NJ GOP really going after the big issues
- Thread starter NYShoreGuy
- Start date
You act like it's petty and there are tons more important things to tackle, but weren't there more important things to tackle when the dems put this in place. So you were ok with dems wasting their time putting this in place, but you're not ok with republicans taking the time to get rid of it. Ask most people if they want no bags and paper straws, they'll agree with the GOP. Paper straws are horrible and just about everybody ended up in a store without a bag at one point and either had to leave with their arms full carrying things or they just didn't buy everything they wanted to get.
NJ was a pioneering state on this. Once signed it did not take effect until 18 months after. People should be aware of their state laws. I like using resuable bags and have no priority preference on plastic vs paper straw though it is better for the enviroment to be paper oriented....so you thing NJ GOP gonna flip state house and senate but going on this on this new culture war?
You realize plastic waste is bad though, right? That the plastic waste just ends up leeching into everything?
We should be doing more to reduce the amount of plastic waste, not going backwards.
Bottles are more difficult for a variety of reasons, but that’s why you start with the smaller things. Get people used to the idea that plastic is bad (because it is) so they will be open to doing more.
Unfortunately people just can’t take a small inconvenience. I hate paper straws, so i don’t use them. If I forget a bag, my groceries go from the cart to the car. Really not that big of a deal. Also prefer seeing less plastic bags on the side of the roads as well.
we draw the lines at plastic bags and straws? Nothing like getting a plastic cup at Starbucks for your iced tea and drinking it with a paper straw. Cup ok, straw bad. Or buying 5 Gatorade’s in plastic bottles but I can’t get a plastic bag to carry them out in? What a joke
and what happens when you get a call from the wife to pick up 3 bags of ice and 6 drinks from 7-11, no cart. You take 3-4 trips.
The horror. How often does this happen to you?
You figure it out. It’s a mild inconvenience.
To switch out the billions of bottles produced per year for glass? Harder than you think. You don’t just change the setting from plastic to glass…
Basically every time I go shopping. I don’t carry bags with me for the hell of it.
Any reason why all these places like dunkin and Starbucks don’t use paper cups for their cold drinks? They have them in stock since they use them for hot drinks.
They switched out glass for plastic pretty damn quick when they found out how much cheaper it is. Glass is heavier so more money to transport and glass breaks. Neither of which is something ceo’s want to hear.
Heck we’re not even switching out plastic cups for paper cups. It’s all about picking and choosing where they want to make a political move and for some reason it’s straws and bags.
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Yes, because idiots will stomp their feet and whine that their drinking experience is slightly worse than it used to be and they can’t deal with that.
Exactly. That’s part of the reason why it’s not easy to switch.
It’s more expensive, and that cost has to go to the consumer and they don’t want consumption to decrease. It’s the right thing to do, but the public has to be on board and willing to pay for it.
Bags were easy to stop because we can adapt quickly. (Well some people can) Glass is not easy to switch to.
Love how we make the consumers adapt but when it comes to big business politicians draw the line.
Isn’t it equally good that people drink less soda if it’s more expensive? Sounds like a small change people can deal with. Or is that a horror?
So the companies are ok to deal with idiots stomping their feet on straws, but not cups. People are drinking from paper cups for their hot drinks and don't complain. Nobody complained when many businesses switched from styrofoam to paper. You know it's not about customer reaction. You know it's about profit and not about saving the planet or drinking experience. They change the straws because it's a cheap way to show hey we're doing something green. And then you get a couple idiots who become loyalists because look how great they are, they changed the straw!!!!!
In the mean time, explain how come when you buy produce you bag it in a plastic bag?
I doubt you’re a pro plastic person with everything you have posted here about health and food, so I’m just not sure why you’d be in favor of more plastic bag waste is a good option.
Just so I understand what you’re arguing here, are you arguing that we should have more plastic waste, or are you arguing against incremental changes to reduce that waste? Or is it just politics?
Just so I understand what you’re arguing here, are you arguing that we should have more plastic waste, or are you arguing against incremental changes to reduce that waste? Or is it just politics?
I'm not pro plastic but I'd rather walk out with a plastic bag than let my drink sit in a plastic bottle for months. A straw is used for 5 minutes or less most times. Giving someone a bag who needs it isn't a terrible thing. You want to make a rule of no bags for less than 3 items, I can roll with that. I live right by a convenient store and see people walking out with their hands full because they can't give out a bag? It's just stupid. You know there are people in the world like Jim Abbott. We can't give him a bag? Or the person with 3 kids trying to to buy some things, we can't give them a bag while they got 1 kid by the hand and another kid being held in the other arm. WTF are we doing? I can imagine you with your kids when they were little in Disney, buying souvenirs and holding the kids without a bag. But it's an inconvenience for the consumer you don't mind, but make a real change like bottles.....no no no that's too big. Yet coke seems to do it quite easily for Mexico. When I do have a soda it's Stewarts. Glass bottle and cane sugar instead of HFCS. But literally the straw and bag thing is absurd. It's as insignificant as us watching our carbon emissions while China is 1,000 times worse and doing nothing about it.
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Go in with a bag if it's an issue for you. Adapt.
Again, the public is not on board with changing. That's the issue. Consumers don't care about plastic waste so we will continue to live like it has zero impact. Companies aren't going to do it if the public is not on board and the government is not going to do everything all at once. That's why you start to introduce small incremental changes that people can adapt to, then move on to the next thing.
People can't deal with the struggle of a plastic straw and remembering a bag though so here we are. Trying to undue something that reduces plastic waste.
1000x worse? Per capita, we are worse than China.
Plus they have been developing / deploying renewables at a rapid rate. and their renewable to total energy production is higher than the US.
