Professor Roberts’ speech was well, researched, informed, and captured my attention in ways that I did not think he would be able to. Something that struck me as especially shocking were the images (of the enormous gyre full of garbage that currently floats around in the Pacific Ocean, as well as the dead bird whose stomach was full of various plastics) and  statistics that he included in his presentation about the rate in which we pollute the waters surrounding our country, and the countries/island chains around the US. The things that I learned about the United States’ presence in various bodies of water, through Professor Roberts’ presentation were the first to pop in mind after I read a news article on my phone the other day detailing the deaths of an unusually high number of gray whales off of the coast of San Francisco. The fact the deaths of these whales is happening off the coast of California (where we know that the garbage gyre is) acts as no surprise.

It’s interesting to see how the United States has gone from a country driven by a feeling that we have the right to expand on lands that do not belong to us, to now feeling that we have a right to aquatic spaces that do not belong to us. With these aquatic environments being places that we literally do not belong, or that we have no rightful claim to.  It’s terrible to think that the effects of this expansion are manifesting themself in aquatic environments off the American coast, and globally as well.