To ask what one thing you would ban to help the environment?

[AngryBirdsNoMore]

Following on from @GADday’s well meaning thread about disposable sanitary products being an option to phase out to help the environment - what one thing would you ban to help the environment?

Let’s not get into sanitary products again. That thread makes clear that disposable sanitary products are probably here to stay for a range of reasons…

Ill go first:

Private planes. I’m struggling to think of any reason why they’re necessary especially for short flights.

Scotland is trying desperately to do this, but it looks like Westminster is going to stop it. sigh.
as for me, I'd ban new oil and gas fields and make it compulsory for new build homes to have solar panels on the roof, coupled with some battery storage

Thecountessoffitz, if its too far to fucking walk, could you fucking cycle

As I said, the government would need to ban it because people won’t stop. Shops like The Range and B&M and Primark are the major culprits, and they won’t stop until they’re forced to.

I'd ban people who say whatabout China.
I'd also ban people who say whatabout India. Modi seeks a tap for every house, a very reasonable thing.

I wouldn't worry about the birth rate falling because a population of 8 billion and global birth-rate of 2.3 will keep us over populated for quite a while yet. There will be enough climate refugees to counteract the industrialised West's less than replacement rates.

Make public transport cheeper. that would get more people using it and less cars. Honestly we have had to drive into London the last few visits as the train was just too expensive for a family. We are less than an hour away.
Far too much packaging on everything.
Private planes need to stop, why can't every one ( including famous) not just get on the same planes? Ironically it's the people who use private planes who preach to everyone else about air travel too.

I imagine some people could and some people couldn’t.
Cycling with children who are young enough that they would otherwise need walking to school is not going to be an option that works for many people though.

The thing I would do that doesn’t involve banning anything is giving more help to people to improve the energy efficiency of their houses.
It is absolute madness that UK housing stock is so badly insulated and as a nation we are burning huge amounts of money that we shouldn’t need to if homes were all brought up to scratch.

The trouble is that many offices, even during the day, need lights on as not enough light comes in through the windows to work by.

Private jets

Artificial grass

SUVs

Cost isn’t what stops people using public transport. It’s too inconvenient.

There’s a lot of value in being able to get inside a safe little metal box outside your house, lock the doors and go directly to your destination. No harassment. No safety risks from waiting around in the dark. No getting cold and wet. No having to stand up. No missing the bus or it not turning up. No quadrupled journey times.

Balloons
plastic wrapping of fruit and veg
private jets

Right?! I am imagining a bunch of curtain twitchers who don’t travel, play frisbee (seriously wtf on the frisbee banning-that’s so random), have nothing better to do with their day than walk 3 hours round trip with their horrible eco-unfriendly but has good PR reusable shopping bags filled with sticky cans and bottles to recycle, while tutting at the nice family with 3 kids and a dog.

Plastic grass

I think you must walk around with your eyes closed. Open them and really look at all the litter you pass every day. It will still be there next week and probably next year. I regularly pick up crisp wrappers dated 2016, some are as far back as the late 1990s. If this is the visible crap, what else is in the air, the water, the soil that we can't see and pick up easily. And if we won't pick up the stuff that is easy to remove then what is happening to the invisible pollution?

@TheCountessofFitzdotterel

Cargo bikes exist

@saltinesandcoffeecups

So you're happy to poison and destroy your own environment then?

Takeaway restaurants (Too many discarded wrappers and coffee cups)
Bottled and canned drinks
Dogs (other than proper working dogs) - too much dog poo and dogs disturbing wildlife and dogs eat meat.
Single use plastics (includes balloons, etc )
Unsustainable packaging of all types
Sky lanterns
Fireworks (noisy ones and dangerous ones, don't mind organised silent displays)
Birthday cards and other occassion cards - unnecessary industry.
Cheap imports (cheap unnecessary tat)
Unsustainable fabrics like polyester

I love cats but ultimately they are a pet people let roam around away from their houses, and murder the local wildlife.

Ballons, plastic tat with kids magazines, and I'd like some kind of tax on disposable cleaning products like floor wipes etc.

Also ban antibac products unless with perscription.

This, 100%. Everything else then follows.

"Yay! Culture war bollox!

Nice, clean, healthy environments are only for posh people of course. Us plebs can wallow in pollution because we love it!

Speak for yourself."

@dontlookbackyourenotgoingthatway I am thanks, and that's not what I meant but interesting piece of projection on your part.

@saltinesandcoffeecups yes exactly. Huge amounts of middle class condescension and tone deafness on this thread to the realities of people's lives. People live in their bubbles, murmuring their pieties whilst looking down on those who don't have the luxury of living near work or family and who's main concern is keeping a roof over head and food on the table.

So clearly the answer is to ban everything that you hate Weirdly I’ve not seen anything about the plastic reusable bags, batteries for your cellphones/tablets/laptops, paper face masks, medical waste (packages for instruments/medicine/bandages), electric car batteries, oil based house paint, general medical waste, refrigeration waste, etc…

I'm proud to be a pleb, thank you.

Doesn't mean I'm daft enough to fall for the culture war BS

I'd ban all plastic bottles for fizzy drinks - there's just no need.

And also plastic lawns.

Inflatable paddleboards, cheap wetsuits and cheap body boards too. Yesterday there was a protest in Cornwall over South West Water and poo in the sea. But the amount of plastic left on the beach after the protest was astonishing. At least shit dissolves I guess. (I also hate shit in the sea)

I remember there being a Greenpeace protest a few years ago. Everyone protesting was sitting on plastic or wearing neoprene wetsuits 😂 the irony was hilarious!!

I would ban the cutting down of trees (unless diseased or dangerous), the world desperately needs more not less.