-line to look up the film, and I find a website related to the project “The Story of Stuff” with Annie Leonard. http://www.storyofstuff.com/.

Now, I’ll look up other sites that might critically review what Annie Leonard said in that film. I google this: [“The Story of Stuff” Misleading]

The first hit is from an Ezine article by someone named Alexander Glaser, and his article is “Story of Stuff or Story of Lies” That article is a rant by an ill-informed ignoramus. He writes in the second paragraph of his screed:

According to the Story of Stuff, "It's the government's job to take care of us." However, the document that lays out the government's job, our constitution, makes no mention of "taking care of us."

He evidently hasn’t read the preamble about “promoting the general welfare” or “providing for the common defense” or gotten the concept of what it means to “take care of” the public. He’s probably not familiar with Locke, Hobbes, Jefferson, or Hamilton’s writing about the role of a government. He’s certainly not familiar with the 1937 Supreme Court decisions (or Justice Cardozo’s opinion in Helvering vs Davis).

Yes, I find some of his points similar to misgivings I had. Annie Leonard said that half of our government spending went to defense. That’s correct if by “government spending” you restrict yourself to a consideration of discretionary spending and exclude payments on the national debt and if by “military spending” you include pensions and medical care and benefits to veterans and their survivors. Of course, Leonard couldn’t explain this, because her point was to make a broad picture of the problem with the industrial production stream, and if she had gone into details this would have distracted from her main point and lengthened her presentation.

She said 4% of our original forests are left. She’s right, but that disguises the fact that most of the forests in the United States are second-growth or third-growth forests. In fact, there are probably over 750 million acres of forests in the United States, and only a tiny fraction of those are old-growth never-harvested original forests. The percentage of American land covered by forests has increased dramatically in the past century. She also says 40% of our waterways have become undrinkable. Well, I don’t know if it’s a fact that 40% of our waterways have water that his so dirty that it is cost-prohibitive to treat them for domestic drinking consumption (you can treat almost any water to make it drinkable, and the real question is how much it would cost to treat the water). I do know that since the passage of the clean water act (CWA, officially named the Federal Water Pollution Control Act) the quality of surface waters have generally improved significantly across the nation. Geez, when I was a little kid (in 1969) a river in Cleveland caught fire (R.E.M. had a good song about this, Cuyahoga). Perhaps the most misleading fact was the point that only 1% of stuff produced by the linear system of modern industrial production is still “in use” after a couple months. Well, it seems to me that this must be due to the fact that the modern industrial production line mainly produces food (which has been converted into garbage, human bodies, and sewage within a few months of production) and energy (which is mainly converted into heat, movement, carbon dioxide, ash, sulfur, spent Uranium fuel rods, or whatever).

Okay, the point here is that the program doesn’t go into details, and the way it presents facts doesn’t have the solid evidence or meet academic standards of precision. What is the essential message or messages?

• A finite system (the earth) can’t sustain indefinitely a production system that uses up raw materials so quickly.
• The system that exists is unfair because many costs are shifted to people who don’t benefit from the production process.
• We ought to reduce our consumption.
• People ought to have more control over how resources are used.
• We are artificially driven to consume energy and goods and food at levels that we do not require. Advertising and a culture of consumption supports this false inflation of resource-use in our society.
• This is a consequence of human decisions and choices, and we can make different choices.
• We ought to make decisions to change the system of production and consumption. We ought to produce and consume less.
• What we do produce ought to be produced in ways that waste fewer resources.
• The whole system of production and consumption ought to be changed so that people benefit by having more time for things that make them happy (free time, time with family, time with friends) and people have more control over the process.
• Production systems ought to force people to pay for the externalities (costs imposed on the commons) related to the manufacture of the food, energy, and goods they consume.
• The use of toxic materials in production ought to be curtailed.
• We need more regulation of the production system to protect us from toxic materials in production and wasteful production methods that will exhaust resources.
• We need to change society so there is more emphasis on human values and the quality of life and less emphasis on economic growth, high levels of consumption, and wealth accumulation beyond what we need for satisfying lives.
• Wealth and good standards of living ought to be shared so that we eliminate extremes of wealth and power inequality. It’s hardly fair to ruin environmental systems of people who have little wealth and power so that people who are already wealthy and comfortable can enjoy ever-increasing levels of unsustainable consumption.

