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Should this worry me?

I think that's the main issue. I also agree with Thunderchunky. Good drinking water isn't necessarily easy to come by depending on where one lives. To filter, purify and deliver clean, safe drinking water to everyone is a huge undertaking that requires a significant *financial investment*. It might be "better" if local, regional and national governments made that investment directly, but in many cases that is not happening. In those cases private companies are slowly stepping in to fill in the gaps. Why blame corporations for investing capital and doing what local and regional governments have been unwilling to do for their own people?
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The claims in this film say that many of these people HAD clean and available drinking water UNTIL corporations came through and either polluted their water or redirected it to towns that could afford the high fees.

Thats essentially what I'm looking to debunk here. In that case it doesn't matter how much corporations try to help because they're still charging unfair and unaffordable fees for clean water. This film states that in some places they charge nearly double that of what our 1st world citizens are charged.

Or at least thats what this films saying. But I'm staying on the fence until i get more info on it...
 
Sunray Breaker said:
The claims in this film say that many of these people HAD clean and available drinking water UNTIL corporations came through and either polluted their water
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Well, I would start by suggesting that water *POLLUTION* is a completely different issue IMO from water rights. I'll be honest, I only sat through the first video so I didn't see the whole thing. In fact the scare tactics used in the first part turned me off to the rest. There is some useful information being mixed in with what seems to be personal opinions. It's not clear to me how much of that information is based on actual scientific research and how much is simply the personal opinions of the folks being interviewed.

or redirected it to towns that could afford the high fees.
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Who (what government) gave the corporation the water rights to do that?

Thats essentially what I'm looking to debunk here. In that case it doesn't matter how much corporations try to help because they're still charging unfair and unaffordable fees for clean water. This film states that in some places they charge nearly double that of what our 1st world citizens are charged.
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Was there a specific instance in one of the videos that you want to discuss? If so, could you list the video and/or give me a little background info?

IMO there are two issues here to talk about, water *rights* and water pollution. The pollution aspect does in fact scare me when you see how many relative new chemicals (last 100 years) are starting to show up in many water supplies around he world. In terms of water rights however, I wouldn't simply *assume* that corporate involvement was "necessarily' a bad thing. Like I said earlier, it might be better *IF* local governments financially invested in their own clean water supply, but if they aren't able to do so, someone needs to do it, even if costs a little more IMO.

Or at least thats what this films saying. But I'm staying on the fence until i get more info on it...
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I think I'd have to adopt that same attitude without a little more information to work with.

I do have concerns about the amount of pollutants entering the drinking water supplies, but in terms of corporate involvement in the process of providing drinking water, I have far fewer concerns.
 
Well, I would start by suggesting that water *POLLUTION* is a completely different issue IMO from water rights. I'll be honest, I only sat through the first video so I didn't see the whole thing. In fact the scare tactics used in the first part turned me off to the rest. There is some useful information being mixed in with what seems to be personal opinions. It's not clear to me how much of that information is based on actual scientific research and how much is simply the personal opinions of the folks being interviewed.
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At first glance it does seem that way. But this film does seem to have some credible individuals. They traveled to several places around the globe to interview the actual natives that were effected, they also show very lively (and sometimes violent) protests.

Look up the

2000 Cochabamba protests

Who (what government) gave the corporation the water rights to do that?


In terms of water rights however, I wouldn't simply *assume* that corporate involvement was "necessarily' a bad thing. Like I said earlier, it might be better *IF* local governments financially invested in their own clean water supply, but if they aren't able to do so, someone needs to do it, even if costs a little more IMO.
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No assumptions required. As I said, this film has interviews with several people personally confronted with this problem, even politicians are seen confronting water companies for charging nearly three times the amount to third world countries as they do to people in the US.


I do have concerns about the amount of pollutants entering the drinking water supplies, but in terms of corporate involvement in the process of providing drinking water, I have far fewer concerns.
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Thats because you didn't bother to finish the film. Regardless of its obvious appeals to emotion and liberal bias, there is a lot of seemingly credible stuff in there. For instance, in Michigan, Nestle has been battling with the people there for taking their natural water supply and trying to bottle and sell it back to them. Meanwhile the water that is rightfully theirs is being usurped and many areas around there are drying up. They've been battling in court over this for some time.

Not to mention the bottled water BS. Nestle and Coca-Cola have aggressively campaigned AGAINST tap water in order to scare the public into buying it. There is most definitely a water monopoly and in this case, its also a question of ethics.

Should water, like air, be something one can charge for? Especially, (as this film argues, if you would have watched it) there are much cheaper and less money grubbing methods to obtaining clean water for these poorer areas.

What kind of skeptic doesn't thouroughly research his opposition before rebuttal?

Thats one thing that erks me about JREF. Many people here give me that "I watched 1/10th of it and thats all i needed to see" crap.

Granted that may work with the same tired old CT videos about 9/11 and aliens but water privatization is a MUCH more serious matter that I think deserves more respect and attention. Especially from a community that considers itself humanitarian.
 
It saddens me to see such little activity on a thread regarding something so important.

This deserves more pages than bigfoot I think...
 
