Trump’s attack on paper straws is mostly symbolic — but the plastics industry is celebrating: Trade groups are seizing the moment to call for fewer restrictions on plastics.
Trump’s attack on paper straws is mostly symbolic — but the plastics industry is celebrating: Trade groups are seizing the moment to call for fewer restrictions on plastics.
Trade groups are seizing the moment to call for fewer restrictions on plastics.
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My fuckin zucchini is wrapped in plastic.
My bananas have a plastic ribbon around them.
I buy these PLASTIC smoke filters to exhale bong smoke through, so it doesn't stink up my place as badly. They come in PLASTIC packaging, which is the WRAPPED IN PLASTIC, and the PUT IN A PLASTIC BAG.*
There's SO many places to fight plastic that make so much more sense.
Straws isn't it, fam. Plastic straws are the tits. Paper straws suck butts.
McDonald's in my area went from paper cups and plastic straws to plastic cups and paper straws. Huge L.
I am a leftie nature lover, in full support of plastic straws. Let's decimate the plastic industry, and keep straws, 3d printing materials, lawn furniture, medical supplies, and infrastructure. Deal?
Any amount of progress is good.
Have you tried to give a toddler a paper straw? They last like half a juice box. Subjecting adults to paper straws I can live with, but my god someone think of the children [sic parents]
Reusable straws exist. Biodegradable straws exist. Sippy cups exist. Teaching a child to drink from a cup exists.
In a vacuum yes, but the political and practical cost of this progress is too high. Our efforts would be better focused elsewhere.
Not sure how much "effort" it takes to make plastic straws illegal. No one needs straws to survive. You could just drink out of the cup.
First off, it takes effort to make anything illegal. Campaigning and lobbying are hard and costly work. Second, our "efforts" comprise not only the work put in, but also the cost of the results.
Plastic straws are poor choice of target. They're a highly visible point of friction to the average voter that can be used to easily sour them against progressive climate action in general, switching away from them creates disability accommodation issues, and the net benefit to the planet is tiny. Reducing plastic packaging or targeting fishing waste (as I've mentioned elsewhere, 80% of the Great Pacific Garbage Patch is fishing waste) would have far more of an impact, at far less of a cost to public support for our cause.
Ultimately the focus on plastic bags and straws is a huge benefit to the biggest polluters, because it keeps attention away from them.