Environmentalism, socialism, capitalism et al

1finny said:
I’m not sure but I doubt it.
Must admit that episode was great - means you I can walk past clothes shops without even looking in the window.
I won’t be buying any clothes for years - got more than enough.
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Co-op don't sell clothes do they?!
 
Water is always recycled eventually. The issue with cotton is that farmers use pesticides. However cotton is recyclable - for example UK banknotes used to be made of recycled cotton.

Meanwhile the clothing business is trying to make us all wear polyester clothes. Polyester is a petroleum derived product. You couldn't make it up.
 
Another aspect is the precious metal mining that goes on throughout the world so we can have mobile phones, batteries for electric cars, solar panels etc.
As others have said, sometimes the cost to human lives and the environment far outweighs the claimed benefits.
 
boromike85 said:
I more meant it as a cost saving for the supermarkets because they aren't providing them for free in the volumes they used to but I presume they are recouping costs via the bags for life. It is only the 5p single-use bags that have a requirement that the proceeds goes to charity. Depends how honourable the companies are as to how much of the bags for life goes to charity.
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And some stores do well out of this eg home bargains don’t do 5p bags, they only do bags for life
 
Soutra said:
Water is always recycled eventually. The issue with cotton is that farmers use pesticides. However cotton is recyclable - for example UK banknotes used to be made of recycled cotton.

Meanwhile the clothing business is trying to make us all wear polyester clothes. Polyester is a petroleum derived product. You couldn't make it up.
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Plant based polyester manufacture:
Polyester from plants

But, will moves to sustainable fibres substitute food growth?

One of the original pluses for synthetic fibre was the destructive influence on the environment of cotton growing. These are complex problems to solve: how to best feed and clothe the world.
Cotton growing problems
 
boromike85 said:
Paper bags have a big carbon footprint to produce but a very small one to dispose of because they degrade easily (usually while you are carrying them). Plastic are really good environmentally, they just don't degrade and so even though they are much better environmentally than cotton they cause another problem in clogging up the oceans. I'm sure the conclusion was that the best option is plastic bags but to re-use them. Nothing comes close to using the same bag 5x.

I'm not a big environmentalist so I don't go out of my way too much but it annoys me when we get told to do something that seems like tokenism. The plastic bag charge annoyed me because the big supermarkets seemed to benefit the most because they now charge for something they used to give away for free and in reality the impact on the environment is negligible. It is especially negligible when you consider the amount of plastic you take home from the supermarket in those bags. McDonalds stopped giving out plastic straws but they still give you a cup you can't recycle with a plastic lid. The paper straw is fine until you order a milkshake and you can't finish it so you have to use two etc. There needs to be more understanding and information provided on life-cycle impacts instead of just picking one step in the process to make people think they are doing good that actually delivers no benefit.
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Then don't shop at McDonalds, they're hardly a beacon of virtue.

If you do need a straw, you can get pasta straws, 100% biodegradable.

And it's not tokenism if millions of people get in on it. We ALL need to change our ways.
 
TheFair86 said:
And some stores do well out of this eg home bargains don’t do 5p bags, they only do bags for life
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You are right - customers are being taken for a ride. M+S, Sainsbury’s and Tesco all push their bag for life for so called ‘environmental’ reasons. They have also stopped (in the main) selling the charitable 5p bags.
It’s nonsense. As you have said, they are less environmentally friendly and ever penny of profit goes back to their shareholders.
 
red_harrington said:
Then don't shop at McDonalds, they're hardly a beacon of virtue.

If you do need a straw, you can get pasta straws, 100% biodegradable.

And it's not tokenism if millions of people get in on it. We ALL need to change our ways.
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I just used McDonalds as an example but my point is that them stopping using straws is tokenism. It says to their customers that don't really think about it in detail that they are being environmentally friendly when they aren't. They are selling an image that doesn't exist. The straws were a small percentage of the plastic that they use. There is next to no improvement but they have managed to improve their green image so people think they are doing no harm by eating there. There are plenty of other businesses doing the same, like Supermarkets and carrier bags.
 
1finny said:
That, sir, is a startling stat - and, I might add quite unsettling.
5 mins ago just been told we are having avocado on toast for lunch (n)

They will be my last avocados
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Good God mister Finny that sounds extreme. My advice is, do not do anymore research on this subject your life will be not worth living!
 
MARMITE said:
Good God mister Finny that sounds extreme. My advice is, do not do anymore research on this subject your life will be not worth living!
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:):)
Sadly - I’m an ‘in/out’ person.
Had the same conversation with my good lady who takes a more pragmatic approach saying basically she will have an avocado as a treat every now and then.
I tease her about destroying more of the planet as a ‘treat’.

She, again being pragmatic, ignores me and cracks on.
 
1finny said:
:):)
Sadly - I’m an ‘in/out’ person.
Had the same conversation with my good lady who takes a more pragmatic approach saying basically she will have an avocado as a treat every now and then.
I tease her about destroying more of the planet as a ‘treat’.

She, again being pragmatic, ignores me and cracks on.
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Are you full vegan or just vegetarian (apologies if neither and I'm getting you confused with someone else). Another fun fact about avocados is that technically they aren't vegan because they use farmed bees driven around in lorries to farms to pollinate. Not only are they bad for the environment but they use animals in their production (and they aren't the only crop to do so. I presume being that strict leaves very little left to eat so I guess you have to draw the line somewhere.
 
boromike85 said:
Are you full vegan or just vegetarian (apologies if neither and I'm getting you confused with someone else). Another fun fact about avocados is that technically they aren't vegan because they use farmed bees driven around in lorries to farms to pollinate. Not only are they bad for the environment but they use animals in their production (and they aren't the only crop to do so. I presume being that strict leaves very little left to eat so I guess you have to draw the line somewhere.
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Spot on Mike ref bees. Very sad.
And yes, went vegan shortly after xmas this year.
 
Seemed to me like the the Chinese were getting the blame for this covid carry on and still are, but im starting to think it's natures way of getting rid of a few billion of us. This planet is getting a bit too busy.
 
When you see stats like these it makes you think about the miriad other things that make small but incremental impacts on the planet.
This is why I believe we have to be more engaged in politics and to actually hold politicians accountable and redress the balance of power between the people and big businesses.
 
dooderooni said:
When you see stats like these it makes you think about the miriad other things that make small but incremental impacts on the planet.
This is why I believe we have to be more engaged in politics and to actually hold politicians accountable and redress the balance of power between the people and big businesses.
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The problem is getting asked one question, i.e. which one of these people should make all of your decisions for the next 5 years which is heavily influenced by 1 or 2 key policies and the rest is ignored. It would be better if we were asked specific questions from time to time because there will be things from one party we like that we don't like in another. The whole system is just an illusion of having an input. We have nothing to do with how decisions are made unless you can afford to buy a politician or two.
 
boromike85 said:
The problem is getting asked one question, i.e. which one of these people should make all of your decisions for the next 5 years which is heavily influenced by 1 or 2 key policies and the rest is ignored. It would be better if we were asked specific questions from time to time because there will be things from one party we like that we don't like in another. The whole system is just an illusion of having an input. We have nothing to do with how decisions are made unless you can afford to buy a politician or two.
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Maybe so, but we have to try as the apathy to politics we currently have will lead us further into authoritarian or autocratic rule.
 
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