In the Bag

Something that continues to stun me – plastic bags at the grocery store. WHY do they even still exist? At my local groceries – BOTH the big Stop & Shop AND my hippy/groovy, organic, Vegans-R-Us joint – I almost never see anyone with reusable bags. WTF!?! They’re way better than those thin, annoying, can’t hold much plastic bags AND they won’t kill Flipper, Shamu or Nigel either.

Yeah, yeah, sometimes I forget my reusable bags but never when on a big hunter/gatherer expedition. Still, I try to always have a few in the car because ya never know when you’re gonna pull over for cake and cat fud – right?!

California had the right idea – ban the motherfuckers.

California passed a law last year that prohibits stores from handing out single-use plastic bags for free to consumers. The law was set to go into effect in July.

But the plastics industry and bag manufacturers have been up in arms against it.

On Tuesday, the California secretary of state announced that opponents had secured enough signatures to put the ban to a referendum in November 2016, meaning the ban is effectively on hold until then. (source)

Who was behind the derailment of the very smart, forward thinking, NOT onerous law? Why, that’d be one of those agents of fuckery – the American Progressive Bag Alliance. How’s that for a crazy ass, cunningly deceitful name. Progressive? Yeah, progressing to kill the oceans all in the name of the almighty $$$. Alliance? Yeah, allied to lie their asses off to the public so's they can keep their planet poisoning gigs.

“Delaying a piece of terrible legislation from taking effect … is obviously something that everybody is looking on favorably,” alliance spokesman Jon Berrier said. “There will be a very significant voter education campaign as we move into 2016. This is something the industry is into to win.” (source)

Of course, NOwhere was I able to find their reasoning – why the bag ban is terrible legislation. There is no good, real justification.

I only mention it but if Detroit, of all places, can start building hybrids and electrics, would it be so damn hard for the bag manufacturers to shift gears? No, no it would not.

Earlier this year, 13 sperm whales washed up along the German, North Sea shore.  And...

So far, more than 30 sperm whales have been found beached since the start of the year in the U.K., the Netherlands, France, Denmark, and Germany.

After a necropsy of the whales in Germany, researchers found that four of the giant marine animals had large amounts of plastic waste in their stomachs. The garbage included a nearly 43-foot-long (13-meter-long) shrimp fishing net, a plastic car engine cover, and the remains of a plastic bucket, according to a press release from Wadden Sea National Park in Schleswig-Holstein. (source)

In this particular case the scientists don’t believe the plastic was the immediate cause of the beaching. HOWevah, science dudes and dudettes have linked all the trash these poor sweeties inadvertently ingest to brain stress, which causes disorientation, which leads to beaching.

It is now believed that there are 5.25 trillion pieces of plastic debris in the ocean. Of that mass, 269,000 tons float on the surface, while some four billion plastic microfibers per square kilometer litter the deep sea.

Shoppers worldwide are using approximately 500 billion single-use plastic bags per year. (source)

Car parts, fishing nets, soda bottles, diapers, plastic bags.

I only mention it but, those reusable bags? They fold up pretty small and can fit in a purse or pocket. You don't need to leave home without one.