Jeff Corey said:
Here in Suffolk County, NY, bottled water is 1000 times more expensive than tap water, as is often of lower quality. http://www.longislandnn.org/energy/bottle-less.htm
"Long Island has high-quality, regularly tested, municipal tap water, that meets more stringent standards than bottled water, and costs a fraction of what bottled water does."
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The main difference, unless something has changed in the last 20 years or so, is who is doing the oversight. Municipal water suppliers are overseen by the EPA, which demands regular, stringent testing (multiple times daily) and water bottlers are overseen by the FDA, which does not (though this doesn't mean that the bottlers do not test their water frequently, of course.)
 
ThunderChunky said:
I find documentary films to be one of the worst sources of information.

Access to clean drinking water is a problem in many places, but its not the fault of evil corporations.
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No it's the fault of profitable corporations.
 
The main difference, unless something has changed in the last 20 years or so, is who is doing the oversight. Municipal water suppliers are overseen by the EPA, which demands regular, stringent testing (multiple times daily) and water bottlers are overseen by the FDA, which does not (though this doesn't mean that the bottlers do not test their water frequently, of course.)
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I'm not concerned about the cleanliness of municipal water supply. This film actually shows a Penn and Teller clip about Bottled Water to prove that tap water is just fine.

The film's scary part is where they are talking about serious water usurption by corporations that damn the rivers and lakes near small towns and redirect it to bigger ones and charge draconian prices to get the water back.

It talks about several places around the world where millions of people were displaced and became impoverished because they suddenly lost access to clean water, thus effecting their ability to grow their own food and properly nourish themselves.

That is what I want to see addressed here, but alas, this is a dead thread and the bigfoot thread is alive and well...

Hmm...Which is more important?
 
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Sunray Breaker said:
That is what I want to see addressed here, but alas, this is a dead thread and the bigfoot thread is a live and well...

Hmm...Which is more important?
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Personally I think that going out and actually doing something about it is more important than complaining about who other people don't share your priorities. What have you done in the last month to help on this issue that you obviously feel so strongly about?
 
Maybe this is an opportunity for personal filtration systems such as LifeStraw. It certainly won't do their cause any harm...
 
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ThunderChunky said:
I find documentary films to be one of the worst sources of information.

Access to clean drinking water is a problem in many places, but its not the fault of evil corporations.
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Right because all corporations have such good track records, especially when it comes to exploiting the resources of third world countries. :rolleyes:

The corporate claim is they will provide the capital to build the water access infrastructure. There's a point where this is a reasonable claim. But the line is crossed when the profit motive becomes the sole goal without adding corporate social responsibility to the equation.
 
I am lucky in that where I live, water falls out of the sky on a regular basis. The water then makes its way into the ground where I have a pump that pulls it out for my use. Although I do my best to pollute the local groundwater with my septic system, the darn plants and bacteria keep up with all the waste I am able to produce.

On a side note, corporations are as dependent on water (many more so) as the general public is. Governments who control water resources can make or break an industry. I have the advantage of only needing gallons instead of metric tons. As I speak, there is water piled up in huge white drifts all around my house. You can come and get some if you like. Please start with the driveway.
 
I've been meaning to get a water filter. I have a well and my water is free, and it's ice cold.
 
Personally I think that going out and actually doing something about it is more important than complaining about who other people don't share your priorities. What have you done in the last month to help on this issue that you obviously feel so strongly about?
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If thats the important part, wouldn't you rather I got myself well informed on the issue BEFORE just going out there and acting on what COULD be propaganda and misinformation?

Aren't you guys here to help clear the air on myths and disinfo?

If I were to go out and get active about every influential film I saw, I'd be spreading woo like wild fires.

You should be glad that I'm willing to check with skeptics first before drawing my conclusions, as opposed to willy nilly promoting what could be misleading information to my friends.

But I am surprized that you don't consider a thread like this to be as important as, say, bigfoot...Or maybe you do, I don't know.

But the lack of activity in this thread versus the large amount of activity in the Ghost, ESP, NDE and UFO threads should be appalling to anyone whose concerned about this sort of thing.

I love this place and I look to you good folks from time to time to help me out when trying to figure out whats woo and what isn't. I am fully capable of doing my own research, but with matters I'm less familiar with, its often good to ask for help.

Your not being very helpful.
 
This is an important issue and I believe that it is more important than bigfoot. However, if you are going to be a frequent visitor of this or any other forum then you need to realize that attempting to guilt people into replying to your threads is less likely to get you the replies you want and more likely to get the thread, and possibly even you, an unofficial marking of "annoying".

I've started threads that I thought were terribly important/interesting and gotten few, if any, replies. Unfortunately the only thing you can do is shrug and move on. Also, should additional info regarding the topic become available, bumping the thread with new links may get a previously dead thread going again.
 
Mark Thomas's book Belching Out The Devil: Global Adventures with Coca-Cola includes a section on Coca-cola's business practices in relation to water (in India). Might be worth a read.

ETA - An extract from that chapter

 
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Mark Thomas's book Belching Out The Devil: Global Adventures with Coca-Cola includes a section on Coca-cola's business practices in relation to water (in India). Might be worth a read.
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Thanks...I'll look this book up right now
 
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