But then I’d get made fun of because I’m a dad that dresses like a dad. I’d rather pollute.
Side note… plastic can be made from things produced in mass in this country. Like corn. Could solve straw and plastic bag issues if it isn’t really just about the dollar.
I have to scratch my head at PAPER STRAW in a PLASTIC CUP n LID.
You didn’t seem to read my post – paper vs plastic is debatable - you can look it up yourself.
BTW – You better hope you never go to a hospital if you don’t like plastic. Its everywhere in the operating room for sanitary reasons. Also, you work in the automotive industry - what percentage of a today’s vehicles are plastic? Practically, the entire inside, but for the glass. Bumpers, tires much of the components in the engine bay, etc., are plastic. The knee jerk - plastic is bad is not correct.
I think the paper straws are for animal safety.
AK did away with straws and lids for animal safety. I under stand animal safety.
I think that was the reason for doing away with them elsewhere too. They are a lot like those 6 pack rings. Once they are in a landfill or the ocean, they wreak havoc.
I do agree though, they should get rid of the plastic cups too.
To clarify. I am talking about the single use plastics used for plastic bags.
Curious about this too. I have a reusable bag that packs up to tiny pouch. I’m hoping to take that in with me on the days I know I’ll buy a souvenir, but I want to be able to have it sent back to resort.
WOW! I got a small bag from every park last month! Now I feel like I really scored!
Damn. They even raised the pressed penny prices???
I’m not sure if this is the same as what I saw in September, but the new ones took a credit card, and it was $1 if you only wanted one. But if you wanted all 8, you got them for $5. So 63.3 cents vs 51 cents. Still an increase, but convenient if you want to get a lot of them.
I looked it up.
As far as landfills - paper decomposes considerably faster.
https://www.saveonenergy.com/material-decomposition/
http://storage.neic.org/event/docs/1129/how_long_does_it_take_garbage_to_decompose.pdf
I’m sure you’re correct - there are circumstances in landfills where things don’t decompose on normal schedules, but if paper and bananas are slow under those conditions, plastic decomposition would exponentially take longer than them.
You didn’t quote your sources, but your assertions appear to mirror this source (again, “look it up yourself”):
http://www.allaboutbags.ca/papervplastic.html
At the bottom of that website, did you notice this?
Perhaps you have sources that are more neutral than the industry that manufactures those plastic bags?
ALL disposable bags have an impact. We can argue about which ones make more, or less impact on the environment. Hopefully we all choose to make those little differences that collectively add up to making big differences.
You make valid points. My point was that the fixation of decomposability when weighing the environmental impact of something can be shortsighted. There are many factors to consider.
As the article you cite shows, glass waste never decomposes and aluminum takes 80-200 years. Yes, those items are recyclable (so is plastic btw), but if they are going to end up in landfills as they do in great quantities, why are those packaging industries not facing scrutiny? The problem is single use packaging, regardless of the material. I would contend that if we are going to use single use packaging, which will always be around in some form or fashion, then plastic has some benefits in that it take less energy and water to manufacture than paper, saves trees, and if it ends up in a landfill takes up considerably less room than a paper bag. As your article noted, paper waste is by far the largest component of a landfill.
BTW - I do not work in the plastics business, I used to practice environmental law and like to challenge some of the latest environmental fads such as banning plastic bags and straws in the US which has absolutely no environmental benefit - its just “virtue signaling” by Disney.
This does make me wonder about the idea of the reusable bags that Disney is offering. On the surface, it seems like an environmentally conscious thing to do. BUT, if most consumers go ahead and opt for the reusable bag, will those same consumers use that bag enough to justify the added “bulk” they have before they, too, end up in the landfill. SOME consumers will undoubtedly use it repeatedly. But in what numbers? It is POSSIBLE that in practice, the use of the reusable shopping bags at Disney could be WORSE for the environment.
(I should add that we use cloth reusable shopping bags every time we go grocery shopping, and continue to reuse the same bags over and over again…so I’m not talking about that use case of the reusable shopping bag…but instead, of the “novelty” reusable shopping bag.)
From a medical perspective, reusable shopping bags for groceries are definitely a bad idea. It’s been documented that cases of e coli infections increase in areas that have bag bans, and that’s not infrequently a fatal disease.
To prevent this, consumers need to wash their bags, but how many people do? And, of course that has a cost in water use, too. Grocery stores need to wipe down the conveyor belts more often with antiseptics- so there is more waste, and chemicals in the environment.
So I agree with you that the benefits of reusable bags & plastic bag bans are not as clear-cut as they are made out to be. The entire manufacture and use cycle needs to be analyzed which is almost never done when these types of initiatives are pushed by one group or another.
No, we clearly need to blindly follow the cause of the week, without regard to the consequences. 
I’m so tired of hearing about how such-and-such is bad and we have to stop immediately.
This is why I’m going to stick to the chocolate and donut diet until it is absolutely proven, without a shadow of a doubt, that it is a bad idea. I’d hate to end up with a heart attack in 20 years only to find out it was because of the salad dressing I was using instead of the donuts I COULD have been eating!
Eat chocolate donuts, it’s more efficient that way.
Sorry to rain on your environmental “good deeds”
According to environmentalist Bjorn Lomborg
“Plastic bags best for the environment:
You must reuse a regular cotton bag 7,100 times to make it better for the environment
Organic cotton bag needs 20,000 reuses
Paper needs 43 reuses”
https://twitter.com/bjornlomborg/status/974328993947283457?lang=en
Not to mention the contamination issues (rightly highlighted by Pod) with reusable grocery bags.
Ergo, we must continue to use plastic shopping bags “for the children”. Does Disney secretly hate children?
What about the bags I have that were made from recycled water bottles? Or maybe it was milk jugs.
And I do use little reusable cotton bags for produce. Those get washed after each use.