After reading silent spring sections for tuesdays class and I was curious about what peoples response was to her books. After doing a little research I found out that Rachel Carson was highly criticize. “The weekly Human Events gave Silent Spring an “honorable mention” in its list of the “Ten Most Harmful Books of the 19th and 20th Centuries.” along with just this one quote I found many more things that she ended being criticized even though they did not have the technology yet to find out those things. The book did point to problems that had not been adequately addressed, such as the effects of DDT on some wildlife. However, she did not realize that DDT helped keep Malaria down by killing the mosquitos.
She was also supported, According to a TIME magazine article in 1999, a year or two after it was out, ”all but the most self-serving of Carson’s attackers were backing rapidly toward safer ground. In their ugly campaign to reduce a brave scientist’s protest to a matter of public relations, the chemical interests had only increased public awareness.”
I feel that Silent Springs did what Carson wanted it to do. Although Carson may have not realized how important her book would become I think that by Silent Spring being so controversial has helped bring out the issue of pesticides, making it a prominent issue that is discussed from both sides. Although, Carson did not have the scientific methods that we now use, she still spent her last days finalizing her book to bring the issue to the public eye. She utilized every discourse that should could so that her book could be read from a scientific view to be read by the everyday citizen.
