Reusable bags. Bonus that you can find something that checks all your boxes and its all yours. Paper bags should be last resort and they should charge 10c to discourage their use.
I’d happily pay $1/paper bag with handles, just for the convenience. That’s about what it’s worth to me.
I’m absentminded as all hell, and I’m not gonna remember to bring an armful of bags into the grocery store with me. And then, if I’m not using a cart, I gotta carry them around? Nah.
I mean, it’s a super first world problem, and not a big deal at all in the grand scheme of things. But in all honesty I’d rather just pay $1/paper bag than have to deal with it.
Damn, that hurts me to read haha. Like, I get the absent mindedness thing, but it’s a ridiculously easy step that if all 330 million people in the US (I assume that is also where you are from, sorry if I’m wrong) were to stop then it would actually have a tangible effect on resource consumption. Obviously that isn’t going to solve all of our problems, but the whole idea of ‘whatever, this is slightly more convenient’ should instead be ‘eh, it’s not that much of a hassle.’ I think that’s fully the fault of 100 years of that mindset being pushed down our throats in the form of CONSUME, but we’ve got to break free of it if there’s ever going to be a chance.
I’d be really interested to see a quantitative analysis of how much difference it would make if all 330mil of us swapped to renewable bags.
My gut is that paper bags are pretty clean overall, and that grocery bags are a tiny fraction of paper usage in the US. But I’d be really interested to be proven wrong.
My quick search keeps popping up the statistic of 14 million trees for 10 billion paper bags used annually in the US, but in 1999 so I’m sure that is higher. You’ve also got to consider the high energy usage and large environmental concerns of paper mills. I don’t know if you’ve ever been near a paper mill, but they’re known for their air pollution, they make entire towns stink.
ENERGY TO PRODUCE BAG ORIGINALLY (BTUs)
Safeway Plastic Bags: 594 BTUs
Safeway Paper Bags: 2511 BTUs
(Source: 1989 Plastic Recycling Directory, Society of Plastics Industry.)
I do think the BTUs portion is less concerning in the greater context. Both 600 and 2500 are negligible compared to, say, my daily commute, or a single plane trip, or basically any other activity that requires energy.
But the first part is kinda interesting. Doing some super sloppy back of the napkin math, I think that makes paper shopping bags about 6.5% of all paper products made in the US. Paper products account for around 50% of all wood products in the US, so call it just over 3% of total wood use (which may have gone up some due to increased prevalence of paper lately.)
Which isn’t nothing for sure. I would have guessed lower. I do think it may be overstating it to say we’d see a huge shift if everyone started using reusable bags overnight. A 3% drop in timber harvesting would be good, but not world changing I would think. But not insignificant either.
Again, I want to point out this is a minor change that you can make that if everyone did, would have a positive impact in this world. Huge impact, maybe not. But when our entire society is built to destroy the planet that we require for life, we need to remove as many cuts as possible.
I hope this doesn’t come across as rude, but conversations like this one are the reason that I have zero faith in humanity. It’s easy to point fingers as the obvious evil we have going on in the world, which clearly has more of a direct threat. But even if we were somehow able to rid the world of the truly despicable, we’d still be left with a world full of ‘its more of an impact than I thought, but still not so bad’ people. And our planet cannot continue on like that. It absolutely amazes me how many people (including good friends of mine) who think the same way. And there is no way to change this mindset, its as ingrained as any of the bigotry and hate on the other side. We just have no chance against this.
I think there’s a couple of things in play here though.
First, this kinda has, “if millennials just didn’t drink Starbucks they could afford rent” energy. Would it make a difference? Maybe. But in the grand scheme what it would do is just take away something they enjoy, while they remain unable to make their student loan payments, much less but a house. The actual problems are more systematic, and the “don’t buy Starbucks” argument is to some degree just a distraction from fixing those more systematic problems (or an intentional effort to divide people so they can’t cooperate to fix those systematic issues.)
Second, I think you’re maybe exhibiting a little bit more brinkmanship than is warrented. It’s important to care about the environment, and there’s obviously a ton that needs to be done there. But as you say, there are bigger and worse threats out there than people buying paper bags, and it sounds like you’re letting your existential dread over the environment sour your actual, meaningful interpersonal connections. It feels a bit over the top to “lose faith in humanity” just because most people buy paper bags. Most people are good people, and it’s not unreasonable for them to take small conveniences, even if those conveniences aren’t environmentally “optimal.”
