I have always considered myself to be a fairly well informed person. Throughout my history I’ve always considered the early adoption of good ideas and the prompt abandonment of bad ideas to be part of my genius. I know, I know it doesn’t actually take a genius to recognize good ideas from bad ones as long as you have all of the relevant information at your disposal. Unfortunately, despite living in the so called “information” age we seem to lack major bits of information that would allow us to make well informed and proper decisions.

Take for instance this new article in The Guardian: ‘Moment of reckoning’: US cities burn recyclables after China bans imports”. Maybe I could provide a link to this. Doubtful. Just look it up if you want to read it. Anyway, this article is about what happens to recyclables at a lot of U.S. cities. Apparently, it gets shipped to China and gets processed there and turned into other products or maybe they do like Norway and just burn the cardboard for fuel. I am not really sure as there is a definite lack of information about these things. For starters, the article is lamenting the fact that now that shipping these materials to China has already led to an increase in pollution or will lead to an increase in the very near future. From filling up landfills with recyclables to releasing cancer causing dioxins into the atmosphere there are grave concerns about the health of the public in cities in the USA and especially in those areas where incineration takes place.

The Guardian seems to suggest this is a very terrible thing. I agree. It is a terrible thing. I’ve always wondered what happened to these materials. Naively I have been just assuming that they have been recycled in a responsible manner where we are able to extract all the good bits and then somehow dispose of those naughty bits that have the potential to harm ecosystems. Actually, that doesn’t appear to be the case at all. Especially since we now know that lots of these things were sent to China, a country overrun with pollution, smog and health problems as a result. Certainly, if we can’t dispose of things like plastic bags without causing harmful chemicals to pollute then environment then China can’t either. All we are doing is just passing our pollution and chemical problems onto other people and harming them without ever giving it a moments thought. Why? Mostly because we lack the information necessary to even understand that we have problems or issues in the first place let alone coming up with solutions for those problems.

Certainly, we aren’t ever going to move forward and fix our issues if we can’t recognize that we have issues in the first place. Some of these solutions such as packing up plastic waste and sending it overseas to be processed by unsuspecting and unaware people who are being exposed to a plethora of toxic chemicals isn’t actually a solution but rather a reallocation of who gets sick from our throw away lifestyle. I certainly don’t feel better about a consumptive lifestyle if the person who is harmed by my actions lives in another country on the other side of the planet and speaks a different language than me. Actually, I think that would make me feel a hell of a lot worse. Innocent people who don’t partake in our extravagant lifestyle get squashed in the process is not an appealing headline.

So we lack information about a lot of things. Not just on this subject and people like us should know better but how will we if those who make these dreadful decisions keep the information relatively secret and we lack curiosity about these things anyway. We live in an era where you can get just about any information you want or need except the information that really matters. We watch these TV shows that tell us how to reduce our carbon footprint and all that but then they fail to mention any of the unintended consequences of our actions. We all should know by now that buying a box of cereal is just stupid on its face and that it would be so much more productive for everyone involved and certainly less destructive if we bought flour, cereals, grains, fruits, veggies, etc. in bulk and by putting them in reusable containers that we own. I mean, who still uses plastic bags at the grocery store? Everyone except me and my wife and her oldest son. It is just nonsensical and lazy that people still go to the grocery store and collect those horrible plastic bags that can only hold an item or two. Take your own canvas or even reusable plastic bag and stuff that thing completely full. It is easier to carry your groceries and there are no mishaps either. Plus, you don’t have to find a way to dispose of that wretched plastic bag.

Oh, one last thing before I knock off. Just because we lack information and sometimes don’t want to find out about the information doesn’t mean that we aren’t responsible for the things that go awry as a result of our actions. I’ve always heard that ignorance of the law is no excuse. Well, ignorance outside of our purview isn’t an excuse either. It is time to start stepping up and doing the right thing. The generation that developed this throw away society is just about all gone now and the only ones that remain are those generations that both embraced, advanced and broadened its scope are now in power but that is fleeting. Time waits for no man or woman. We all are just passing through and it is time to start cleaning up these messes and recognizing that there are consequences for unnecessarily trashing our environment. The solution to our throw away society isn’t pushing our trash onto other people but rather eliminating the trash at its source.