On Littering and Confrontation
SniperGuy
SniperGuyGamingRegistered User regular
SniperGuyGamingRegistered User regular
So my girlfriend I were returning from a baseball game when I saw a kid climbing some stairs in the parking garage take a flyer of some sort given out at the game, and place it on the ground in between the stair rungs. His mother just sort of passively watched this happen and they continued up the stairs. I, aghast, mentioned to my girlfriend how horrible it was that a parent would just let their kid litter like that. SHe agreed, and we moved on to discuss what might be done about that sort of thing.
Here's my thinking. A great deterrent for something like littering, is having normal citizens just speak up. If you see someone littering just say "Dude, that's not cool man." I feel that if everytime people that throw their receipts on the ground had three people give them disapproving looks and audibly try to dissuade them from doing so, the rate would drop tremendously.
My girlfriend felt that it would have no affect. Anyone willing to litter at that point she said, would probably just look at you and say "It's none of your buisness" and walk off, or even haul off and hit you if pestered enough. (Not suggesting pestering, just a simple one line thing works I think). I suggested that perhaps the older folk who are set in their ways might be like this, but certainly teaching the youth to openly disapprove of littering would catch on. Peer pressure and all. Her response was that now we'll have a huge amount of overly confrontational children trying to shove their views down people's throats. I can see how something might escalate to that, but not for something as simple as littering!
And after all, if someone is littering it IS my buisness. I mean, it's my earth and city too. Plus, i'm the one paying the taxes on having that shit cleaned up.
I feel like as a whole, Americans (And perhaps other countries) are very complacent and uncaring about these sorts of things. Why shouldn't you speak up? Because someone might find you rude? That seems almost cowardly to me.
Obviously the whole "Speak up and not be silent" thing works and has ramifications for things other than littering too. Off the top of my head, those commercials about telling your shitty driver friend to slow his ass down instead of just sitting in the back waiting to die come to mind.
So, internets. Is it better to let the trash fall unchallenged (or even throw it away yourself) or should we stand and try to make the litterers feel awkward?
Here's my thinking. A great deterrent for something like littering, is having normal citizens just speak up. If you see someone littering just say "Dude, that's not cool man." I feel that if everytime people that throw their receipts on the ground had three people give them disapproving looks and audibly try to dissuade them from doing so, the rate would drop tremendously.
My girlfriend felt that it would have no affect. Anyone willing to litter at that point she said, would probably just look at you and say "It's none of your buisness" and walk off, or even haul off and hit you if pestered enough. (Not suggesting pestering, just a simple one line thing works I think). I suggested that perhaps the older folk who are set in their ways might be like this, but certainly teaching the youth to openly disapprove of littering would catch on. Peer pressure and all. Her response was that now we'll have a huge amount of overly confrontational children trying to shove their views down people's throats. I can see how something might escalate to that, but not for something as simple as littering!
And after all, if someone is littering it IS my buisness. I mean, it's my earth and city too. Plus, i'm the one paying the taxes on having that shit cleaned up.
I feel like as a whole, Americans (And perhaps other countries) are very complacent and uncaring about these sorts of things. Why shouldn't you speak up? Because someone might find you rude? That seems almost cowardly to me.
Obviously the whole "Speak up and not be silent" thing works and has ramifications for things other than littering too. Off the top of my head, those commercials about telling your shitty driver friend to slow his ass down instead of just sitting in the back waiting to die come to mind.
So, internets. Is it better to let the trash fall unchallenged (or even throw it away yourself) or should we stand and try to make the litterers feel awkward?
SniperGuy on
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Let me say, though, that the city has as much responsibility to prevent litter as your average citizen. I've lived in the same city for 30 years now and at some point a few years ago, the sanitation geniuses here decided to save money by minimizing routes and removing the public garbage cans on every corner meaning that if you were a pedestrian and you had garbage in your hand, you'd have to carry it around with you like an opossum.
As a method of protest, if I had crap in my hand and I was in an area that used to have a garbage can but no longer did because the city decided sanitation and hygiene weren't important, I would go chuck my shit right there anyway. On purpose. Nothing too terrible or dirty but if I had to wipe my face with a napkin and the city expected me to hold a soggy, ketchup-and-mustard filled napkin for 2 miles because they were too cheap to maintain proper sanitation routes in my city, then fuck them.
I know I'm going to take a lot of shit for that, but it's the truth. I don't do it anymore, but I was infuriated at the city's actions and I didn't know what else to do.
My point is this: if you do have a proper sanitation system in place, I agree with you 100% SniperGuy. Though I don't necessarily feel it is up to the citizenry to police each other, I wouldn't find anything wrong with you suggesting people be less lazy and more hygienic. But I do think it is ultimately the city's responsibility to (a) enforce their sanitation ordinances and (b) provide a proper sanitation system. I guess it depends on where you live.
Good luck with that.