I live in a state that has banned the use of them, so no, most people I know don’t use them. The people that said the same thing as you complained for all of a month before they acclimated to a simple fucking task. All parts of our system are fucked, but if it is a trivial matter to unfuck one small part of the system, then we should do that. And then fix the next trivial fucking thing that people say they would rather spend a dollar per bag on and argue for twelve hours about whether or not chopping just 14 million trees per year on top of the other billion trees we chop is all that bad.
This is exactly why I say I have no faith in humanity, your dollar a bag comment says more to how fucked we are than anything. People absolutely will not change. They will literally hurt themselves just so they can hurt the environment because ‘haha, I forget sometimes so I don’t want to try.’ Even when presented with the evidence they ask for on the environmental impacts, they will say ‘worse than I expected, but not that bad when everything else is shit.’ I’m tired of everything being shit. And I’m tired of people saying, oh it’s a just a little shit. Quit accepting shit people. And don’t buy starbucks, because it’s shit coffee from a shit company.
The timber part is no big deal - it’s all farmed trees and sawmill waste product. The water and energy use to make them, store them, ship them is more significant.
I dunno not being willing to even carry bags, things that are literally made for carrying, kinda seems like a you problem rather than a first world problem. Like there’s the regular biases toward convenience we all have and there’s Jesus fucking Christ how are you this incapable of tolerating the most minor of tasks.
You know how you handle the onerous task of carrying a bag while shopping? You put the bags in the basket with everything else, put the food in the bags themselves, or just loop the handle over your shoulder.
I think you’re overstating my position. It’s not that I’m “not willing to carry bags.” It’s that I’ve weighed the options and decided that the provided disposable bags are more convenient, so I’m just gonna do that. I’m unconvinced that switching would do much beyond slightly inconvenience me.
And you say it’s just a “me problem,” but a quick and unverified Google search says that 70% of people in the US don’t use reusable bags (and 57% worldwide). So it seems like it’s not so much a “me problem” as a “literal majority of the world” problem. Though I’m sure it probably felt good to attack me personally, as that gives you someone to lash out at.
There’s a reason I only commented on the “carry bags throughout the store?!? not me” position. That’s the one that outs you as unusually unwilling accept even the most trivial of inconveniences. That you even include that in your justification speaks volumes about your personality.
Reusable bags. Bonus that you can find something that checks all your boxes and its all yours. Paper bags should be last resort and they should charge 10c to discourage their use.
I’d happily pay $1/paper bag with handles, just for the convenience. That’s about what it’s worth to me.
I’m absentminded as all hell, and I’m not gonna remember to bring an armful of bags into the grocery store with me. And then, if I’m not using a cart, I gotta carry them around? Nah.
I mean, it’s a super first world problem, and not a big deal at all in the grand scheme of things. But in all honesty I’d rather just pay $1/paper bag than have to deal with it.
Damn, that hurts me to read haha. Like, I get the absent mindedness thing, but it’s a ridiculously easy step that if all 330 million people in the US (I assume that is also where you are from, sorry if I’m wrong) were to stop then it would actually have a tangible effect on resource consumption. Obviously that isn’t going to solve all of our problems, but the whole idea of ‘whatever, this is slightly more convenient’ should instead be ‘eh, it’s not that much of a hassle.’ I think that’s fully the fault of 100 years of that mindset being pushed down our throats in the form of CONSUME, but we’ve got to break free of it if there’s ever going to be a chance.
I’d be really interested to see a quantitative analysis of how much difference it would make if all 330mil of us swapped to renewable bags.
My gut is that paper bags are pretty clean overall, and that grocery bags are a tiny fraction of paper usage in the US. But I’d be really interested to be proven wrong.
My quick search keeps popping up the statistic of 14 million trees for 10 billion paper bags used annually in the US, but in 1999 so I’m sure that is higher. You’ve also got to consider the high energy usage and large environmental concerns of paper mills. I don’t know if you’ve ever been near a paper mill, but they’re known for their air pollution, they make entire towns stink.
This stat taken from http://www.forestecologynetwork.org/climate_change/plastic_or_paper.html
ENERGY TO PRODUCE BAG ORIGINALLY (BTUs) Safeway Plastic Bags: 594 BTUs Safeway Paper Bags: 2511 BTUs (Source: 1989 Plastic Recycling Directory, Society of Plastics Industry.)
I do think the BTUs portion is less concerning in the greater context. Both 600 and 2500 are negligible compared to, say, my daily commute, or a single plane trip, or basically any other activity that requires energy.
