a fantastic example of a letter supporting the ban of plastic bags posted in the bainbridgereview.org

Clearly, environment is suffering due to plastic | Letter |

February 2, 2012 · 3:53 PM

The recent proposal by Council Member Kirstin Hytopoulos that Bainbridge Island consider the banning of plastic grocery bags has evoked discussion and protest, much of it centered on the convenience of these bags, not only for items purchased at the store but for numerous uses around the home.

No one can argue that plastic bags are convenient and can be used for many purposes. But they are not a necessity.

In the 1950s, the era that many look back to as a golden age, plastic bags were unknown. Yet people went about their lives feeling no particular inconvenience. As late as the 1980s, European cities, including Vienna, provided no plastic bags for grocery or other customers.

Even in the most exclusive areas of the city, a customer was expected to bring his own bags to transport any purchases. People live very comfortably without the convenience of plastic bags.

Marine life, however, does not fare so well. Fifty plastic bags were found in the stomach of a dead whale that recently washed up on a Washington beach.

An area the size of Texas, consisting of plastic waste from throw-away cultures, now exists in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, growing every day as runaway consumption continues across the globe.

Plastic is ruining our environment, despoiling our scenery with roadway litter, choking our sea mammals with plastic bags, filling our landfills to overflowing, and poisoning our oceans and creatures that depend on the oceans for sustenance.

As plastics slowly degrade, their chemical components are released into the seas and into the sea life that consume the plastic particles, mistaking them for food. Finally these poisons return to us when we eat fish.

Does anyone think this way of life can continue? It will have to cease at some point. No matter how many well-meaning people recycle, the majority don’t. Why continue down a road that leads to even more despoliation?

I would like to see Bainbridge Island join other communities that have faced the implications of this way of doing business and have said no to plastic bags.

Abigail Nazareth, Bainbridge Island