Most everyone today should have some sort of understanding of the environmental issues threatening to destroy us. One cannot turn on the TV without seeing a PSA extolling the virtues of wind energy or reinforcing the evils of 'clean coal .' We can't purchase a product without receiving some sort of message – subliminal or in-your-face flagrant – about packaging, CFCs and the new 'three Rs.' Yes, in gentler times reading, 'riting and 'rithmetic was the social message which got us motivated; but today, reduce, reuse and recycle has become the mantra for what will save us from experiencing the same fates as the dodo and dinosaur.Generally speaking, the idea of recycling is a great idea. No one in their right mind is about to dispute it. But when does the social consciousness become madness? I'll tell you when. When it's hidden behind modern corporate greed and the ill-conceived notion that we're all morons who can't control the innate urge to toss an Oh Henry! wrapper on the street instead of a nearby trashcan.
Case in point: my trip to the supermarket this week. It's been more than a month since the Real Atlantic Superstore – a branch of national grocery giant Loblaw, Inc. – announced their new plastic bag policy. Here's the gist: when you buy their groceries, Loblaw will charge you 5 cents per plastic bag used. Simple enough, right? The intent here is to reduce the amount of bags going into landfills – in the case of Loblaw, by an estimated 1 billion bags by the end of the year. Sounds reasonable, right?
Perhaps we should all pat ourselves on the back now, for being forced to participate doing our part in a green initiative to save mother Earth. Oh wait, see what I did? We're not being given a choice, even considering the options forced down our throats given to us by Loblaw.
Option number one is to bring your own plastic bags. You know, the ones which pile up under your kitchen sink? Surely they've been there, decomposing, since you moved them out of your university dorm and into your new house, and every house you've lived in since.
Option number two is to shell out a buck for nifty cloth bags at the checkout counter. It's reasonable enough. The bags are strong and somewhat attractive. More importantly, they're reusable. But the reality is, unless you're prone to hugging that oak tree in your back yard on a daily basis, will you really purchase ten or twenty of these things and bring them with you each time? What if your family was particularly afflicted with the munchies last week and this week you need twenty-three bags? Okay, you shell out a couple of bucks for the sake of the environment, feel good about yourself and cart the bags back and forth from home to store. It doesn't matter that you're gonna look rather silly walking into the store, arms piled high with black cloth bags. It's all for the good of the environment.
(Please note that, since the policy was implemented, I have never seen anyone walking around the store with more than two or three bags in tow. Which suggests either: a) no matter how environmentally conscious, they just can't be bothered to carry twenty or thirty bags with them, or b) they eat like anorexic birds.)
Before I move on to what prompted me to opine about this, it should be noted that the cloth bags are not without their own troubling issues. Contaminated with bacteria? Are you kidding me? Fecal intestinal bacteria? What the hell are they doing when they make these bags?
Option three is to pay the 5 cents for the plastic bags we`ve all grown accustomed to use. 5 cents is a small price to pay, and one could theorize that by paying the 5 cents, you are (in a retroactive manner) doing your part to protect the environment. Loblaw has already stated that they will donate what`s left after they make their money "partial proceeds" to the World Wildlife Fund. It`s roughly equivalent to the recycling premium most people pay when they purchase soft drinks and bottled water. That little stipend at the end of your weekly grocery bill that doesn`t really bother anyone. Problem solved, right? We can all go back to feeling like the universe makes sense, right?
WRONG.
