Your Trash is My Trash
April 17, 2006
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The neighbour’s children are practicing alcoholics. I spent my Sunday picking up the beer bottles, shattered glass, and remnants of lustful parties they have strewn throughout the nearby fields. All the while I muttered about “kids nowadays,” and how, “when I was their age,” I wasn’t such an insensitive jerk.
I got angry with them — angry enough to go for a walk through what once was wilderness and is now a wasteland. At the edge of Kitchener, suburbs are expanding into infinity and the forest is being uprooted to make room for a bigger landfill.
And then I stopped being angry with the neighbour’s alcoholic children. It’s not just the kids who are fucked up — it’s our society as a whole. As a society, we have a dismal environmental record: Canada is one of the largest producers of waste and one of the biggest consumers of energy on the planet. We are also unresponsive to any pressures to change our earth-ravishing personal habits: as energy prices climbed in 2005, we continued to buy more ferocious gas-guzzlers and cranked up the heat in our homes while opening our windows.
And because we don’t need anyone telling us what to do, we cut the funding of the “One-Tonne Challenge” program, the only environmental program in Canada that aimed to change people’s personal habits. When seen in this context, having the fucking neighbourhood kids leave their trash everywhere seems insignificant — we’re all out there smashing beer bottles on the pavement in our own way.
I think we all need to get angry about this and ride our bikes naked through downtown Toronto.
Posted by Tudor at 11:44 PM in Various Positions | TrackBackErm. Somehow I can’t see naked bicycle protests getting too many participants here… (;
And I agree with you about suburbia. I can’t even look anymore. I get so angry. It’s such a senseless waste and destruction. In fact, I get so angry I can hardly express what I’m feeling… which is something of a miracle ;P
Posted by: spindriftdancer on April 18, 2006 at 08:43 AMTudor! I totally agree with this post! We are “all smashing beer bottles on the pavement in our own way”. Here too, the forest beside my old high school has been demolished to make room for a Costco. There are piles of logs lying on the soil and fences and it makes me so sad. I was driving on the weekend, and my sister said something mean about some guy who had just blatently thrown a cup onto the sidewalk. And I thought… what we’re doing (driving) is so much worse.
And all those links… I am outraged. (I didn’t know about the One Tonne thing. Grr.)
It’s good to talk about for sure. And good to be aware of our own habits. I’m still trying to get into the habit of changing mine.
Posted by: oceanthoughts on April 18, 2006 at 08:36 PMit’s true, we live in somewhat of an axis of evil for development…but they’re trying to reign in the growth. and others are trying too.
some say it’s still not enough, but as sad as it is to say, dalton mcguinty may be the best thing that could happen to the environment in this region for a while…
…as for stephen hitl..harper, well…we all know how much good he’ll do
if you’re interested in finding out more about the kind of development that’s going on in your area, and if there are any public hearings, check here…you can always speak out against shitty projects (i.e. the big pipe)
Posted by: karen on April 19, 2006 at 01:21 PMI am covering the naked ride for the international media from the view of a naked rider!!! YES I AM GONNA RIDE naked and shoot from the BIKE.
Posted by: Daniel Hebert on April 27, 2006 at 01:52 PMI’ll see you there then! It’s good to see people will go (I was afraid I was the only one going from around here … hehehe).
And yes, I’m bringing my camera too. Ahem. I’m covering the naked ride for my blog from the view or a naked rider.
Posted by: Tudor on April 27, 2006 at 01:57 PM