A short cartoon – The Lorax Free Essay Example

The Lorax is a short cartoon by Dr. Seuss, although this cartoon is targeted at children it still relates to economical and environmental impacts we learnt from our class. The story illustrates many important economical concepts such as: needs and wants, supply and demand, profit gain and loss, limited resources, and opportunity cost. This cartoon is probably what inspired David Suzuki to write his essay. There are two main characters in the story, the Once-ler and the Lorax. The Once-ler appears in the story riding his wagon when he discovers a beautiful place with lush trees and friendly animals.

He soon encounters the truffula trees which seemed like the perfect material to make the Thneeds and it also seemed like an unlimited resource. He knew there was a market and created a demand from the Thneeds. This is the concept of Supply and Demand. He saw a way to make money and thought that everyone owned them and that he was the first person smart enough to take advantage of a money making opportunity.

We quickly realize that the Thneed stands for Things that people Need but it is purely a want and not a necessity. Soon we are introduced to the Lorax who seemed to make it his duty to protect the trees and the animals.

The Lorax symbolizes the environmentalists in our world much like David Suzuki, who seems to understand the environmental impact and make it their duty to protect the environment but lacks the power necessary to control it.

The Lorax warns the Once-ler to stop cutting down the truffula trees but fed by his greed the Once-ler chooses not to obey the Lorax’s orders. The Lorax says “It progresses to fast innovations causes a lot of destruction”. As the demand for Thneeds increase the Once-ler had to expand his factory to increase production and to supply the goods on what the people need.

As the expansion made appearance there were a lot of ecological damages to the surroundings such as pollution, furthermore resulted in total destruction of the wildlife such as the fishes (garbage in the lakes), birds (affected by the smoke), and the Brown Bar-ba-loots (food became so scarce) were affected by the pollution and scarcity of food to a point where they were not able to withstand the ecological damages done to the surroundings which resulted them moving to another area. In addition to ecological damages done to the surroundings the Once-ler’s greed for money also blinded his decision making as a business man.

When the Lorax started to talking sense into Mr. Once-ler’s head and that changes need to be done one of his assistance told him that he stocks are rising tremendously and profits are out of the roof his greed for money and profits and him determined to cut every single tree in order to make more money. The down fall of this mentality is that Thneeds are not unlimited resources this resource is limited they don’t continue to grow after you cut them. When Mr. Once-ler chopped down the last tree production started to fall dramatically hence profit levels decrease therefore there is no market for this good.

As a result of this it created a path of destruction. Although The Lorax is a short cartoon by Dr. Seuss it still relates to economical and environmental impacts we learnt from our class. Everyone must take a stand in protecting our environment because a little bit of help can go a long way. In conclusion innovations can cause destruction it is up to us the people to understand what were doing and to find and efficient or alternative methods to get the job done with minimal environmental damage because simple things like starting a business can get out of hand.

Remember! This is just a sample.

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