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When you have multiple flights of stairs and you're buying 40 items, the bags become a necessity. I'd like to see anybody carry 8 paper bags full of groceries at a time. Keeping things from falling over and rolling around your trunk is also a benefit, as is containing spills. That poorly packaged piece from the meat department stays in the plastic bag but oozes right through a paper one.
This whole "many things don't need a bag at all" is a lazy, patronizing, one-size-fits-all argument. You want to go bagless, fine, but don't foist it on others, especially without walking a flight in their shoes.
I'm ok paying a few cents for each bag I use. Amazing how many people are pennywise-pound foolish when it comes to things like this, going through an extra barrel of oil in a year doing extra things with their car (and buying heavy-duty reusable bags that consume the equivalent of dozens of disposables) to conserve the shot glass of oil that went toward things like disposable plastic bags. How easily we forget that burying our petroleum-derived waste doesn't do anything to the climate.
Paper requires the manufacture of electricity-guzzling sodium hydroxide, which is why paper mills tend to be close to hydro power plants. Paper has its advantages, but don't be deluded into thinking that only one type of disposable bag brings a cost to society.
Paper isn't the only option. As others have mentioned, there are reusable bags. They cost a buck or two and last a long time, and can do everything paper or plastic can do. The argument for not using plastic is far-reaching and environmental. You argument for using it is self-centered.
I walk to get my groceries. When I lived near San Mateo and Zuni I used to walk to Walmart and now that I live downtown again I walk to the Silver Street Market. The reusable bags costing a buck or two don't actually last a long time. The seams come loose, sometimes right after you buy them, and they develop holes quite easily. They also get grimy and must be washed quite regularly, sometimes after every use. I use plastic store bags in addition to reusable bags. Reusable bags are obviously not as easily torn as plastic, but they are not at all indestructible either. Plastic bags help prevent the sturdier bags from getting grimy and dirty. I reuse my plastic grocery bags for my trash that used to go in the dumpsters at my old apartments and now into the trash chutes of my new apartment building. Many of my neighbors do the same. I will now have to buy new plastic bags for this purpose. There is no perfect option as far as I'm concerned and I don't know if this ban is actually a good thing overall.
When you have multiple flights of stairs and you're buying 40 items, the bags become a necessity. I'd like to see anybody carry 8 paper bags full of groceries at a time. Keeping things from falling over and rolling around your trunk is also a benefit, as is containing spills. That poorly packaged piece from the meat department stays in the plastic bag but oozes right through a paper one.
This whole "many things don't need a bag at all" is a lazy, patronizing, one-size-fits-all argument. You want to go bagless, fine, but don't foist it on others, especially without walking a flight in their shoes.
I'm ok paying a few cents for each bag I use. Amazing how many people are pennywise-pound foolish when it comes to things like this, going through an extra barrel of oil in a year doing extra things with their car (and buying heavy-duty reusable bags that consume the equivalent of dozens of disposables) to conserve the shot glass of oil that went toward things like disposable plastic bags. How easily we forget that burying our petroleum-derived waste doesn't do anything to the climate.
Paper requires the manufacture of electricity-guzzling sodium hydroxide, which is why paper mills tend to be close to hydro power plants. Paper has its advantages, but don't be deluded into thinking that only one type of disposable bag brings a cost to society.
I didn't feel Deserter's response as smugness but I do feel your response was somewhat arrogant. Deserter was referring to people asking for a bag for one or two items, not 40. I see a lot of people getting a bag for a couple of small items that could either go into their pocket of simply be carried - even up multiple flights of stairs.
At least paper bags, while they come at a cost, will decompose. Plastic sticks around for years and years and years. I use a cloth reusable bag - has lasted me for years and will likely last me years more - and the handles are a lot sturdier and comfortable than the ones on plastic bags.
It's not a case of just saving a shot glass of oil, it's stopping as many shot glasses of oil from filling up the landfill, clogging drains etc etc - plastic is a nuisance once it's been thrown away. If people had to deal with their own waste material even for a week, it would be quite an education for them.
When I was growing up, people brought their own (non plastic) bag to the grocery store. If you needed a bag, you had to pay for each one. I don't recall seeing plastic bags littering the street as a kid. I see this ban as simply going back to how things were albeit 50 years ago and feel it's long overdue. We did fine without free plastic bags back then and we can do so again.
I didn't feel Deserter's response as smugness but I do feel your response was somewhat arrogant.
That is the problem, people acting and arguing solely based on feelings.
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Deserter was referring to people asking for a bag for one or two items, not 40
I was there, and I stand by what I said. Maybe you failed to notice the overgeneralization going on.
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At least paper bags, while they come at a cost, will decompose.
Basis? If you go digging in landfills, you will find 50-year-old newspapers that you can still read. If newsprint won't decompose in an anaerobic environment, why would paper bags?
Have mixed feelings on it. Went through California's enactment; basically just paid more for plastic bags when I wanted them.
Even though the risk of a NM bag ending up as ocean waste is minimal, they do tend to be wind up as litter a bit frequently for my taste. But boy are they convenient, and it'd be a shame to get stuck with paper or nothing.
I feel the same. I understand the concerns about the oceans and share them, but then there are the positive things about plastic. We use plastic bags that are meant to be used over and over.This way we are not doing nearly as much damage but have the convenience of plastic.
I have been using a net bag and a reusable plastic bag for 15+ and 5 years respectively.
I don't understand how people think losing single-use plastic bags is such a dramatic decrease in the quality of their lives. You will adapt quickly.
this is true and we also have used some of the same bags over and over for years. One of our local grocery stores, instead of charging for plastic bags gives us a nickel off for each reusable bag. It isn't much but does encourage depending on reusable bags.
I just went to a talk about the recycling in our city....why so little is recyclable any more ..the Chinese quit buying, and it’s cheaper to make new glass than recycle old.
The mayor happened to be there, and I asked him why more isn’t required of businesses to use recyclable plastics and biodegradable packaging. He said they hadn’t even thought of it.
People don’t like change. It makes us uncomfortable. We’d rather not adapt, than adapt, but that’s not a good reason why we don’t.
I just saw on FB that ALDI will be using only sustainable packaging by 2025. I’m not sure what sustainable packaging means, and ALDI is already a “bring your own bags” place.
There are all kinds of reusable heavy-duty grocery bags on Amazon. I got a set about a year ago and they are great. Worth spending a few bucks for something you like instead of buying a cheap and tacky reusable offered at the store. Keep the set in the car trunk, easy.
I still have most of the cloth bags from when this started in California around the turn of the century. Cleaning them once in a while is a good thing to do for the people who bag your groceries, at least. You can still use the flimsy plastic to cover leaky meats and such, don't think that was banned.
People will get used to no plastic pretty quickly.
Basis? If you go digging in landfills, you will find 50-year-old newspapers that you can still read. If newsprint won't decompose in an anaerobic environment, why would paper bags?
Zoidberg speaks truth. I remember fondly digging around under the Edmonds Junior High School football field bleachers for paper things of any sort. I recall reading football handouts to games from the 1920's and 30's. Incredible. You could still read them. They'd been sitting under there (the slats in the seats allowed them to fall down below) for decades.
It was a thrill for a 11 year old kid to find them and read them, as I love sports. Oh, technically oxygen was surrounding them - heck they were under those seats on dirt ground, just sitting on top of other papers. Oxygen everywhere.
People will get used to no plastic pretty quickly.
It will take whiny Americans some time to get used to what Europeans have always done, bring their own bags, and Europeans are far more likely to walk to the market and climb stairs than Americans.
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