Arch,
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t_goGR39m2k
I'd be more annoyed at the people handing out the flyers, frankly. Flyering is a nuisance.
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
When you throw away your dirt, do you care if it gets tossed on a big pile on the outskirts of town or if it's going to be melted down in a dirty factory or if its going to be shipped to some war-torn country where whole villages will make a living sorting it out? I sure as hell do not care when I throw away yet another needlessly big piece of package material, as long as I won't have to step over it again I'm cool.
On an intellectual level I recognise that it is important to discard my trash in such a way that neither me, nor anyone or anything else will be disadvantaged by it. But considering the amount of trash I discard throughout a regular day I cannot muster the motivation to improve my discarding practises beyond trash-->bin or in case there is no bin trash-->side of the road. End of the week the bin goes to the side of the road, underpaid trash collectors empty the bin in a truck painted in a cheerful green colour and drives off over the horizon out of sight forever.
That mother did not suckerpunch her child for not putting that flyer in a bin because she was not disadvantaged by that flyer being on the ground in a parking. If the kid had done that in her home she would have scolded him, but here - in the public space - it was none of her concern and she had a thousand other things to care about. If you'd sit with that woman she would gladly agree that trash is unhealthy and she'd wish we'd all just get together, make Cradle to Cradle a reality and never have to worry about what diseases her child might get from the amount of waste he will have to wade through in his life.
Basically, you're fighting against humanity's uncaring nature here. I could argue it's the same for all living creatures, as long as the nest is clean, birds don't care where their shit falls on.
*e: to take this rambling back to the topic: you won't be able to get 3 people together to go 'tut tut' everytime someone throws a flyer on the ground. You have to pay people and make it as easy or fun as possible for people to throw their trash in the correct bin.
eWaste, for example, was not a known problem till it was brought up - now I am concerned about it.
I don't know about confrontation though. It is one of those things that feels like it could go dreadfully wrong even in a country where people don't have a lot of guns. I remember having this exact thought though - I was sitting next to a guy on a ferry who was quite happily tossing individually wrapped candy litter into the harbor as we crossed, even though he was holding the bag for it right there.
But the mother is a worse person for not disciplining her child over that.
So far as reducing littering, well, a reasonably regular public education campaign and a focus in schools is probably as much as you can do for the encouragement. That will hopefully get most of society on board. The rest, well penalty fines and a reduction of excessive consumer packaging perhaps?
I certainly think the attitude to littering has improved as I've got older. I do not see quite so much of the blatant littering that was apparent even as a teenager. So something is clearly working
Aldo, "That mother did not suckerpunch her child for not putting that flyer in a bin because she was not disadvantaged by that flyer being on the ground in a parking. If the kid had done that in her home she would have scolded him, but here - in the public space - it was none of her concern and she had a thousand other things to care about. If you'd sit with that woman she would gladly agree that trash is unhealthy and she'd wish we'd all just get together, make Cradle to Cradle a reality and never have to worry about what diseases her child might get from the amount of waste he will have to wade through in his life. "
I disagree. I think that quite a few people and this person in particular simply don't think littering has any affect. They've started to pass this down to their children, this attitude of total not caring. Had I been able to talk to this person about it, it would have had little effect because I would have been the only one doing it.
And our society seems to encourage people to keep their mouths shut. If instead of apathy, every person around had reacted with indignation at the mom and kid, you bet their ass they'd think twice about doing it next time if there's anyone nearby. Maybe it's simply a matter of people not considering it a big enough of a deal to speak up about.
Very high success rate, and the worst I get is "well, I might as well chuck it on the ground since they're picking up litter anyway."
I agree with this statement on so many subjects, not just littering. It's a very common and frustrating problem.
Areas in the local neighborhood are constantly littered, and it drives me nuts to see it. I always confront people who do this. It's my world too, and I don't appreciate people tossing their garbage all over it.
Shogun Streams Vidya
Okay, thread continues.
I know it's a douche thing to do, but anytime someone leaves a flyer under my windshield I just pull it out and throw it on the ground without even looking at it. Sure I could throw it away, but that would mean it sits in my car until I get home or wherever first.
As far as how to combat the litter problem? Recycling. Where I live, recycling isn't encouraged or really even talked about. To actually be responsible and recycle you have to drive 35 miles out of YOUR way and do it between 8-5 Monday through Friday. I think giving EVERYONE a separate recycle bin would help teach people responsibility and, especially kids, would be less likely to just throw paper on the ground ("We should recycle this!")
In NYC, flyering is an exceptionally annoying thing. I could walk south 6 blocks (a 6-7 minute walk) and have 4 or 5 flyers shoved at me. They stand in the middle of the sidewalk almost everywhere and thrust that shit directly at your midsection.
I oscillate between deftly sidestepping them and stopping, looking them in the eye, taking the flyer, and crumpling it up in front of them before moving on.