You act like people are living their lives walking around with bags constantly. Is your life that planned? That’s not reality for most of the world.
companies are concerned about profit. The only time they are concerned about public concern is if it will impact profit.
Yes I am sure the earth is worried about per capita more than total volume
I keep bags in the trunks of my cars.
Yes, exactly. Companies will always choose profit over doing the right thing, which is why we need government regulation. The government balances regulation and burden to those companies and citizens.
Ignoring per capita to make an argument is pretty ridiculous. Of course China's emissions would be greater than the US when they have more than 4x the number of people.
Good for you. I choose to take mass transportation most places. I don't carry bags with me.
Bags and straws, what balance. And nobody remembers when people were bitching we're cutting down too many trees 3 or 4 decades ago. Now more paper straws is ok. Weird.
It's not ridiculous. We have more people than a lot of countries and because of that we bear more responsibility than those countries. And it works the same way, where countries bigger than us bear more responsibility. I'm not here saying Trinidad and Tobago is polluting the air more than us because their emission rate per capita is double ours. That would be ridiculous.
Yes, it is a balance. Is plastic waste good or bad? Should we aim to reduce the amount we are throwing away or no?
Split China in 4 equal quarters. All of a sudden each of those countries would be larger than us and contributing less than us per capita and in total of each. Did anything change other than China A, B, C and D now exist? To suggest that China is worse than the US in emissions because they are 4x the size of us is really just an absurd point to make, as if they should only be allowed to produce the same amount of energy as us with 4x the population...
Yes plastic is bad. We should go after the bottles, but we stop at straws and bags?
Their rules and regulations cover a much larger area. Their rules and regulation have more impact than ours do. It's really that simple.
Who says we stopped?
I would bet we will go after plastic bottles in my lifetime, but we're clearly not ready because people lose their minds about straws. .
They need to produce enough energy to meet the needs of their population.
Because their population is large, you think that each family in China should not be able to use as much energy as the rest of the world?
I'm hoping you know how dumb that is but just want to continue to argue the point.
You think people would lose their shit over glass bottles? People don't like wet paper straws because it's a crappy drinking experience when straw gets soggy. It's not about the environmental impact or politics. It's a shitty drinking experience.
The world's biggest polluter with about 12 billion metric tons isn't changing. That's kind of a big deal. But this is about straws and plastic bags and the amazing impact they're having.
So don't use one.... I hate them. I don't use them.
No shit. It's the world's biggest country and they are rapidly developing parts that were not developed.
You're seriously going to sit here on your high horse after the US went through the industrial age, growing our economy while being ignorant to / not caring about our impact to emissions and then expect other countries not to do the same?
Exactly. We know we need to eventually stop using plastic.
We started simple with straws and bags and people just can't handle the burden. Humanity is destined to make idiocracy a documentary.
I'm just objecting to them being "1,000 times worse" than us. They aren't.
They're not the good guys, but neither are we when it comes to emissions.
They suck. I've read paper straws create more waste than plastic straws because people use 2-3 of them because of how bad they are losing their shape and getting soggy.
Actually Russia is the worlds biggest country. China is not much bigger than the US. It's just more populated. I'd like to think people are more aware today than we were during the industrial age.
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Don’t you think in a way that this is why people are skeptical about politicians in general. This was legislation that really tracks from talking big picture and making material changes. Outlawing plastic straws was legislation to make some people feel good.
Haven't you been reading, it's a small step in the right direction. Every little bit helps. LOL
Instead of making a change back to glass bottles which wouldn't impact the drink itself negatively, they gave us these straws that lose their shape, taste funny and get soggy. They also told us carry a bag with you at all times. These are changes that people reject and because of it aren't willing to run with the idea that they're working to make things better. When they changed from glass to plastic, nobody changed because to most people they didn't notice a difference. It was pretty easy change for most people to get used to.
Honest question. If a politician ran on banning all plastic, would they have any chance at winning?
Wouldn't the other side campaign HEAVILY against that politician for ruining your freedoms to choose plastic?
Politicians can't pass bills that are unpopular. The public needs to change first.
So while I get your point that politicians won't push the bigger bill with more important changes, but it's not because of a lack of desire to do so, it is because the bill wouldn't pass and the public would turn on them and vote them out.
And every plastic straw you've ever used is still around and will still be around after you're gone...
Shockingly. empty land does not require as much energy as humans do. China has 10x the amount of people compared to Russia.
I was obviously talking about size by population...
And so are the bottles…..what’s your point? Paper straws suck and what’s the difference if the plastic that is around forever was a straw or a bottle.
Merge, you take things to extremes. No one is going to run on banning straws because it’s an immaterial issue. Making a big deal about plastic or paper straws makes the public question if politicians are focused on what’s important…. hence the 12% approval rating, Congress has.
So they should pass bills that no literally nothing? I’d rather see them pass fewer but meaningful legislation.
Thats lazy in my view. Do your job no matter how difficult it may be.
That is exactly my point though. I disagree that plastic waste is an immaterial issue. It’s obviously bad, and we obviously should be replacing plastic as much as possible to the waste will stop leeching into our soil and water.
The problem is that the majority of people do not care about the issue so politicians can’t possibly do something that would be meaningful there. so they start small with something that they can pass that will have an immaterial impact on people’s lives while waiting for the public to catch up.
That’s not how it works in practice though. If you push bills that are good but unpopular, you’re out of office and will be replaced by someone who is against the progress you want so what have you accomplished?
The public opinion needs to be swayed in order to add meaningful legislation.
That’s politics. Same can be said of real issues, the border, migrants, crime. They were non issues for democrats until election time and those issues mattered to most people.
