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The Sacrament of Recycling
Office Christmas parties have few redeeming qualities. I maintain that the world would be a better place if the practice were done away with completely. I do, however, have a rule about never turning down free food. While standing amongst co-workers this past Christmas, plotting how I could subtly steal the entire tray of cannolis, some of our colleagues from Britain inquired as to where the recycling was.
One co-worker pointed to the holiest of holies, while beaming with unjustifiable pride. Mildly surprised to find that we Yankees observed the same religious rites, our British colleagues began inquiring as to the depth of our devotion. Anyone can recycle bottles, cans and stacks of printer paper, but did we recycle cardboard? The American congregation was unsure.
Bemused, but only there for the food, I endeavored to stay out of the conversation. I remembered Clark Wiseman’s calculations showing that if the United States were to continue generating garbage at current rates for 1,000 years, and put it all into a single landfill 100 yards deep, it would occupy a space of 30 miles on each side. This hardly seems a great imposition for a nation of 3.8 million square miles.
I bit my tongue as the self-flagellation of my co-workers continued. We learned that the British are far from perfect in their devoutness, and recycle only a fraction of their waste when compared to the Scandinavian countries. And yet the guilt of my co-workers would not be easily assuaged. The United States needed to take recycling more seriously, they all agreed. After all, we’re running out of space.
I laughed audibly, drawing the skeptical gazes of the faithful. I looked up from my plate, which was at this stage suffering from a distinct lack of cannolis, and decided it was best to elaborate.
“Have any of you ever driven laterally across Kansas?” I asked. Several smiles appeared in the room, identifying my fellow recycling heathens. “We’re clearly not running out of space.” The point was granted by all in the room, and the subject quickly changed. An awkward tension hung in the air for several minutes as some tried to continue small talk.
If this were truly a disagreement about efficiency or resource management, there would be no need for hurt feelings in response to a dissenting opinion. My crime was far more sinister. I questioned the instrument of their redemption and the source of their smug moral superiority.
Like most religions, the Green movement attempts to define codes of right behavior. It contains an original sin: Existing. The battle against entropy requires the consumption of resources and the production of waste. These actions wrack the environmentally conscious with tremendous guilt, which can only be assuaged with an act of contrition.
The ritual is simple enough, though lacking the entertainment value of firewalking. Sort your waste into separate bins, rinse the recyclable items clean, and put a can down at the curb weekly. Now that you have “made a difference” you can go about your day knowing that you are better than most people. After all, think of all of the trees you’ve saved. One doesn’t need to guess at the number, as it can be readily determined.
It is commonly believed that increased wastepaper recycling will save trees, and presumably result in a larger growing stock of forests in the long run. The adjustments that can be expected to occur in forest management cast serious doubt on this conclusion. About one-third of the pulpwood for paper comes from residues of other wood products, the production of which will be negligibly affected by recycling. The remainder mostly consists of pulpwood trees, largely plantation-grown softwoods planted in orderly rows and mechanically harvested as a 20-year rotation crop. Their small size—indicated by a fiber yield of less than 200 pounds per tree—contributes to the immense numbers of trees cited by recycling advocates as being “saved” from the woodsman’s axe. The notion that stately old trees are used for paper production is erroneous; their value as lumber or plywood far exceeds their pulpwood value. Increased recycling will result in the conversion to agricultural uses of some plantation forest lands in the same way that a reduction in the demand for bread will reduce wheatlands, the possible result being a net reduction in the nation’s forest inventory.
None. You saved no trees.
Recycling is not inherently foolish. Many companies profitably recycled things like paper before governments began mandating the activity. And there are certainly environments (like a spacecraft) where the benefits of recycling vastly outweigh the costs. But what should be a cost-benefit analysis performed by individuals in a market place has become an article of faith enforced with social norms,rather than reason and evidence.
This has become a bit of a running gag when I’m at friend’s houses. I ask where the trash is so that I can throw away the can of soda I am holding, only to have my friend look down with disapproval, raise one figure into the air, and, with a pained expression on their face say, “Actually, we recycle.” Their concern for my soul is written clearly across their faces. Will this be the moment where I accept the redemptive powers of recycling into my heart?
“That’s neat.” I say while throwing the can in the trash. “Now let me tell you about Scientology.”
I’m a big hit at parties.
Published in General
Love it.
All this recycling mania rather calls to mind yet another of Mao’s disastrous blunders, the Great Leap Forward as it was known.
Desperate to industrialize Mao ordered hundreds of thousands of backyard furnaces built across the land in hopes of massively increasing China’s steel production. Countless pots, pans and any other metal artifacts that weren’t nailed down ended up being recycled in order to meet the impossible quotas demanded of the mad Chairman. Of course steel produced in such primitive conditions was almost completely useless yet the effort continued unabated for years.
我们同矿石一起炼成钢 – We and ore together make steel!
…and now…
Hmm… I think their old propaganda posters were of a bit higher quality.
At work, every desk has two small garbage cans, one for regular garbage and a blue one for recycling. On the nights that I end up working late I get to see our cleaning crew in action. After exchanging Hola’s with the cleaning lady I watch her dump the contents of both cans into one garbage bag. Oh well, at least the folks that go home at a normal hour can feel as though they fulfilled their sacrament.
I assume you’ve seen Penn and Teller on Recycling is [expletive deleted]?
This [expletive deleted] heresy even infects my church lady friends. I tell them, “As long as you recycle your metals, you can receive absolution for the other stuff.”
What I don’t understand is, as our green-conscious packaging has been minimized, it’s also become impenetrable. What’s that about?
