This Comfort Zone

By Marimar McNaughton

Staff Writer

At the YWCA’s women of achievement awards last week, 42 women and young ladies were recognized for their leadership in the fields of business, communications, education, environment, public service, health and wellness, and volunteerism.

One of them, Wrightsville Beach School principal Pansy Rumley, received one of the top 12 honors for her role as an educator. Her vision for a marine science and environmental studies curriculum forced her into the mainstream of fundraising to support programs she initiated that utilize outdoor resources to teach experiential sciences.

The construction of the pier at WBS, the county’s only waterside school, encourages participation by faculty and students, and other regional school groups, some from as far away as Durham County, to use the facilities to learn about nature, examine our fragile ecosystem up close, and enroll young children at an early age in the process of becoming good stewards of the earth.

Rarely does outstanding achievement like this occur in the comfort zone. More often than not, true leadership like Rumley’s emerges out of the discomfort zone.

To the naked eye, the comfort zone was blanketed this Memorial Day weekend by a sea of bikinis and buffed bodies. Marching to the beat of a different drummer was one lone shirtless soldier, Steve Grimsley, who carried the American flag — a visually potent reminder of what this weekend actually was intended to represent: not the start of the summer season, but a day of tribute for those who risked and gave up their lives in military service for their country’s freedom.

Our town fathers and mothers sometimes find themselves in the position to steward those freedoms. Collectively, they have faced many uncomfortable situations during their tenure of public service. It is during these times of circumspection, often fueled by public debate, that they find themselves in the discomfort zone where real learning takes place, real leadership steps up to the plate and real achievement occurs, benefiting the entire community.

As we sit on the sidelines and watch, report to our readers and await the outcomes, I wonder: When was the last time you left your comfort zone?

How many Chinese products do you buy?

My thoughts
by Pat Bradford

I am done.
Seriously, I’ve had it up to here, as the old saying goes.
For those of you who don’t want to hear anyone local speak on international issues, turn the page.
Here’s the deal: I am done with everything that supports China (excepting food cooked locally).
What is fueling this terminal frustration is my horror over the lengthening list of recalled Chinese products, China’s environmental standards, not to mention China’s human rights abuses, compounded by the continuing loss of American manufacturing jobs.
Nineteen deaths in America and Germany are now linked to the widely used blood thinner, Heparin. Heparin, like a large portion of the drug processing in the world, is made from raw materials from China (in this case, pig guts).
Yes, none other than the land that has poisoned our kids through its lead-painted toys and children’s jewelry and our infants through its baby food. They’ve poisoned us with antifreeze-laced toothpaste, toxic farm-raised fish and vitamins. Then there are the faulty tires. Even our pets have not been immune.
Last year, 93 deaths in Central America were attributed to tainted cough syrup, processed where? Yep, China.
An ever-increasing share of the 40 percent of pharmaceuticals and a whopping 80 percent of the chemical ingredients in drugs come from countries that lack our consumer protection regulations, not to mention hygiene. The big three are China, India and Mexico.
What has happened to this country that big business and politics come before the welfare of the people?
It’s time, past time actually, to return to the war cry, “Buy American!”
And war is what we’re in.
In this county, town, country, our small businesses are struggling under declining sales, high fuel prices and too little relief from the taxing authorities.
There’s a mayor in Florida, John Mazziotti from Palm Bay, who in October became the first American mayor to propose an ordinance prohibiting his municipal government from buying Chinese products. The measure would bar the city from buying products in which half or more of the parts are manufactured in China, unless the total cost is under $50 or an alternative product would cost 50 percent more.
Criticize him if you will, but at least the guy gets it. Mazziotti is so adamant about buying local that he apparently won’t dine outside of his constituency.
Likewise, until we also adopt an earn-it-here, spend-it-here mentality, we’re apt to see more business closings in this next 18 months, and more of our friends and neighbors headed toward financial insecurity.
Included in this boycott of China movement — the boycott of products manufactured there — what about the upcoming Olympics?
Ask yourself, if we continue to buy their products, what message do we send? It’s OK to continue to poison us, just keep the cheap goods coming?
Then too, do we really, as enlightened people, want to support a country whose brutal oppression of a segment of its populace is ongoing? Think about it as you hear more about the growing international protest as the summer Olympic Games near.
Do we just turn away from “the unpleasantness” and do our own thing?
I can imagine that many in Germany in the late 1930s and early ’40s felt that same way as Jews and Gypsies were being carried away to concentration camps.
What if the other 12 New World colonies had not come to the aid of Massachusetts following the Boston Massacre in 1770? Where would our “States United” be?
So, what’s your personal level of tolerance?
For me, I thought I was all about free trade, everyone’s right to make a buck, but when it takes food out of our own mouths, weakens our own country, poisons our kids, our pets, and just about everything we touch becomes suspect, it’s time to quit.
I am going to make a real effort to not buy Chinese, and couple that with spending my dollars where I earn them, right here in New Hanover County.
How about you? Up to a challenge?
Even if we did it for one week, imagine the impact we would have.