I have seen the technique used in another field. The US government set out to reproduce a foreign study showing a strong positive correlation between traffic speed and injuries and deaths. The goal was to promote speed traps. The domestic study disproved the foreign result. So the government quoted the foreign study and buried its own study where nobody would read it, knowing that the desired message would get out even though it was incorrect. Nobody bothers to read past the press release.

Gordon Brown announced last month that he would force supermarkets to charge for the bags, saying that they were "one of the most visible symbols of environmental waste".

Most people are symbolic environmentalists, not real ones.

This article primarily addresses the mistaken notion that plastic bags are responsible for vast amounts of animal deaths. Its secondary point--far, far secondary point--is the mistaken notion that plastic bags account for huge amounts of landfill space.

There's a hell of a lot more to know about plastic bags than that.

submitter: Everything you think you know about plastic bags is false.

They aren't made of plastic?

ZAZ: Most people are symbolic environmentalists, not real ones.

People, environmentalist or not, are stupid as shiat. This is a well known fact; so when a political leader or an interest group or a scientist misleads the stupid people to advance his or her own interests, I don't think it does any good to blame stupid people.

That said, opposition to plastic bags is a handy indicator that the person opposing them is stupid or deceptive.

More junk science? People jumping on the bandwagon since they are too stoopid to think for themselves instead of researching a topic? Say it ain't so!

Damn that powerful plastic bag lobby!

I don't know, nor do I particularly care what they're killing, but I DO know I can't drive to work, go for a hike, or even a walk through a park without seeing a half dozen of the damn things in trees, and bushes.

They're freaking everywhere.

I'm with Pocket Ninja; I don't actually remember ever having been told that the reason plastic bags are bad is that they kill animals, just that they don't rot and are filling landfills.

Prof_Moriarity: I don't know, nor do I particularly care what they're killing, but I DO know I can't drive to work, go for a hike, or even a walk through a park without seeing a half dozen of the damn things in trees, and bushes.

They're freaking everywhere.

Yeah, so are people. I agree that it's a good thing to reduce the amount of litter because it's a good thing, and keeps the environment, but representing it as a Deadly Killer is just ludicrous. If plastic bags were such inescapable killers, my Mom's cat would be dead ten times over, instead of just being a dumb plastic bag freak! *kneadkneadknead* Gah! He just won't stay still!!!

Everything you think you know about plastic bags is false.

So... it's okay for children to put plastic bags over their heads?

Cancel that trip to Toys 'R Us, kids! I've got a thousand hours of fun right here in the pantry!

BunkyBrewman: More junk science? People jumping on the bandwagon since they are too stoopid to think for themselves instead of researching a topic? Say it ain't so!

Did you even RTFA? It seems Pocket Ninja did.

They are also cheaper and more environmentally sound than paper. If idiots didn't litter we wouldn't have a problem. Also, they are recyclable.


When we burn up all the petroleum in our cars what are we gonna make bags out of? Plastics make our modern world possible, and the cheapest way to produce plastics is with petrochemicals.

Don't burn petro, make something of it!

What happened to the newer greener bags that are supposed to disintegrate faster due to exposure to UV light that were touted a few years ago? I remember seeing the ads at the supermarkets about those bags will fall apart sooner than traditional plastic.

Most people put trash in plastic bags. Plastic bags go into landfills. Landfills become full of plastic....

really another big issue is these damn cell phones. Why is it that a modern cell phone starts to fall apart after 18 months of use. It is a damn conspiracy i tell ya.

/plastic
//got nuthin...

Yeah, this is a bait and switch. I think most people are aware that the primary problem with plastic bags is that they don't biodegrade and are harder to recycle, unlike paper. And the whole problem could be avoided if we gave people incentives to bring their own re-usable sacks to the grocery store.

Sounds like they are coming up with a really complicated solution for "Brits are litterbugs".

