I am a hippy at heart. I love peace signs, have at least 6 environmental t-shirts, and love to recycle. I can’t bear to see a pristine piece of paper perish in the garbage instead of being redeemed through recycling. I grew up in the green state of Oregon, outside of the hippy heart of Eugene, OR. There I learned reduce, reuse, recycle both from my family and in school. My parents had taught me and my siblings that we could do our part to help the environment by recycling. We had the means to recycle all plastics, glass, paper, newspaper, cardboard, tin, aluminum, etc. It was one of my family responsibilities to take out the recycling and sort each item into its proper bin. I remember awaiting the arrival of the recycling truck with colorful zoo animals on it each week knowing that I was doing my part to help conserve the environment. It was both mantic and sophic knowledge to me. I learned that it was a created scientific method that helped preserve the environment by reusing resources. It was mantic to me in that these natural resources are a gift from God and we are stewards over the earth.
What happens when you are taught a life-long habit, but then move somewhere where you can’t enact it? I used mantic and sophic knowledge to help get my new home recycling.
As much as I hate it, sometimes I am limited in my means to recycle and end up having to throw something away. I was thirteen when I moved to the “happy valley” of Utah and was horrified when I realized that my new hometown of Cedar Hills in the heart of the Mormon bubble did not have a recycling system in place for residents! This seemed like an oxy moron as the Gospel teaches that we should be stewards over the earth. What better way to be a steward than to recycle resources? This inspired my 8th grade science fair project entitled: Cedar Hills, UT a Trashy Community. Will it Ever change? For my project I surveyed residents of Cedar Hills asking them questions regarding a potential recycling system in the community. Most people wanted recycling. I shared my data (sophic knowledge) with the city of Cedar Hills and helped bring recycling to my community. Now we can recycle everything but glass in Cedar Hills.
Recycling is not a new technology but has been around for thousands of years. However, it was just enacted differently today. Pre-industrial times reusing and melting down items, such as metals, to recycle them was a common practice. However, after the industrial revolution came mass production where it became cheaper to throw items away. Is it worth the cost of convenience of filling up dumps with reusable goods?
Sorry for random font differences and space issues. I know little about blogging and ran into some issues.. Like why does it sometimes randomly make a paragraph a link?
ReplyDeleteI actually was going to say that the changes in fonts helped break up the texts kind of by topic.
ReplyDeleteI can kind of relate to this, actually. I'm from North Carolina, which is not as- er- "hippy" as Oregon, but we still recycle plastic, cardboard, glass, and some paper stuff. I was kind of surprised the first time in Provo when I went with my roommate to take out the trash and sort the stuff we'd put in the recycling can we had. At the garbage pickup place by our apartment, there were recycling bins for cardboard and plastic, but not glass, which kind of surprised me.
Kind of off-topic, but we were talking about recycling: does Utah do a lot of alternate energy stuff? I ask because I've seen a lot of wind towers and also some billboards about cleaner energy.
There are a few good intending wind-farms, but not many viable alternative energy options. There seems to be a reactionary movement to environmental consciousness from people that think that "God gave us this earth, let's use what we have..." Which is true! But that doesn't mean that we can't work really hard to develop cleaner, more efficient methods. I'll stay out of the recycling conversation, which I know very little about. However I will say that when recycling is available, I try to do so. It's also helpful when the recycling containers are very clear in what does and does not go in it.
ReplyDeleteBrianne! I know exactly how you feel! I feel the same way! I grew up in Concord, MA, where everyone is very "granola" and cares so much about recycling, solar energy, and organic foods. Growing up with that all around me made it become a part of everyday life--and a part of me! It was like something inside me felt obligated to recycle, not because it was law, but because of an intrinsic motivation within me that drive me to do so. I moved here to Provo when I was 14, and it was like I was thrown into a different culture...a culture that was being taught to find reverence in Mother Nature, but they werent actually doing it--exactly like you were saying!
ReplyDeleteAnyways, I think it is very remarkable that you went around your community and were able to get that going! I really look up to you for that! Way to make a difference!
I would be very interested to see what ancient societies did to recycle! Sorry I don't have any extra input or knowledge about this, but I am using my phone (because I don't have wireless right now) and can't look up two pages at once and research this!
I agree with Brenda that it would be good to learn more about historical recycling practices. When I was young (in the 1970s) no one talked about recycling, but they did talk about "conservation." So it's really a relatively new phenomenon. And, it differs a great deal across cultures. Third world countries are much better at it.
ReplyDeleteYes, Brianne, you deserve kudos for taking action in your city.