Environment vs. convenience

Taxed, banned, then blowing in the wind: Why Toronto can’t fight its way out of a plastic bag, Nov. 28 The real issue in my eyes is that we have too much stick and not enough carrot in any positive communal changes. In the instance of plastic bags, it appears as though we’ve reached the end of our capacity to change. This is a beautiful struggle for our modern world because despite the discourse we know what we should do and the right thing for the future of the entire world will be to make fewer garbage islands in the middle of the ocean. That is the bottom line. We need to become slightly more accustomed to some struggle in our daily lives, and conveniences are going to have to be at least modified if they impact our world so negatively. Solving issues like these is a small step and we need to move past it. Let’s have a little less conversation and a little more action.

Andrew Sullivan,

Aurora Plastic bag companies are like cigarette manufacturers: they advance their business interests over the health of the environment and the body, respectively. What’s alarming in city council’s endorsement of plastic bag use is that they, too, have put corporate profit over the long-term interests of the city and the planet. And, as with the destruction of the Jarvis St. bicycle lanes, they are going against international trends toward environmental responsibility. Dublin, Mexico City, Portland and several cities in India have banned plastic bags. Germany, Switzerland, Italy and the Netherlands are among countries that impose a fee. The tragedy is that behaviour had changed. I had gotten into the habit of always carrying fold-up nylon bags, but now that I don’t have to, I realize I’m not so diligent.

Richard Fung,

Toronto