If the zombie apocalypse happens tomorrow and I don’t have a sharp implement handy, I’m going to starve from being unable to open the bags of life-saving potato chips I’ve been hoarding. We’ll all be found dead, just our skeletons, with teeth gnawing on the corners of unopened Lays bags.
I’m told just rinse out the containers and put them in the bin. Well, some foods require a lot more than that. Some take serious detergent and scrubbing. I wonder how much gas and hot water balance the loss of the container with a simple toss into the can. Oh and by the way, you can’t recycle pizza boxes, because they contain oils and food particles. Motor oil containers should not be recycled, but isn’t plastic made from petroleum? Is it better to clean out a paint brush or just throw it away? So many questions to ponder.
It not only has to be Green but Safe, and to be fair, the safety trend came first. Products remain safer when you can’t get at them, though that doesn’t factor in the injuries you risk by trying to get to the product in the first place.
They’ve even started packaging seedless cucumbers in a sort of hardened, shrink-wrapped condom to… keep you safe from the cucumber? Keep the cucumber safe from you? I hope the latter, since I’d rather not contemplate what kind of damage people expect from a seedless cucumber.
As Dave Barry put it,
Recycling cans is the worst. Hey, here’s a garbage bag full of 1-2 week-old saliva rimmed cylinders!
Wanna fish around in it?
Frank, this is the best Ricochet post I’ve read in a long time. I mean, a long time. I think it should get promoted to the member feed.
*Batteries not included
**Spring-loaded shears recommended to remove doll from package
“That’s neat.” I say while throwing the can in the trash. “Now let me tell you about Scientology.”
I love this post. You are clearly a realist if not a pessimist. One of my best friends is a trial lawyer ( although I am a physician, I live a life filled with diversity). He went bankrupt a few years ago by putting his entire life savings into building a commercial green building. Gavin Newsome was at the grand opening and everyone praised my friend for his commitment to the planet but the banks took over his life 18 months later. At dinner one night he made the sort of statement that you describe and I said that from what I had read the only material that makes economic or ecologic sense is recyling aluminum. He was more than incredulous but that is why he is bankrupt and I am not.
Walk in the light of Mother Gaea my son and you shall be saved.
I’ve actually started recycling, but for two very irreligious reasons: greed and slavery.
We started recycling at work for 2 reasons:
1. It costs us nothing to do so, we even got a discount from our garbage hauler.
2. It keeps the more vociferous employees happy. They would visibly wince at our weekly cardboard waste and would not believe me when I told them that recycling cardboard costs more energy than making it new.
So we do it. It’s stupid, but it’s no cost to me.
that video was quite funny. Some of what penn does is kind of [expletive], but in this case (and actually many other cases), I agree.
The paper picture is even better than that. Here in Oregon we have giant poplar farms that grow a tree to harvest in less than 12 years. There is a farm in Eastern Oregon over 18,000 acres large and is home to over 5 million trees. It is quite a cool little micro-ecosystem they have created for themselves over there. Most of the green circles in this photo are trees (and it covers only a tiny little bit of Oregon).
I will not though that recycling can make actaul financial sense as it is much more energy efficient to recycle paper then to make new paper.
When I moved to Seattle we had some friends over and I got “the look” when they asked where the recycle bin was. They took their aluminum cans home with them. I can remember thinking, “what the *&%$ did I get myself into moving up here?” It became one of those things I gave into eventually just to save my wife the awkwardness around her co-workers who we spent a lot of time around. I’ve got no problem with recycling, we should be good stewards, but having someone demand I do it like it’s some moral issue makes me want to go to parties at their houses just so I can un-separate their garbage when they’re not looking.
We live in the Seattle area, where they take recycling to new heights (or depths). In Seattle, it is ILLEGAL to throw away “compostable” food scraps, and the garbage collectors are allowed to open your garbage and look to see if you are throwing away anything that must be composted. If they decide that you have, they fine you. Want to know why we don’t live in Seattle?
Cans and many types of bottles in Michigan have a $0.10 deposit. No way am I losing a dime.
So this must be why Seattle can’t dig a tunnel. They are too busy snooping in your garbage.
My grandparents in Toledo would collect all bottles and cans, then drive over the border and get the deposits. You guys are suckers.
I tell the same story over and over – never throw it out.
That deposit contributed greatly to and end of summer staff party when I worked at summer camp up there. Sometimes to my smoking habit too. Trade offs.
Wow.. a lot of heat on this topic. If I may differ gently…
I do recycle for a number of reasons, none of which are about personal virtue or saving the earth. My reason is primarily to avoid squandering valuuable materials.
Like previous commenters I object to mandated recycling with onerous sorting requirements. But, where the value of recovered material justifies the collection cost and the sorting requirment is modest I’m happy to participate.
As someone already posted, it’s worth a watch: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rExEVZlQia4
Now, now, we aren’t exactly suckers.
We’re screwed. That’s a bit different.
Happy Valentines Day, Ricochet!
There are a great many parts to this, but to the extend that recycling is useful, it will be done voluntarily. A good 40% of what you are putting into recycling bins ends up in landfills anyway. So observations like “My recycling is twice the size of my trash” are hugely misleading.
Like FM radio.
Gas is $2.00 a gallon. How far is the turn in and how’s your car’s gas mileage?
Well, first, we seldom actually drink sodas or the things that come in such bottles or cans, and secondly, the deposit centers are at all grocery stores, so you bring them in, the machine gives a receipt, and you get it off your grocery bill. It’s definitely an easy system.Since we’re going to the market anyway, no big deal. I will admit though, that since we do it so little, when we do have a can or bottle to take in, my wife will often forget it for a few weeks before remembering.
That said, I doubt that it does much, other than getting trash pickers interested in ensuring roadsides are cleaner.