I feel awful when I toss a butt on the ground, and I only do it when I'm trying to go into a business that I assumed would do the courtesy of having a ash try or garbage can outside, but of course, there's no such thing. I'm not going to carry it inside and throw it away in the garbage, so please leave us something to trash them in.
twitch.tv/tehsloth
They don't want to acknowledge this, but the real reason the public ban on smoking at the beach got so much support was because it drastically reduced beach litter.
I never knew people thought like this.
I don't really understand Drez's rage. There's ton's of trashcans in NYC and I've never lived in a city that insisted on cleaning each side of a street twice a week before, but whatevers.
When I'm traveling in poor countries where littering is the norm I still don't do it. I will carry my dirty napkin for a mile or two not to litter and the local people I'm sometimes with will sometimes comment on how much they admire that, since everywhere we go there's trash on the ground. This is especially true if its recyclable, no matter where I am I always try to recycle bottles and cans and such, and if I do throw something away that's recyclable I'll feel guilty for a while. In poorer countries throwing away a recyclable isn't a huge deal since someone will usually dig through all the trash to find anything recyclable, but I still always hold onto the item and just give it to them directly, I usually get positive feedback from them.
I should have specified that I live on Staten Island. There's no excuse for littering in Manhattan because, as you say, there are cans everywhere.
That's mean for no reason. They know their job sucks. Being a jerk is in no way "sticking it to" whoever is paying them to hand out flyers.
Fucking with people when they're working is not cool in my book.
Eh, depends. If it's a flyer for, like, a fundraiser for the Red Cross, that would be totally out of line yeah. But if it's a Chick tract that's being pressed into my hands you can bet that the motherfucker giving it to me is going to get the stinkeye and a theatrical crumple.
EDIT: actually Chick tracts are probably a poor example because on the two or three occasions I've seen someone hand them out or had them handed to me, the people doing the handing are fucking terrifying. I would not want to offend them for any reason, due purely to my instincts for self-preservation.
It's mean but not for no reason.
If you stand on the corner handing out fliers to passersby, that's one thing. If you stand directly in the middle of the sidewalk on 7th Avenue anywhere between 42nd and 49th street, then I don't give a fuck you are just "doing your job." You live/work in the city, man. You know what it's like. That's just obnoxious, like inserting yourself as a boulder in the middle of the sidewalk.
So is my behavior mean? Sure. Justified? I think so.
Even worse are the jackoffs that stand in a cluster and try to sell me their CD. There was a period of time - and they might still be there - where there was (no exaggeration) 7 people forming a blockade on 47th and 7th to push their CDs on people. They aren't justified in severely impeding an already heavy amount of pedestrian traffic just because they are trying to make money.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iGCfiv1xtoU
I don't like to confront strangers on stuff like this. You never know who is looking for an excuse to get into a fight.
Wrong video dude.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z1SiSUrvUnk
This is a pretty awful argument in my opinion. You are removing responsibility from the guy handing out the flyers. He took the job doing it, he obviously condones his own actions. The blame is on no one but the guy handing out flyers in my opinion.
"Just following orders" is never a valid excuse for anything.
That's easy to say if you have a job, especially in this economy.
Indeed.
Except for the part where I don't have a job, largely in fact due to my sense or "morality" if you will. I was fired because I refused to lie to customers. Because I know that in reality, individual responsibility is ultimate, the only reason this fails is because people like to pass the buck, which doesn't work out too well, except in preserving their fragile egos.
I don't want to go all Godwin on this, but on some level "just doing my job" has been fairly well agreed to not cut it re: what you are actually doing.
It sucks if that's the only job they can get, but that's not what this is about. I think it's reasonable to expect people not to forcibly interpose their bodies in my path to hand me crap I don't want when all I'm trying to do is walk from point A to point B. It's obnoxious.
If all these people were trying to do was stand off to the side and hand me something that I could either ignore or only be required to like move my shoulder slightly to walk past them, that's one thing. When people physically move themselves in front of me to hand me a flier? Well I'm sorry (really and truly) that they can't get a better job, but I'm under no obligation to just accept their excessive rudeness either. I find that excessively rude. Especially at lunchtime on a weekday in Times Square. It's like elbow to elbow pedestrian traffic out there.
There are scales here. You can't reasonably compare soldiers fighting for the Nazis to someone trying to pay the bills by handing out flyers.
A brief inconvenience for you could mean he gets to put vegetables in his ramen tonight.
If you agree that the credo falls apart at least in one situation, you have to at least express why it shouldn't here.
Also, context is important. I've never had to hand out fliers for a living. I don't envy the position. But I doubt that most of those individuals are told "you have to jump in front of people and force them to take these things."
So in this particular case, I rate my unwillingness to be jumped in front of over their job. Stand to the side and hand out fliers if you like, but you really don't have a right to step out in front of me even in the name of doing your job.