But the first part is kinda interesting. Doing some super sloppy back of the napkin math, I think that makes paper shopping bags about 6.5% of all paper products made in the US. Paper products account for around 50% of all wood products in the US, so call it just over 3% of total wood use (which may have gone up some due to increased prevalence of paper lately.)
Which isn’t nothing for sure. I would have guessed lower. I do think it may be overstating it to say we’d see a huge shift if everyone started using reusable bags overnight. A 3% drop in timber harvesting would be good, but not world changing I would think. But not insignificant either.
Again, I want to point out this is a minor change that you can make that if everyone did, would have a positive impact in this world. Huge impact, maybe not. But when our entire society is built to destroy the planet that we require for life, we need to remove as many cuts as possible.
I hope this doesn’t come across as rude, but conversations like this one are the reason that I have zero faith in humanity. It’s easy to point fingers as the obvious evil we have going on in the world, which clearly has more of a direct threat. But even if we were somehow able to rid the world of the truly despicable, we’d still be left with a world full of ‘its more of an impact than I thought, but still not so bad’ people. And our planet cannot continue on like that. It absolutely amazes me how many people (including good friends of mine) who think the same way. And there is no way to change this mindset, its as ingrained as any of the bigotry and hate on the other side. We just have no chance against this.
I think there’s a couple of things in play here though.
First, this kinda has, “if millennials just didn’t drink Starbucks they could afford rent” energy. Would it make a difference? Maybe. But in the grand scheme what it would do is just take away something they enjoy, while they remain unable to make their student loan payments, much less but a house. The actual problems are more systematic, and the “don’t buy Starbucks” argument is to some degree just a distraction from fixing those more systematic problems (or an intentional effort to divide people so they can’t cooperate to fix those systematic issues.)
Second, I think you’re maybe exhibiting a little bit more brinkmanship than is warrented. It’s important to care about the environment, and there’s obviously a ton that needs to be done there. But as you say, there are bigger and worse threats out there than people buying paper bags, and it sounds like you’re letting your existential dread over the environment sour your actual, meaningful interpersonal connections. It feels a bit over the top to “lose faith in humanity” just because most people buy paper bags. Most people are good people, and it’s not unreasonable for them to take small conveniences, even if those conveniences aren’t environmentally “optimal.”
I live in a state that has banned the use of them, so no, most people I know don’t use them. The people that said the same thing as you complained for all of a month before they acclimated to a simple fucking task. All parts of our system are fucked, but if it is a trivial matter to unfuck one small part of the system, then we should do that. And then fix the next trivial fucking thing that people say they would rather spend a dollar per bag on and argue for twelve hours about whether or not chopping just 14 million trees per year on top of the other billion trees we chop is all that bad.
This is exactly why I say I have no faith in humanity, your dollar a bag comment says more to how fucked we are than anything. People absolutely will not change. They will literally hurt themselves just so they can hurt the environment because ‘haha, I forget sometimes so I don’t want to try.’ Even when presented with the evidence they ask for on the environmental impacts, they will say ‘worse than I expected, but not that bad when everything else is shit.’ I’m tired of everything being shit. And I’m tired of people saying, oh it’s a just a little shit. Quit accepting shit people. And don’t buy starbucks, because it’s shit coffee from a shit company.
The timber part is no big deal - it’s all farmed trees and sawmill waste product. The water and energy use to make them, store them, ship them is more significant.
I dunno not being willing to even carry bags, things that are literally made for carrying, kinda seems like a you problem rather than a first world problem. Like there’s the regular biases toward convenience we all have and there’s Jesus fucking Christ how are you this incapable of tolerating the most minor of tasks.
You know how you handle the onerous task of carrying a bag while shopping? You put the bags in the basket with everything else, put the food in the bags themselves, or just loop the handle over your shoulder.
I think you’re overstating my position. It’s not that I’m “not willing to carry bags.” It’s that I’ve weighed the options and decided that the provided disposable bags are more convenient, so I’m just gonna do that. I’m unconvinced that switching would do much beyond slightly inconvenience me.
And you say it’s just a “me problem,” but a quick and unverified Google search says that 70% of people in the US don’t use reusable bags (and 57% worldwide). So it seems like it’s not so much a “me problem” as a “literal majority of the world” problem. Though I’m sure it probably felt good to attack me personally, as that gives you someone to lash out at.
There’s a reason I only commented on the “carry bags throughout the store?!? not me” position. That’s the one that outs you as unusually unwilling accept even the most trivial of inconveniences. That you even include that in your justification speaks volumes about your personality.