Ever since I saw a report on this where sea turtles and birds are dying because their mothers are feeding them what they think is jelly fish and the like, I have had a real problem with plastic. A scientist went through the stomach of dead turtles and birds and their stomachs were full of plastic -- primarily those bags we put our groceries in.
And since my consciousness has been raised to this new level, it seems that I too am swimming in these bags. I am loathe to throw them away, so I have bags full of these bags tucked all over the place. I use re-usable shopping bags when I shop, but I am often in a situation where I don't have them with me. Even if I stack them up and leave them on the counter before I leave to shop, I will forget them. Or they will be in the wrong car. I have loads of them -- it's crazy, and absolutely inexcusable, but those plastic bags keep creeping in.
I need to remember to ask for paper. I had read that from a recycling standpoint, there was no difference to the question "paper or plastic, ma'am," but the paper bags are far more sturdy and able to perform another purpose, even if it's to act as a container of more garbage. Oh, there's just so much waste.
Plastic doesn't biodegrade, it photo-degrades, which means it is broken down by sunlight into smaller and smaller pieces, all of which are plastic polymers, eventually becoming individual molecules of plastic which are still too tough for anything to digest. These molecules are then eaten by plankton and jelly fish who are then eaten by fish who are then eaten by bigger fish ... and well, then we eat those fish. So we're potentially eating plastic.
It boggles the mind. Like the plastic that deformed this turtle.
This is a picture of a dead albatross, you can see all the plastic that it has ingested.
And yet, it's hard to undo using something that is so convenient, I get that. But I just can't throw them away -- I see them going to sea, and it just feels wrong.
I have stopped using plastic water bottles and I recycle as much as I can, but our family still produces so much garbage. Everything I throw away I look at, and think all this can did was hold this food for a short amount of time, and now it is useless forever. Or this plastic container held yogurt and now it is useless, forever.
Forever. It's not going anywhere. In fact, it might just end up back in our bellies.
You want any salt with that?
No comments:
Post a Comment