• skisnow@lemmy.ca
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    2 hours ago

    I was always given to understand that the straw thing was because plastic straws get out and fuck up wildlife, but that message seems to get buried in handwringing over climate change so often that I suspect bad actors are at play spreading all these memes.

    • TropicalDingdong@lemmy.world
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      1 hour ago

      Idk. It’s not at all clear to me why or what’s the point of these very performative acts.

      There is almost no way it represents any practical differences to wildlife. It seemed to me something companies could “do” as a form of visual way of communicating that they were “doing something”, and it’s something that was done in sync, with no real consent of the consumer. It’s not like people were driving this. It was very much from the corporate side.

      • skisnow@lemmy.ca
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        1 hour ago

        There is almost no way it represents any practical differences to wildlife.

        Source: your ass?

        Eighty of 135 (59%) species with studies reported in the literature between 1962 and 2012 had ingested plastic, and, within those studies, on average 29% of individuals had plastic in their gut.

        https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.1502108112

        • RustyEarthfire@lemmy.world
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          15 minutes ago

          That doesn’t really get to the impact of the plastic. Something like 100% of humans have plastic in their blood. It’s there, but mostly it just seems to be inert. There are thousands of problems we are creating that we know are causing widespread extinctions. I’m not opposed to reducing plastic use, but forcing a major inconvenience for dubious results burns a lot of goodwill. That’s why this is a popular wedge issue for the right, even though it mostly affects liberal coastal cities.

          • skisnow@lemmy.ca
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            7 minutes ago

            Something like 100% of humans have plastic in their blood

            It blows my mind how you’re saying that like it makes it ok

        • TropicalDingdong@lemmy.world
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          1 hour ago

          Source: the about an hour of research I did on straws to write the response. I mean I read a fucking thesis on it and probably 4-5 articles. I mean the links in there you lazy fukkah

          So maybe shove it up your ass.

          Oh you editing now? Go find evidence that the transition from plastic straws to paper has had any measurable impacts on wildlife.