The Rest Are Bait: What happened to the newer greener bags that are supposed to disintegrate faster due to exposure to UV light that were touted a few years ago? I remember seeing the ads at the supermarkets about those bags will fall apart sooner than traditional plastic.

That kind of falls apart (pun intended) when the drive to have see-through landfills failed to exist.

They barely even talk about plastic bags' biodegradability. I stopped using plastic bags and it wasn't because I was worried about marine life. (In fact, I had never even thought of that before reading this article).

My heart fills up like a balloon--and it's about to burst.

rorypk: When we burn up all the petroleum in our cars what are we gonna make bags out of?

Today's garbage dumps are tomorrow's plastic minds. Invest now, for the sake of your grandchildren.

mamoru: rorypk: When we burn up all the petroleum in our cars what are we gonna make bags out of?

Today's garbage dumps are tomorrow's plastic mines. Invest now, for the sake of your grandchildren.

Yeah. That makes a little more sense.

There are morons everywhere making these kinds of policies based on wild arguments rather than hard science. They're trying to make fireplaces illegal here in Socal. Yes, FIREPLACES. Because getting rid of those will solve our pollution problem, right? I guess the real polluters have too much political clout, so they're going after soft targets now. I doubt they even know how much pollution fireplaces are actually responsible for.

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-fireplace8mar08,0,4485269.story

Is there some kind of law that says you have to be functionally retarded to get elected into a position of power?

Should I feel bad that I burn all of my flammable garbage, including plastics?

Wow, as I read it even a greenpeace mouthpiece said basically meh, plastic bags are no big deal

"David Santillo, a marine biologist at Greenpeace, told The Times that bad science was undermining the Government's case for banning the bags. "It's very unlikely that many animals are killed by plastic bags," he said. "The evidence shows just the opposite. We are not going to solve the problem of waste by focusing on plastic bags.

"It doesn't do the Government's case any favours if you've got statements being made that aren't supported by the scientific literature that's out there. With larger mammals it's fishing gear that's the big problem. On a global basis plastic bags aren't an issue. It would be great if statements like these weren't made." "

When farking GREENPEACE says it's not that big a deal........

gonegirl: I'm with Pocket Ninja; I don't actually remember ever having been told that the reason plastic bags are bad is that they kill animals, just that they don't rot and are filling landfills.

So what? It's a freakin landfill. What the hell are you going to do with it other than wait for it to settle and then build on it. Who cares if they don't rot? Not like you're gonna dig it up or anything

When I was in Taiwan this past summer the stores would give you the first plastic bag for free and charged NT$10 (about US$0.33) for each one after that. The reason I was told was the dumps were full of them and they did not decompose. So everyone has shopping bags they carry with them now. It was by national law this was done.

I recycle all mine at the Publix here in Florida where they all have recycle bins for bags and egg cartons.

Seattle is trying to ban plastic bags as well. I guess I'll have to buy some bags to throw away cat litter.

Irving_Cohen: Yeah, this is a bait and switch. I think most people are aware that the primary problem with plastic bags is that they don't biodegrade and are harder to recycle, unlike paper. And the whole problem could be avoided if we gave people incentives to bring their own re-usable sacks to the grocery store.

Huh? They recycle real damn easy, and paper doesn't degrade in landfills either while consuming more space. Obviously, reusable sacks are very environmentally friendly, but if the choice is between paper or plastic, paper is absolutely the worse option. On an energy consumption basis alone, anyone who is concerned about climate change shouldn't be caught dead with a paper bag.

Without plastic bags from the stores what would I put my cat sh*t in when I clean the litter box? I need 2 or 3 of those bags a day.

The Rest Are Bait: What happened to the newer greener bags that are supposed to disintegrate faster due to exposure to UV light that were touted a few years ago? I remember seeing the ads at the supermarkets about those bags will fall apart sooner than traditional plastic.

One local supermarket has used lightweight recyclable plastic bags since the 1990s. There is a recycling bin at the store entrance. Another uses paper bags unless you want your meat wrapped in plastic.