It’s 9:22 now. I’ve read up on the documentary, read a bit about one person didn’t like it, and considered what I didn’t like about the documentary. I’ve also extracted the main points I took from the documentary. Now in the next 10-15 minutes I’ll take my notes and write something that could serve as a good reaction essay.


Here’s the first draft. I’ll write this in fifteen minutes, using some of the notes I’ve already generated.

In my class on social welfare I showed the video “The Story of Stuff” in the second session of class. It had been recommended, and I was aware it was a good tool for provoking discussion and thought. I like films like this that make people question they way they are living their lives, and I especially enjoy arguments that force us to face assumptions and lifestyles that we take for granted.

After showing the film I visited the film’s website, and also googled the film to read some of the discussion about the film. It’s easy to find websites where people discuss the film and offer opinions about the film’s message. What is the film’s message? Some people say the film is warning about overpopulation. Others say the main point is to get viewers to reduce their waste and consumption. I made a list of main points I took from the film. Here is my list:

1. A finite system (the earth) can’t sustain indefinitely a production system that uses up raw materials so quickly.
2. The system that exists is unfair because many costs are shifted to people who don’t benefit from the production process.
3. We ought to reduce our consumption.
4. People ought to have more control over how resources are used.
5. We are artificially driven to consume energy and goods and food at levels that we do not require. Advertising and a culture of consumption supports this false inflation of resource-use in our society.
6. This is a consequence of human decisions and choices, and we can make different choices.
7. We ought to make decisions to change the system of production and consumption. We ought to produce and consume less.
8. What we do produce ought to be produced in ways that waste fewer resources.
9. The whole system of production and consumption ought to be changed so that people benefit by having more time for things that make them happy (free time, time with family, time with friends) and people have more control over the process.
10. Production systems ought to force people to pay for the externalities (costs imposed on the commons) related to the manufacture of the food, energy, and goods they consume.
11. The use of toxic materials in production ought to be curtailed.
12. We need more regulation of the production system to protect us from toxic materials in production and wasteful production methods that will exhaust resources.
13. We need to change society so there is more emphasis on human values and the quality of life and less emphasis on economic growth, high levels of consumption, and wealth accumulation beyond what we need for satisfying lives.
14. Wealth and good standards of living ought to be shared so that we eliminate extremes of wealth and power inequality. It’s hardly fair to ruin environmental systems of people who have little wealth and power so that people who are already wealthy and comfortable can enjoy ever-increasing levels of unsustainable consumption.

I actually agree with just about every point on this list. That said, I can’t say I really enjoyed everything about the video. One thing I didn’t enjoy is that the film was made as a 20-minute piece of propaganda. It was made to be entertaining, fast-paced, and superficial. That’s the nature of any 20-minute take on a big complex subject like the materials production system. And so, the film was full of generalizations and characterizations lacking nuance. It probably comes with my training as a scholar, but I like arguments to have high standards of evidence and precise truth. On the other hand, the purpose of the video was to provoke thought, search, and questioning, and I think it works well at that level.

One thing that I want to defend is the basic premise made in the video that the public (our elected government) is supposed to take care of us. It seems some reactionaries and libertarians on some of the online discussions of it are trying to re-frame this and question this point. A government is supposed to protect and empower the citizens. Protection comes in several forms. In America, our government is supposed to provide for our common defense and promote the general welfare. Although when we talk about ‘common defense’ we tend to think of defending us against criminals or invaders or terrorists, but it seems to me we should also be defended against businesses that want to sell us unsafe products. We also should be defended against anyone, whether a private for-profit interest or a public entity, that would allow us to be exposed to poisons or risks or costs that we should not need to bear. And as for the “promoting the general welfare.” this has already been established (see the Supreme Court cases of 1937) as one of the roles of government.

