Honestly, the whole concept of "recycling" plastic feels more like a PR strategy than an environmental solution. If it were genuinely effective, we’d see investment, innovation, and accountability—like we do with metals. Instead, we’re handed the guilt while corporations keep pumping out garbage.
this post was submitted on 02 May 2025
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Much like the concept of a carbon footprint, it exists solely to make consumers think they can make an individual difference so they won't push for regulations
Yeah I especially love that one everytime I fly. I get to choose the environmentally friendly option with lower carbon footprint for more money. Who the fuck they think they are kidding? We are all in the same plane burning fuel at 10000 m.
Dont forget the goal of disrupting actual leftist movements into confusion
Honestly if it was up to me I'd just ban plastic flat out unless you got some kind of "this is actually really important and NEEDS to be made of plastic" cert
There are tons of single-use plastic medical supplies - syringes, wrappers, etc.
Would you say that those things are actually really important and NEED to be made of plastic? I wonder if Aeri would account for that possibility
I'm not the ultimate authority on all things, but I'd question if these things need to be made of plastic.
Syringes are made out of things like Borosilicate glass, Stainless steel, autoclaves and cases exist.
It would also be way less big a deal if we just didn't have as much plastic in general.
It would be a lot more costly to make syringes out of glass/steel for single-use types.
Counterpoint, how much is cancer treatment for (research sounds, papers rustling)... Seven thousand people†?
Multiply that by... some studies show costs of cancer treatment as high as $173,831 annually. 1,216,817,000? Would it cost more than 1.2 billion dollars a year to stop making everything out of plastic? This is just like, napkin ass math I'm not pretending to be a huge know it all or anything by the way. Personally I think that yes, we should stop making things out of poison, even if it costs more money.
†A recent study estimated that PFAS contamination in drinking water contributes to more than 6,800 cancer cases each year in the United States.
I don't disagree with you at all, but I just don't see a way for it to happen in the current corpo-controlled climate.
Interesting to compare aluminium recycling with plastic recycling
When the true aim is to recycle material, industry comes to the party and you get a refund scheme, even purpose built deposit facilities that can be set up locally
When the aim is to misdirect public attention toward a non solution you get government mandated plastics recycling bins and penalties for "contamination" plus never ending messaging (gotta keep the lie alive with constant repetition lmaooo). Coercion is just a lowkey admission that the material isn't worth recycling
The real question isn't how to get the plastics industry to change, it's how to make the ruse no longer a tenable position for governments
Its basically impossible to avoid too. Anything you buy comes packaged in plastic for the most part.
The price stuff can change through taxation that makes new plastic more expensive than recycled plastic.
As we all know, taxation is super popular and has never been controversial, ever.
At the very least flaskepant has worked great for like a century here in Norway. Always kind of surprising when other countries don't have it.
The US still has subsidies going to petrochemical companies, despite being insanely profitable. Basically, just extracting the country's wealth in addition to natural resources. Ending those or forcing them to be spent on recycling would help here immensely.
Most plastic can’t be recycled into something usable. Plastic degrades quite a bit with each recycling, leaving a bunch of microplastics behind (same thing with “biodegradable” plastic). It would be better to tax it enough (or ban it) to make it not used in certain applications.
Should've made the producers responsible for collecting and processing all plastics they produce. It that makes certain products economically non viable, than that's on them to innovate better processes.
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Being an old man this really gets me. I love the internet and the way computers today but there is a whole lot that worked fine before plastics were so common. Almost nothing in the grocery store had plastic and everything was pretty much as convenient as nowadays. Sure you had to pay a deposit on the glass bottles but you got it back when you returned them.
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Really annoyed to have believed in plastic recycling even into my thirties. Being an idiot is such a burden sometimes.
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Right now it looks like paper and metal recycling is still good as far as I can read in two minutes. If someone has a correction let me know.
Correct. Paper (PS: or at least brown cardboard), glass and alu will always be great candidates for recycling.
Aluminum is the poster child for recycling, really. It takes more energy to extract it from the ore than it is to recycle it.
Former aluminum process engineer: This^
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Yeah same and I hate when people just say well might as "well not recycle at all then" :/ that kind of defeatism doesn't help either
That is the point at which you remind them they are focusing on the worst R and remind them of the other two which are much more ppwerful
Maybe i should recommend DDD instead of RRR 🤫 lotta assholes running around still doubling down on dooming everybody
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there have been several articles exposing plastic recycling as green washing. unfortunately they never make it to mainstream media
i saw a chart somewhere showing less than 1% of plastic in use today is recycled but I can't find it now
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And this is how capitalism eats itself. Nothing can be done without a market incentive, including not suffocating our planet to death.
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How to get politicians to change views:
Plastic causes ed and shrinkage
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