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Why do you think their organization “should” promote recycling? Recycling is not the end goal in itself, it’s a process designed with the supposed intention of
by ninth_ant 4y ago
Why do you think their organization “should” promote recycling? Recycling is not the end goal in itself, it’s a process designed with the supposed intention of reducing waste.
If the outcome of recycling isn’t doing a good job of achieving that goal — which it arguably is not - then we should not be overly attached to that. Recycling shouldn’t be be a quasi-religion, accepted on faith as a solution with no regard to its actual outcome.
Right now, putting out recycling to be collected every week makes people feel better about themselves and their consumption. The numbers indicate it isn’t working to reduce waste though, despite how happy we are to pat ourselves on the back.
Is it gloomy to point out the emperor has no clothes? I’d argue someone needs to say it.
- vesinisa 4y agoThis article paints an overly gloomy picture because it is certainly possible to make plastic recycling work, like my city has already done. It is of course always preferable to try to reduce waste than need to invest in recycling - that is a given. We can always dream big about everyone switching to reusable containers and other ways to reduce plastic waste on a grand scale. But to claim that plastic recycling does not work and can not be made to work (and by logical extension is therefore not worthwhile) is akin to ignoring the present problem while proposing a pie-in-the-sky solution.