Since Loblaw implemented their new policy, I've taken to patronizing my local Sobey's store, another large supermarket chain. Currently, my local Sobey's hasn't implemented a similar policy, although Sobey's in the Toronto area have, so it's just a matter of time. In the few instances when it was less convenient to shop at Sobey's, I hauled thirty feces-laden cloth bags swallowed my pride and set out for the Superstore. Each experience has been one loaded with frustration. First, if you use the regular checkouts, you're greeted by someone who doesn't want to be there a pleasant cashier whose sole purpose in life is to ask you if you wish to purchase bags today. Since I don't like getting chocolate in my peanut butter mixing my foodstuffs with dangerous bacteria, I leave the cloth bags at home and say, "yes, I'd be delighted to shell out an extra dollar twenty-five for the sake of the environment." You see, I've been shopping for food nearly as long as the day I realized that my parents wouldn't do it for me anymore. After I moved out. Being a bit of a pro at this, I've already figured that my shopping cart today will require twenty-five bags, or a cool buck twenty-five. A small price to pay for the privilege of increasing Loblaws' already ridiculous wealth protecting the environment.
Imagine my shock when this brainwashed well-trained employee manages to stuff twenty-five bags' worth of groceries into ten plastic bags. Meat with my Oreos. Eggs with my bread. All crammed into these already-flimsy 5 cent bags. On the plus side, I saved 75 cents, partial proceeds of which would've gone to the WWF. We even lost some eggs a few weeks back because of this new sorcery, passed on down from the management at the Superstore to their minions. Reduce is a nice idea in principle, but in practice, it sucks.
Not wanting to draw the ire of the line of people behind me (all suspiciously devoid of their own feces bags), I kept my mouth shut and carefully transported my booty home. Grateful that a couple of eggs were the extent of the casualties, I went about my business and resolved to go to Sobey's the next time.
Alas, circumstances necessitated that I patronize the Superstore the other day. As I left the house, the few feces bags we own stared accusingly at me, surrounded by police tape and biohazard signs. I tried to ignore them because this time, I only had a modest amount of things to pick up. "I can use the self-serve checkout," I assured myself. I won't have to watch the cashier stuff my bag like my groceries are a china shop and she's the bull. After getting what I needed – six bags' worth of groceries – I went to the self-serve and waited.
And waited.
"This isn't right," I said to myself. Normally, the self-serve moves at a nice clip. I scanned the people in front of me. No little old ladies, no one with excessive amounts of produce that would require finding them on the system and keying in the code. A mystery. Normally, I like mysteries, but I did not like this one.
When a checkout became available, I quickly devised the insidious nature of the mystery. normally equipped with six weight-sensitive pads, the carousels had been reduced (there's that word again) to two. With a modest amount of bags and only two weight pads, I steeled myself and commenced checking myself out. With each new item I was greeted with the nasally computer voice. "Please place the item in the bag." I was trying! Really! But since I had to juggle six bags' worth of items on two pads, it was a lesson in futility, and had I eggs, I may have broken a few as a I placed bags upon bags, sweating profusely as I realized that impatient people waited behind me, invariably with more than two bags' worth of groceries.
Finally done, I heaved a sigh of relief and headed to customer service. The service rep was friendly and responsive and nodded knowingly when I began telling her how much her bosses' new policy sucks. She had heard it all before. All she had for me was a programmed response.
"You can always bring your own bags," she informed me, of something I knew too well. I shuddered when I thought of rat feces.
"It's not the cost," I assured her, keeping my composure because I knew it wasn't her fault. I even felt a little guilty about complaining about an environmentally-sound initiative.
Having said my piece, though, I headed home with my bags. After unpacking the groceries, I placed the bags under the sink, amongst perhaps hundreds of other bags, each which will be used. They get hung in our kitchen for trash, which reduces our need for traditional garbage bags. They get put in our waste bins throughout the house. They even get used for food preparation, when we make seasoned potatoes or anything else that would normally require a ZipLoc bag. They even get used to collect doggy poop (eww!), although I've been eyeing the cloth bags for that task. After all, what would be the difference?
Each bag will be reused, thus reducing the burden on the environment. Now that I pay 5 cents a piece for them, so what? It's still a good investment. Now, all I have to do is wait and see if Sobey's adopts the same policy here. Perhaps this is my big chance to revisit the fifties and start using my local family-owned grocery store.
I'm not above it.
No comments:
Post a Comment