To think mass balloon releases are selfish and should be banned?

[QuestionableMouse]

I've just heard about a mass balloon release in memory of some teens who were killed in a car accident. I hate them and think they're selfish; they're so damaging to the environment (ingesting balloons or the string can lead to a horrible death for both farm and wild animals, including marine life.)

The emoting behind them is lovely, but I hate the fact that they're essentially delayed littering. Releasing bubbles or seeds can do the same thing but without killing wildlife!

I'm against it too. Why do you need to do something that may kill something else, or at best end up as litter to remember a loved one? And filling them with seed is awful. Why should a farmer end up with flowers in the middle of his crops! Plant a flower in your own garden where you can see it, or a tree in one of the remember forests. I'm even more against lanterns. In my opinion you should even remove plastic/cellophane from flowers if you're leaving them.

Surely filling them with seed is going to mean it’s more likely birds and animals will eat them?

@LizardMonitor hand on heart, I cam say that I don’t know anyone that uses rhinos or tigers as a remedy, nor would I condone it.

Living in the south east of England, this is a dilemma I luckily don’t have to face often

I think some people are linking this with an accident if know nothing about... I was ranting on Facebook last year about balloon releases and it popped up today, hence the post. I genuinely haven't seen the news lately so if there's some horrible coincidence I'm really sorry.

Agreed. However we don't need new laws, we have too many already. As some PPs mentioned, it's littering, and merely needs to be enforced as such.

Worcester City Council did plan to fine people for releasing balloons, though I don't know if they went ahead with it. www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/06/14/council-killjoys-plan-to-fine-people-70-for-letting-go-of-helium/

I don't want to see people being fined for letting go of one or two balloons, I feel that would be too heavy-handed, but when organisations plan to release hundreds at once that should be shut down.

I agree OP, the environmental damage is unjustifiable. Also, you shouldn't just send seeds off anywhere - it is all just horrible, unnecessary litter.

Listen, my one year old son died suddenly and tragically 16 years ago. There is not a day goes by that I don't miss him and grieve. So no-one can pull the 'think of the grieving parents' card on me - I am one. With my surviving children we have developed rituals to remember their brother on significant anniversaries that do no harm. Children do not need to release balloons to remember beloved family members, there are many other ways.

I can tell you now, from a place of deep knowledge, nothing you do makes the slightest fucking difference to grief this deep so the balloons are utterly utterly pointless, don't really help anyone and cause genuine real harm and suffering. Please everyone just stop and think before you litter.

YANBU

Our local council has banned balloon/sky lantern releases.

@TheNavigator

Someone said children think balloons float up to heaven to their lost friends/relatives. Children would not think such things by themselves. Adults have made the suggestion to them. Wouldn't it be much nicer if those same adults suggested planting some trees or flowers and letting the seeds or pollen float up to heaven?

Releasing balloons intentionally is littering. Why would children want that?

The environmental impact of a single release of balloons does not register at all when compared to the lost 60-70 years x4

It's not s single release, though is it? It's on the back of hundreds (at least) of other releases.

It's selfish. There are many ways to grieve. This way should be banned.

The impact of the plastic bottles I pick up because people teach their kids to be skanks is also not huge. But it all adds up.

Dont litter!

There was another balloon release as a tribute to the three teenagers killed at a bus stop in Hayes.

There has got to be a ban on selling helium.

I'm with the OP on this. Don't get me wrong, grieving is a horrible time, but no way would I class releasing balloons as a way of dealing with my grief, it's a piece of man made plastic for God's sake, it bears absolutely no resemblance to someone's soul or existence! It's a ridiculous idea I agree.... looks all pretty whilst they are floating off then a couple of minutes later completely out of sight & the wildlife are left to deal with the horrific consequences.

YANBU OP.

I'm feeling nauseated at the 'food they never ate, cars they never' drove excuses being given now. Just how selfish are some people?

This planet can't sustain what we're doing now... to want to continue this eco-vandalism with a trite' let them grieve' is pathetic. I've got no time for it. Not everybody does this but everybody could - and there are plenty of selfish, entitled people who have been told of the damage to wildlife and the environs - and they just don't care.

