4 Ways to Protest Trashy Policies
So June 1st was a bad day for America.
President Trump has withdrawn the US from the Paris Climate Change Agreement. It is now only the US, Nicaragua and Syria who are not going to participate in the agreement to lower their carbon emissions. At a certain point, the damage done would be irreversible, however the shared plan is to at least slow the production of greenhouse gas emissions in an effort to delay rising sea levels, uninhabitable heat and cold, and eventually hellish migrations the world over. These inevitabilities are sure to bring great risks to national security, border security, overpopulation, and access to food and clean water.
Along with India and China, the US is the greatest polluter and producer of greenhouse gas emissions on the planet. With a new president claiming that he is more concerned for the limited (and ultimately obsolete) coal jobs for middle American citizens than protection for the “citizens of Paris” as he says, it is our responsibility as concerned humans to take action.
This blog is meant to be a basic how-to on how not to make garbage, however the concept of garbage can reach further than you may imagine.
Garbage is not only what you put in your waste bin or throw on the street. Understanding your waste is about seeing a bigger picture concerning the nature of a waste cycle. In being more conscious about our consumer choices, it’s important to ask yourself, Where does this product come from? Can I find out if it was sustainably produced? Is it a fuel-intensive product to make, transport or recycle? What system do I contribute to in purchasing this product? And finally, where will this product go when it is no longer useful to me… when it ultimately becomes garbage?
Getting a sense of your own consumer habits can not only help to simplify your life, but also make a statement (and a vote!) in favor of your personal values without a single spoken word.
1. First off, plastic. Overused to an excessive amount in our society. It has always been confusing to see organic fair-trade products wrapped in plastic packaging. Besides the fossil fuels needed to transport these products, the toxicity of the material, the unsustainability of it, the most shocking realization is that plastic is made of oil.
When you give up using and purchasing products made/wrapped with plastic, you are essentially boycotting the petroleum industry. One of many simple ways to stick it to the new administration, whose lifeblood is pumped with fossil fuels.
Shop with your glass jars and cloth bags. Refuse the mainstream throw-away packaging.
2. Secondly, is choosing secondhand. When you purchase a new book, Macbook, product wrapped in any kind of container, even a new electric car, it contributes to a demand for more products which must be replaced on the market and ultimately go into the waste stream. When these products are made in a factory, what fuels the machines? When a brand-new eco-friendly, sexy electric car is purchased, keep in mind that the battery is made of precious metals which must be mined from (likely) economically vulnerable parts of the world, where locals are displaced, exploited, and certainly left with contaminated soil and water once the mining company has moved onto the next location. And then, the demand for new cars continue, as that product must be replaced on the market. I don’t mean to “trash” electric cars, but it’s important to understand that buying new is not always the best solution for trying to live more sustainably.
Buying new creates a demand for a replacement. More production, more fossil fuels, and ultimately more garbage and pollution. So why contribute?
3. Keep yourself informed about current events and know who your representatives are. Having worked for a congressman in the past, I am aware that our reps are not sitting at their desks waiting to hear what their constituents think, but they do pay attention to the numbers which indicate the overall interests of the areas they represent. If they want to get reelected, you can be sure that they will do as their constituents want, so it’s vital to be part of the sustainable majority. Letters, calls, emails, absolutely everything is counted. So let them know how you feel about any recent environmental legislation. Remember that they work for us.
4.Ugh, landfills. Besides fossil fuels, the effects from landfills are also quite damning. Getting rid of plastic from your waste is fantastic, but it’s also the mixture of toxic plastic with rotting organic matter which causes the production of methane in landfills. This methane is toxic for groundwater as well as the atmosphere, and ultimately produces greenhouse gases, overheats the planet… you know where this goes. A good solution is to give the unadulterated organic matter back to the earth in the form of COMPOSTING. So methane or healthy soil? Try to find a compost site near you and keep your banana peels out of the landfill.
(Bezobalu - Zero waste shop and compost drop-off in Prague,
There are literally millions of changes we can make to our daily lives as ways to vote in favor of our values. Vote with your purchases, and ultimately, your way of being.
