The Beloved Community

In the summer of 2004, Canadian health researchers made a startling discovery in the Chippewa birth records for the city of Sarnia, an hour north of Detroit: for the preceding decade, female babies had been outnumbering male babies at a rate of 2 to 1. Further investigation revealed large numbers of miscarriages, a cluster of reproductive cancers in young women, and widespread neurological problems among the band's children.

The Beloved Community looks at a Great Lakes oil town facing a toxic legacy head-on. The nerve center of Canada’s petrochemical industry, Sarnia once enjoyed a high standard of living, but eventually paid a devastating price through a compromised environment and a public health crisis. Having already lost a generation of men to workplace-related cancers, local widows and daughters discovered a reproductive health threat: because of their exposure to hormone-mimicking chemicals known as "endocrine disruptors," future generations faced severe risks. How do you stay in the home you love when the price you pay may be not only your own life, but the safety of your children?

While the impact of endocrine disruptors on wildlife was well-documented, the skewed birth ratios in Sarnia presented an unprecedented alarm regarding human populations exposed daily to industrial pollutants. Because these chemical compounds are used globally in products ranging from pesticides to dry cleaning solvents, the situation in Sarnia serves as a vital case study for anyone concerned with environmental health and industrial accountability.

Because corporations and government agencies proved slow or incapable of providing solutions, the community of Sarnia took matters into its own hands. Women who never considered themselves scientists went door-to-door collecting health data from neighbors to uncover answers. They demanded a voice in community governance when facing a complex of giant multinationals: Dow, Shell, DuPont, Imperial Oil, Suncor, Nova, Bayer, and dozens of others that had long dictated the city’s economic and environmental reality. Rather than abandoning a heavily polluted region or attempting to shut down the plants entirely, residents pressed for accountability to close the books on past industrial damage and reclaim their future.