To be annoyed that my dad barely recycles?

[Danceintherain2018]

He's in his 60s so not old by any means but he refuses to recycle anything apart from cardboard and newspaper and says it's a generation thing.
I know plenty of people in their 60s who recycle but he flat out refuses to go beyond newspaper and cardboard. It's not even that he doesn't know what he can recycle, he just doesn't care. He uses a lot of cans and bottles which could all be recycled.

Anytime I am round I take what I can home with me but it drives me nuts!

AIBU? How can I make him recycle more? He's having to change his kitchen bin regularly as it gets full with all the stuff he could by recycling.

It's always the little things that grate in the middle of the night isn't it!

[echt]

I'm in my 60s, but have recycled since whenever. I see he doesn't care, so unless you can radicalise his ass, there's not much hope.

By way of a stealth boast, my DD is housesitting where there are no recycling facilities. She drives home with a sack of the stuff every week to put in our bin. Well-indoctrinated or what? :o

[headinhands]

Gosh, pick your battles! My ddad is a sexist racist but pretty good at recycling.

[OneEpisode]

My parents are poor recyclers. They are good at reuse though. And don’t buy much new stuff. And don’t drive much.

[BlueBug45]

I've know and met people older than your dad who recycle everything. Your dad is a bit odd as things like glass milk bottles and glass fizzy drinks bottles use to be recycled regularly in the 80s so his excuse "It is a generational thing" isn't true as he would have been recycling these even if he didn't realise returning them to the milk man/pop man or taking them back to the newsagent was recycling.

Most of the older people I know who recycle do it in part because they have grandchildren.

On the other hand I've also met people in their late 20s and 30s who have refused to recycle anything. Their excuse being why should I do someone's job for them? I've not spoken to any refuseniks since some areas have introduced mixed recycling to make it easier and so leading to more people employed to sort through it.

[JennyBlueWren]

My in laws put all sorts of odd rubbish in our recycling even though I leave the clear list for them. At home they only recycle glass... they burn the rest of their rubbish!

Does your dad not recycle because he doesn't want to wash everything first?

[Monty27]

I find it very hard to bear when people don't recycle properly.
Mind you some councils will collect responsibly and some don't.
Plastic should be banned imho

[MissionItsPossible]

I don’t recycle much either and I’m in my 30s. Some people just aren’t into it, YABU for letting it drive you nuts.

[unadventuretime]

My mum doesn't do it at all . She lives rurally so only gets one bin collection. When my sister and/or I were at home we just kept glass etc in the shed and took it to a recycling point at the supermarket once in a while but she won't (& she's retired so not short on time!). It feels really wrong to me when I'm there and have to put glass jars etc in the regular bin.

[DopeyDazy]

67 and recycle everything i can we have a 3 weekly rubbish collection if you dont recycle its overflowing. Food waste is weekly and a godsend as we never get maggots now

[AhoyDelBoy]

@MissionItsPossible sorry but wtf!? Not being ‘into it’ is not an excuse not to recycle.

[FraxinusExcelsior]

We recycle everything. However a colleague who has worked in Abu Dhabi says that his eyes were really opened by the amount of profligate waste there. Not only everyone driving monster sized vehicles with petrol cheap as chips, but everything in single use plastics and no recycling going on. Just a society that believes in throwing everything away.

He said that when he came home it put his partly sorting box into perspective and he wonders why bother at all now.

[Calledyoulastnightfromglasgow]

My mum is the same. Refuses. To be fair, she also hardly uses anything. She says she doesn’t believe most doesn’t go into landfill anyway. I suspect she is probably right!

[BlueBug45]

@Calledlastnightfromglasgow it doesn't mostly go to landfill due to the taxes on it put in place by the EU.

Also how would people get clothes made out of recycled material, shopping bags made out of recycled plastic and toilet roll made out of recycled paper if it did?

The main problem is some of it being shipped to the developing world to be "disposed off".

[wheezing]

My cleaner doesn’t seem to understand recycling in that she seems to put all rubbish (in the bin liners) into the recycling bin. I have started fishing through the bins. It does make me think though that there must be lots of people out there who just don’t bother.

[speakout]

Agree- pick your battles.

My mother tries to recycle, but she puts all sorts of shit into the recycle bin, flimsy plastic, cling film, polystyrene.

She is also a rabid christian, thinks homosexuality is an illness, likes Donald Trump and thinks we should bring back the death penalty.

We still manage to have a relationship.

[Calledyoulastnightfromglasgow]

blue don’t get me wrong, I am an avid recycler.

But now our stuff isn’t going to China, where is it going? And furthermore, apparently one item that isn’t washed will contaminate the whole lot resulting in it being binned. Finally, shipping everything around the world, contaminating land and air and humans to process it, burning fossil fuels to do so doesn’t sound sensible either.

The answer has to be not to use it in the first place

[Shoxfordian]

Not everyone cares about recycling

[MaterialReality]

I recycle, but not as much as many posters here because I don't wash out food jars and such - if it needs more than a quick rinse, it goes in the regular bin. If there's any doubt about whether it's recyclable or not, it goes in the regular bin. I've read about large quantities of recyclable stuff being sent to landfill because it's 'contaminated' by one dirty or non-recyclable item.

YABU to be so bothered by it, in my opinion.

[bookmum08]

I sort out my recycling the best I can but then I have to put it in communal bins - so I might as well not bother. The bins are always full of everything and anything. Grrr.

[incorruptibledream]

I also couldn't I've a nat's ass about recycling. But then you only have to do a little digging in to what happens to all your hard work sorting and you'll see what a waste of time it is. If it makes you feel better doing it I guess there's no harm but it's largely pious nonsense.

[incorruptibledream]

^give

[MissionItsPossible]

But then you only have to do a little digging in to what happens to all your hard work sorting and you'll see what a waste of time it is. If it makes you feel better doing it I guess there's no harm but it's largely pious nonsense.

Exactly.

[BikeRunSki]

My PiL are in their 70s and are excellent recyclers/re-users. They recycle as much as they can. FiL is a chemical engineer though, and worked in land/landfill remediation/sewage treatment using bio methods, Reed beds etc, so he has a very educated and is experienced understanding of what happens to waste after we’ve finished with it. As he says “ there is no away”.

DM is also in her 70s, but also “gets” recycling. She has about 5 bins! So I am not sure it is generational.

[MaterialReality]

But then you only have to do a little digging in to what happens to all your hard work sorting and you'll see what a waste of time it is.

When my local council first introduced recycling, they gave us two bins to sort different kinds of recyclables into. Both bins were then emptied into the same truck. - and no, it didn't have different compartments or anything sensible like that. Fortunately it only took a couple of years (!) before they realised how daft it was and started collecting it unsorted instead.

[Onlyjoinedforthisthread]

I'm friends with a recycling coordinator at the local council she recycles most things but says they just need a quick rinse not washed properly and 1 dirty can doesn't get the load rejected.
We recycle nearly every thing we can, the council provide 4 bins and a composted for the garden so food waste goes in there, our general waste bin is normally nearly empty.