I have heard the accusation that plastic bags kill animals. It has not reached a green frothing frenzy around here. It's just something people complain about once in a while.

I've actually seen these things crippling pelicans (2 of 'em), entangling a sea turtle (yeah, I saw a turtle), and at best being an eyesore all over the place. This was all about 25 years ago. Another quarter century of this has led to no laws, no bans, no activism. There are more than 2 choices; shall it be paper, plastic, or bring your own bag that you finally realised is easy to throw in your car when you leave your house.

/even China has banned these killer eyesores

ToxicVodka: gonegirl: I'm with Pocket Ninja; I don't actually remember ever having been told that the reason plastic bags are bad is that they kill animals, just that they don't rot and are filling landfills.

So what? It's a freakin landfill. What the hell are you going to do with it other than wait for it to settle and then build on it. Who cares if they don't rot? Not like you're gonna dig it up or anything

Not like we have a limited supply of landfills or anything.

Christ.

I think we've reached the point in time where we basically need a "Supreme Court" of scientific studies... Some top panel of 13 to 25 scientists who's job it is to issue the final say on the conclusions of the scientific information available to date BEFORE the government goes off half-cocked on bad science... and NO I'm not talking about global warming here.

Think about your average congress person - somewhere middle range intelligence (with a few "How the fark did that person get elected" types), probably well meaning, but hardly the type who can hash through scientific studies and really discern what they mean. Hell I AM a scientist and even I get cross-eyed reading some of these damn things.

The Supreme Science Panel wouldnt make any policy - just issue statements like "The data DOES/DOES NOT support the conclusions upon which the bill is based" and let the politicians decide if they still want to go through with it.

I was never worried about marine life. What bothers me about plastic bags is that one of their main components is petroleum. One more thing we're wasting oil on. We should be reducing our oil consumption where we can and plastic bags is a pretty easy thing to cut back on. Targeting big things like driving less is much harder. People are reluctant to make the lifestyle changes needed for some of the big stuff, but reducing our use of plastic bags is something everyone can do.

stevarooni: The Rest Are Bait: What happened to the newer greener bags that are supposed to disintegrate faster due to exposure to UV light that were touted a few years ago? I remember seeing the ads at the supermarkets about those bags will fall apart sooner than traditional plastic.

That kind of falls apart (pun intended) when the drive to have see-through landfills failed to exist.

I definitely agree with that idea(covered and no exposure to UV light) but I sort of thought it was a good idea for the millions of bags that are left to blow in the wind around the world and the ones I see wrapped around trees in the rivers I cross over everyday.

FTA:

Plastic particles known as nurdles, dumped in the sea by industrial companies, form a much greater threat as they can be easily consumed by birds and animals.

nurdles?

Retro: They're trying to make fireplaces illegal here in Socal.

If you get cold and have no fireplace, who would then be your sole source of heat?

Prof_Moriarity:I DO know I can't drive to work, go for a hike, or even a walk through a park without seeing a half dozen of the damn things in trees, and bushes.

They're freaking everywhere.

THIS

There's a place here in chico that's growing by leaps and bounds making bio-biodegradable shopping bags out of cellulose. Sence we in California all already have hybrid-fuel cell-hamster friendly caged gerbil SUV's, the next best place to wave the eco-stinkfinger in each other faces is in the supermarket.

ToxicVodka: Not like you're gonna dig it up or anything

Dumps in the 3rd world have whole shanty towns around them that do just that. I could see a time in the future that we dig them up just for all that plastic (when oil is 5-600$ a barrel). U know what they say about one mans junk...

Fizpez: I think we've reached the point in time where we basically need a "Supreme Court" of scientific studies... Some top panel of 13 to 25 scientists who's job it is to issue the final say on the conclusions of the scientific information available to date BEFORE the government goes off half-cocked on bad science... and NO I'm not talking about global warming here.

