Recycling is largely a scheme to make people feel better about themselves without actually meaningfully addressing their environmental impact.

If you care about the environment, BY FAR the most important thing you can do is reducing your carbon footprint. Everything else is really a rounding error compared to that. But that requires a materially poorer existence: living in a smaller home, eating meat less frequently, foregoing air travel, bundling up in the winter instead of cranking up the heat, etc.

Most people generally feel like we need to do more for the environment, and have a vague sense of guilt if they're not contributing. However, that guilt is not strong enough for them to be willing to meaningfully decrease their standard of living. It is strong enough to make them willing to sort their trash into separate bins. Hence recycling.

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nozzlegear 5 hours ago | parent | next [-]

I don't think calling it a scheme to make people feel better is fair. Grand scheme of things, you'd do more "harm" to the planet (however minuscule on the personal level) by choosing not to recycle than choosing to recycle; a portion of it does get recycled in the end. As for whether or not people use it to absolve themselves of environmental guilt in other aspects of their lives, I personally doubt a significant number ever consider whether or not they recycle when choosing to eat a burger, buy a big house or crank the heat.

	▲	bluGill 5 hours ago \| parent \| next [-]
		> Grand scheme of things, you'd do more "harm" to the planet (however minuscule on the personal level) by choosing not to recycle than choosing to recycle; a portion of it does get recycled in the end. Are you sure? A garbage truck direct to the landfill is less energy than a garbage truck (for what isn't recycled), and a second truck to the sort facility, all the machines to sort, and then a truck to the landfill. Now if only Al goes on the recycling truck this is a clear win since recycled Al much less energy than mining new. However for many plastics the value is already questionable if it is recycled, and clearly worse if not. (I'm not sure about paper or glass)
	▲	umanwizard 5 hours ago \| parent \| prev [-]
		> Grand scheme of things, you'd do more "harm" to the planet (however minuscule on the personal level) by choosing not to recycle than choosing to recycle Yes, if everything else were held equal, but it's not. People have a limited amount of energy to dedicate to caring about environmental issues; every minute spent talking about recycling (or other only marginally important environmental issues) is one we're not spending talking about things that matter.

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tmnvix 5 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

> If you care about the environment, BY FAR the most important thing you can do is reducing your carbon footprint.

And by FAR the most effective way to do that for the average person is to drive less.

Most people have no idea how far they need to drive to produce 1kg of CO2 (even though it's widely advertised alongside fuel efficiency).

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throwaway27448 5 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Surely there's no point in reducing your personal carbon footprint without holding capital accountable at the state level.

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tmnvix 5 hours ago | parent | next [-]

If I remember correctly, US per capita CO2 footprint is around 14 tonnes (this includes industrial activity). Average US driver of an ICE vehicle produces around 4 tonnes of CO2 per year.

Personal choices matter.

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	▲	throwaway27448 4 hours ago \| parent \| prev [-]
		I think the second half of your argument is missing. How much of that CO2 emission is even in my control? What is capital doing to reduce its end of output? What sort of mechanisms do I even have to control the economy? I can't stop american companies from selling out my grandkid's future. My parents couldn't either. Our economy is simply not structured to reflect collective interest. If you vote for a political party that does want to take this seriously, you get accused of supporting fascism. I'm not going to sweat recycling while our entire political economy makes a farce of caring about the future.

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bluGill 5 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Your efforts cascade. You alone mean nothing, but states and companies are just reacting to the collective wants, so if everyone waits for everyone else first nothing will happen.

	▲	throwaway27448 4 hours ago \| parent [-]
		> states and companies are just reacting to the collective wants Insanely naive take. They react to capital.

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like_any_other 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

> Recycling is largely a scheme to make people feel better about themselves

No, it's a scheme to stave off taxes on plastic packaging, or regulations to mandate glass. Which industry cares about how people feel about themselves, to fund and promote this scheme? On the other hand, it's very easy to point to the industry that benefits from continued use of plastic.

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5 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

[deleted]

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brewcejener 5 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

The best way for one to reduce their carbon footprint is to stop supporting large corporations. Unfortunately this involves not being lazy and we are lazy.

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umanwizard 5 hours ago | parent [-]

> The best way for one to reduce their carbon footprint is to stop supporting large corporations.

Not really, no. The carbon footprint associated with your consumption has little-to-nothing to do with the type of economic structure that provides it.

Lots of fossil fuels are produced by the state, some even in socialist countries. Burning oil extracted by Pemex or Petróleos de Venezuela releases just as much carbon as oil extracted by Chevron.

And high-quality grass-fed organic beef raised by your local rancher involves at least as much carbon emissions as the cheapest beef you can get from Wal-Mart. Why wouldn't it?

The issue is consumption of fossil fuels, not capitalism. Capitalism is indirectly at fault only inasmuch as it has grown the economy, enabling our consumption of fossil fuels to increase.

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brewcejener 2 hours ago | parent [-]

I didn't say anything about capitalism. I said this is our fault. It is a direct result of human behavior.

	▲	umanwizard 2 hours ago \| parent [-]
		Huh? You said it has to do with "large corporations", specifically. Which is not true.