Today on the way back from lunch, Marc and I were discussing recycling/sustainability/social awareness/the horrible trash island forming/etc. That conversation reminded me of something that happened recently…
About a month back I spent a weekend in Seattle with a few friends – one day while waiting for my friends to get their food, I saw a lady drop some trash on the ground. I proceeded to watch this lady look at the trash she had just dropped, think for aout .25 seconds, then walk away from her trash.
So, I decided the best option I had would be to stand in position for the next 3ish minutes to see if anyone would pick up the trash. I think the pictures speak louder than anything I can say, so you should look below and draw your own conclusions.
The only thing I will say is on a sociological level…what an interesting thing to witness. All these people passing by who have either been A. trained to be unaware of trash on the ground, B. under the assumption / idea that someone else will take care of the problem, or C. …maybe everyone throws trash on the ground at their homes and I have just lived an extremely sheltered and sterile life.
Anyway, here are a handful of the pics I snapped in the 2-3 minute period. Yikes.
I think it’s funny how much time we spent talking about the big issues – and by we I mean the media…which translates into us, the people. Big issues are important, but it’s the little unresolved problems like the one shown above that cumulate into the large umbrella issues we are currently facing. Perhaps we should start small and tacklethe attainable issues first – perhaps with this method, some of the larger umbrella issues will more organically begin to resolve themselves?
4 Comments
June 24, 2009 at 8:41 am
I have to admit: I would not have picked up that trash.
Excellent observations though, my intrepid social anthropologist.
June 24, 2009 at 12:20 pm
Word. (= Can’t say that in the moment I would have stopped to pick it up either, as that is how we have been trained. If we all stopped and picked up the trash we saw…could you imagine? Well, alot of sanitation workers would be out of jobs, but we would have alot cleaner public places. HMMM. Something to think about! (and p.s. hope day 2 at eROI is going well!!)
June 24, 2009 at 7:58 pm
Ah, Kim Son! You are so wise!
I love that the garbage is RIGHT THERE!
I want to watch people with you. Keep posting pictures, I love it.
June 24, 2009 at 8:33 pm
…you called me son. perhaps the best comment i’ve ever received. ahhaha
and yeah. YEAH, people watching anytime, anywhere, i am there.