If you actually need scientific proof and legislation to see that the world gets uglier and dirtier every year, then the people in it must also be getting stupider and more selfish as well. Too bad consumers can't see this for themselves and do something about at at the 'prole' level.

Plastic bags are just the tip of the iceberg, and corporations must understand this. Do we really need a factory turning out batteries to power electric mocha latte stirrers? We're so weak and lazy we can't turn a goddamn spoon anymore? We can't carry some empty cloth bags to the store? Just put some in your SUV (not yours, Fizpez, I just mean people in general) so when you drive four houses down to the corner store for cigarettes (100% unnecessary consumer item that converts into 100% waste and poison, 0% nutrition or benefit) and cola, toss them into your own bag. Why is this so hard to do? Why is there a factory making money right now churning out worthless crap? Because consumers let them and then complain about it.

/Didn't mean to rant, just got on a bit of a roll
//going out for smokes

I did read TFA, and one part confuses me:

between 1981 and 1984, more than 100,000 marine mammals, including birds, were killed by discarded nets.

I went to public school, but even there I thought animals were part of their own taxonomic class separate from birds. May the author meant these?

farkplug: ToxicVodka: gonegirl: I'm with Pocket Ninja; I don't actually remember ever having been told that the reason plastic bags are bad is that they kill animals, just that they don't rot and are filling landfills.

So what? It's a freakin landfill. What the hell are you going to do with it other than wait for it to settle and then build on it. Who cares if they don't rot? Not like you're gonna dig it up or anything

Not like we have a limited supply of landfills or anything.

Christ.

I saw on Penn & Teller's Bullsh*t that the amount of garbage generated by the U.S. for the next 1000 years would fit into a landfill the size of Connecticut.* Not a small area, but relatively nothing compared to the size of the rest of the country. We're not going to run out of space anytime soon.

Does this include plastic breast implants?
They're Plastic bags too.
/I know they'll sure be the death of me!
// And they don't taste just like chicken either.
///trust me, I know.

1980's Environmentalist - Plastic bages are the savior of the environment. We can use plastic instead of paper. Think of the trees we'll save!

2000's Environmentalist - Plastic bags are the debil.

paper, plastic, or bring your own bag that you finally realised is easy to throw in your car when you leave your house.

I own several Trader Joe's reusable bags and it turns out to be quite difficult to have one in the car when I need one.

Wow, so a politician took a talking point and ran with it without doing his due dilligence. Sounds like they have the same problem in England as the do here in the US. Nobody really wants to fix problems. That is challenging, rather everyone wants to have little fixes which make them feel smug and supperior to others (ethanol, discouraging use of plastic bags, those new lightbulbs etc..) Not only is this ineffecitve, it is also counter productive. We all remember how the story of the boy who cried wolf turned out.

We see so many plastic bags floating around in the ocean that we've nicknamed them "Cabrillo Beach Jellyfish".

Without plastic bags to play with, what will the children do when they go to the beach?

Please... think of the children.

We have some strong canvas shopping bags that we use when shopping.  They're obviously much stronger than plastic shopping bags.  Our biggest problem is getting your average brainless bagger to USE them; the clueless morons have tried to pass them to managers, throw them away, put them inside plastic bags.

Anyway, how's this for science:
1) Plastic bags are made from petroleum.
2) Petroleum is getting expensive and is arguably getting scarce.
3) Canvas bags are stronger and last longer than plastic bags.

Are those better reasons to switch than "OMG the animals"?

MrStarbuck:

I saw on Penn & Teller's Bullsh*t that the amount of garbage generated by the U.S. for the next 1000 years would fit into a landfill the size of Connecticut.* Not a small area, but relatively nothing compared to the size of the rest of the country. We're not going to run out of space anytime soon.

because if penn and teller say it it must be true.
their show is just as lopsided as the a-holes they make fun of.

why can't we just make a biodegradable bag and end the issue.

starch based?

apparently no one here has their own ground water well, otherwise you wouldn't be so quick to keep adding toxins to landfills that then leech into underground waterways.