Is Your Plastic Actually Being Recycled? | NYT Opinion

The greatest trick corporations ever played was making us think we could recycle their products.

In the Video Op-Ed above, we debunk a recycling myth that has lulled us into guilt-free consumption for decades.

This holiday season, the United States Postal Service expects to ship almost one billion packages — cardboard boxes full of electronics and fabric and plastic galore. And the Environmental Protection Agency estimates that Americans generate 25 percent more waste in the period between Thanksgiving and New Year’s than during the rest of the year, an additional one million tons per week.

But hey, most of it is recyclable, right?

Well, not really.

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[hapacooks]

Thanks NYT for this video! All, take it a step further - reduce your use of single-use plastics! Bring your cups, bring utensils, stop supporting Amazon and GO to the store!

But in all seriousness, it also stinks to have the burden fall on the consumer. Corporations need to be liable for more of their wasteful actions. I’m glad that more and more folks are realizing that recycling is mostly a myth. If anyone has ways to pressure corporations to clean - no pun intended - their act, I’d love to hear about them.

[av-icts]

this is also explained in “broken” on netflix

[RandyLy]

It's even harder to convince people, who want to do good, the dangers of "wishcycling"

[monstrellsf-w]

Proof that we need to utilise our Karens

[OGHiddenpaw]

If barely 8% is used to recycle. Why are we wasting our time paying for recycling taxes when we buy Sodas.

[haveaseatmarj]

Theres is so much ignorance. Knowledge needs to begin in elementary schools!!

[shawnnewell]

Michael Moore was on to this years ago. He quite separating his garbage. And to be honest most people have given up on it for the reasons mentioned here.

[clewis]

When are we going to make responsible for the entire life cycle of all it’s products - especially when it becomes waste (I.e. the end of the life cycle)?

[Jaguar]

Here's a fun fact... At The New York Times I saw a custodian taking the recycling from the bin and putting it with the regular garbage... 😅😥

[SuperBogey]

It's also a problem when the janitor comes in at the end of the day and just dumps everything from the trash and recycling bins into the same big trash can.

[mariaaldred]

It was not that long ago when there was no plastic containers they were all glass, cardboard with wax, cardboard, paper etc. There was no plastic bags. Plastic was pushed on us . We try to use plastic containers and bags over and over again before putting them in the bins.

[nikushim]

@3:55 the funny thing is that symbol there is not a recycling symbol, its a resin id code. Which was designed with the intent of being confused with the recycling symbol. If you see a narrow lined arrow triangle with a number in the middle is a resin code, it has nothing do with recycling.

[yahooo]

It's disturbing but also helpful to find out about what is happening to all the wastes we've been creating. Thank you for the video and creating more awareness on the issue and pollution overall.

[transon]

Or put a price on throwing stuff away, it worked for japan.

[AntonioLopez-mbjj]

It is messed up because we are trying to reduce our pollution . Hope all this gets fixed because it hard to avoid plastic. It even be if everything can be actual be recycled or be actual biodegradable . Also some old things like glass bottles they are still used in other counties the companies take them then wash and sanitize them, but I remember when I was little when I noticed the change is that if it falls especially by a kid or person with lesser motor skills it will not break. Hope like this video said better regulations on labeling and essayer access to actual recycle or have it be reused.

[sebastianrositas]

It’s always been hard for me to accept that recycling is actually being done after my fist job. I worked for sea world and they have bins for patrons to separate their recyclable materials and trash. Yet at the end of the day when I asked where do we throw the recycling bins they all went into the same compactor. Just a big front for them to show the public how “environmentally conscious” they are. Even though they claim how important it is for everyone else to do their part and recycle to save the oceans and it’s wildlife.

[markeasley]

Metal and wood based products is where we need to go. Canned water and paper cups and plates. People will complain we need to save the trees but its biodegradable and organic so we can throw those in a landfill all day, it's natural. Metal is actually recyclable and easy to recover, reuse, and repurpose.

[davidhagen]

Consumers need to purchase goods made with recycled content (especially paper and plastic). Until there is a robust demand for recycled material, the recycling system will struggle.

[alexsbikesandmotors]

I used to drive a residential recycle truck for a large waste company. We would go down a cul de sac where no one was watching and back the recycle truck up to the trash rear load truck and empty all the recycling into the trash truck and it would all go to the landfill. This was daily.

[주재현-gy]

Time tags for personal studying 😃
00:10 It goes to a separate place, to a plastic recycling plant, to a factory something akin to the end of to a factory, something akin to the end of "Toy Story 3", where they're all heading to this big incinerator.
00:22 Then I imagine that there's some large machine that just squishes everything together.
00:47 This is actually propaganda. We've been spoon-fed since we were kids in commercial after commercial.
01:43 You probably guessed it, minus the plastic that ends up in the ocean.
영상에서 "You probably guessed it" 하고 land fill이 나왔으니까, "바다에 버려지는 플라스틱을 minus 하고는 (매립지로 갈 것이란 것을) 짐작할 수 있을 것이다"로 이해하면 될듯.

01:46 To make it worse, we used to export a third of our recycling, a whopping 20 million tons a year and pay countries like China to deal with it for us.
02:06 This recycling shutout has cause hundreds of American municipalities toy cancel cut down or totally cancel their recycling programs.
02:13 We can't even recycle our milk cartons or yogurt containers anymore.
02:28 Let's ask the F.T.C. That's the entity set up to protect American consumers like you and me, by setting rules on consumer labeling.
02:53 Like if a shower curtain package says recyclable, but either the curtain or the package isn't recyclable, then that's considered deceptive.
03:08 Unless the bottle has a non recyclable wrapping or is contaminated with food.
03:15 Is anyone else totally lost here?
03:53 She took Keurig to court to sue them for false advertising
04:32 And now a whole bunch of other Kathleen's are lining up in a potential class-action suit against Keurig.
04:17 This lawsuit might eventually cause one company to clean up its act, but short of millions of crusading Kathleens and court cases, how are we going to clean up the entire plastic pushing industry?
04:35 And we need companies to stop hiding behind their green marketing ploys and actually deal with the plastic crisis.