There has to be a ban and I'll be supporting it. Be creative and compassionate in using props to grieve but be compassionate globally, which means not fucking up this planet for everybody here and still to come.

@LyingWitchInTheWardrobe you summed up my thoughts exactly. I think it's pathetic too & this kind of behaviour with the excuses makes me feel nauseating also. It's time people grew up & started taking responsibility for the state the environment is in and this balloon releasing crap is banned.

There are ways of expressing your thoughts and feelings that might not upset bereaved people who choose to release balloons in memory of loved ones. Calling them pathetic, selfish and nauseating and everything else I've read on this thread is probably not the best way to go about convincing anyone to change the way they commemorate someone's death, especially as families sending one or two balloons into the air seem to being lumped in with those who release thousands in organised releases.

Perhaps your energies would be better spent lobbying companies like BOC who sell fundraising kits complete with balloons and helium canisters for people organising mass balloon releases or fundraising to help researchers find alternative ways to cool MRI magnets than kicking people when they are probably already at their lowest.

Glitter, Death is a fact of life, it comes to everybody and at some point, every poster here will likely be grieving for somebody.

The 'choice' to release balloons is selfish. It doesn't matter the reason because the end product is damage. If you don't get that then you don't but don't attempt to silence posters who are concerned about the very real risk to wildlife - and people - if you read the post about the Chinese Lantern setting fire to a house.

You can grieve any way you like, for as long as you like - but don't impact other people's lives and livelihoods, animals, etc.

I can't imagine where your thought of fundraising to seek alternate cooling methods for MRI machines comes from. Do you really, truly believe that consumable and pointless balloons should take priority for finite helium gas resources? If so, then educate yourself.

My thought on fundraising comes from posts worried about the depletion of helium as mentioned several times on this thread. I haven't once said that I think balloons should take priority to medical use (or manufacture of TVs or smartphones or ipads or welding or scuba-diving or any of the other myriad of uses) have I?

My post wasn't aimed at you personally, although I did take words from your post and the one below it as examples of what not to call bereaved people making a different choice to you, albeit one you don't approve of.

There are other ways of sharing the important message about littering and the impact on wildlife without insulting people. Words like selfish and pathetic are insulting.

Glitter, we just disagree, that's all. I'm ok with that.

I find the wanton destruction and wastage of precious and finite resources insulting. That takes precedence over a condition that every single person on the planet will experience at some point or other.

This isn't a thread for bereaved people, posters who have been bereaved are posting on it. My views on balloons don't detract from sorrow at their loss. I'm sorry whenever anybody loses somebody they love, it goes without saying. The balloons have to stop and whether we like the way other people post or not, that is the important issue.

YANBU OP.

And I speak as a bereaved parent. Potentially killing an animal or person with litter is not the way I want to remember my children.

I'm actually agog though at how you think fundraising would do anything to increase sources of this noble gas though given that so many people seem to be cognisant yet wilfully er selfish in their entitlement to release these balloons?

The only 'thing' that is going to work is a legislative ban.

No amount of fundraising is going to increase the amount of helium or other rare elements on the planet.

Helium is an element, a by-product of the natural gas industry.

An element cannot be made by man. It's not a compound to be manufactured and cannot be created using any method. When it's gone, it's gone. There is no more.

Hydrogen is smaller and less dense, but it is so reactive, that it combines with so many other elements and chemicals, it's easy enough to stop it from leaving earth's atmosphere.

Helium is one of the inert, noble gases. It's so stable, that it does not react with anything and, therefore, escapes earth's gravitational pull. It can rise into space through our atmosphere.

Throwing it away inside a balloon which could, additionally, choke and kill wildlife is just wicked.

Chinese lanterns are fire hazards and the metal parts also cause deaths by lacerating animals' mouths or by being another choking hazard.

Demonstrations of grief should be for funerals and memorials.

Wrapping environmentally destructive flowers in sheets of non-recyclable plastic film, tying teddy bears made of non-biodegradable fabrics to railings and lamp posts and sending balloons into the atmosphere won't do anything except do more damage.

Yes indeed, Intelligent, wicked - and arrogant.

Maybe not arrogant, as the people who do it may not realise the consequences, but certainly an act born of ignorance.