It’s amazing how dependent our society has become on plastics. Imagine a world without plastics. How would we eat lunch in public? How would we be able to sit down, relax and change the channels of our televisions? If all the plastic in our world suddenly disappeared, we would be so debilitated that even a simple task such as getting on the train would be impossible.
Participating in the home plastics audit made it clear to me just how much plastic I use daily. Prior to the audit, I didn’t think that I used plastic as much as other people, but then while I was going about my day in school, the tallies started adding up. I wake up in the morning and turn off my alarm clock— the one that’s made of plastic. I get out of my bed and touch my glasses, which just happen to have a plastic frame. Then there’s my tube of toothpaste, the stylish plastic cover on my faucet handles, my toothbrush, and that’s within 5 minutes of waking up. Although the home plastics audit only took into account the plastics that we consumed, I realized that my life was way more dependent on plastics than I thought it was.
I believe that the way this data was collected was flawed. It only takes into account the plastics that one throws away. It does not distinguish specifically between category of plastic or size of plastics well. If a bottle has three pieces of plastic associated with it (bottle, bottle cap, and the plastic wrapper) and a person places three tallies in the area labeled beverage bottles, how would the data interpreters know the difference? And even if the person placed the cap and wrapper into the plastic fragments category, how would one know if the wrapper contained more plastic than the dense cap? The interpreters would not even be able to tell that it was a wrapper and a bottle cap at all!
Although this is a flaw, it doesn’t affect the main concern of this data collection: informing participants of just how much plastic they consume daily. It shows us how important plastics are in our lives. We begin to notice how dependent we are on them and then most importantly we begin to plan different ways on hindering our plastic usage. Although the data might not be completely accurate for definitive scientific use, I believe the numbers are enough to cause change in the way we view plastics and the issue we have with its waste products.
I think this data collection also brings into question the media’s use of statistics. When news channels state statistics such as “every year the average American uses 15,000 pounds of plastic” (a 100% made-up statistic) what kinds of plastics are they using? What sample size? Over the course of how many days was each person surveyed? What season? Almost anything can affect statistics, so clarification is necessary whenever reporting the results of any scientific study.
The home plastics audit is extremely important in that it lets all individuals track their plastic usage and create anti-plastic approaches that are specific to their own lives.