There, it’s now 9:35. So, I have eight minutes to revise this. Here is the final draft:

In the second session of our class on social welfare we watched the video “The Story of Stuff”. The film had a reputation as being entertaining and informative, and I knew it could be a good tool for provoking discussion and thought. I like cultural artifacts such as this film when they make people question the way they are living, and I especially enjoy arguments that force us to face assumptions and lifestyles that we take for granted. Another work like this is Ishmael, by Daniel Quinn. Although I disagree with much in that book, and there were points in this film with which I take issue, I still enjoy the overall message and the feelings I get when I’m forced to critically examine my own life.

After showing the film I visited the film’s website, and also searched the Internet to read some of the discussion about the film. It’s easy to find websites where people discuss the film and offer opinions about the film’s message. What is the film’s message? Some people say the film is warning about overpopulation. Others say the main point is to get viewers to reduce their waste and consumption. I made a list of 14 main points I took from the film. Here is my list:

1. A finite system (the earth) can’t sustain indefinitely a production system that uses up raw materials so quickly.
2. The system that exists is unfair because many costs are shifted to people who don’t benefit from the production and consumption process.
3. We ought to reduce our consumption.
4. People ought to have more control over how resources are used. The government and the private corporations aren’t sufficiently looking out for our interests.
5. We are artificially driven to consume energy and goods and food at levels that we do not require. Advertising and a culture of consumption supports this false inflation of resource use.
6. This over-consumption and production system is a consequence of human decisions and choices, and we can make different choices.
7. We ought to make decisions to change the system of production and consumption. We ought to produce and consume less.
8. What we do produce ought to be produced in ways that waste fewer resources.
9. The whole system of production and consumption ought to be changed so that people benefit by having more time for things that make them happy (free time, time with family, time with friends), and people should have more control over the process.
10. Production systems ought to force people to pay for the externalities (costs imposed on the commons) related to the manufacture of the food, energy, and goods they consume.
11. The use of toxic materials in production ought to be curtailed.
12. We need more regulation of the production system to protect us from toxic materials in production and wasteful production methods that will exhaust resources.
13. We need to change society so there is more emphasis on human values and the quality of life and less emphasis on economic growth, high levels of consumption, and wealth accumulation beyond what we need for satisfying lives.
14. Wealth and good standards of living ought to be shared so that we eliminate extremes of wealth and power inequality. It’s hardly fair to ruin environmental systems of people who have little wealth and power so that people who are already wealthy and comfortable can enjoy ever-increasing levels of unsustainable consumption.

I actually agree with every point on this list. That said, I still want to point out some limitations of the video. One thing I didn’t enjoy is that the film was made as a 20-minute piece of propaganda. It was made to be entertaining, fast-paced, and superficial. That’s the nature of any 20-minute take on a big complex subject like the the modern materials production system. And so, the film was full of generalizations and characterizations lacking nuance. It probably comes with my training as a scholar, but I like arguments to have high standards of evidence and precise truth. On the other hand, the purpose of the video was to provoke thought, search, and questioning, and I think it works well at that level.

One thing that I want to defend is the basic premise made in the video that the public (our elected government) is supposed to take care of us. It seems some reactionaries and Libertarians on some of the online discussions of it are trying to re-frame this and question this point. I think it’s clear that a government is supposed to protect and empower the citizens. Protection comes in several forms. In America, our government is supposed to provide for our common defense and promote the general welfare (read the preamble to our Constitution). When we talk about ‘common defense’ we tend to think of defending us against criminals or invaders or terrorists, yet we should also be defended against businesses that want to sell unsafe products. We also should be defended against anyone, whether a private for-profit interest or a public entity, that would allow us to be exposed to poisons or risks or costs that we should not bear. And as for the “promoting the general welfare.” this has already been established (see the Supreme Court cases of 1937) as one of the roles of government.

There, it’s 9:43, and I think I’m done with this. It took exactly one hour to produce the essay above.