Litter bugs
I was visiting my nieces in Brantford yesterday. I decided to take them for a walk in the "little red wagon" or (green plastic as the case may be) to the grocery store.
We walked down the residential street to the sidewalk that ran along the main road. From there is was about a 10 minute walk to the mall with the grocery store, hair cutter, gym, coffee place etc that all these generic suburban settings have.
As we walked along the pathway the surrounded the parking lot, in front of all the stores, I was blown away with the amount of litter strewn everywhere. Receipts, coffee cups, candy wrappers etc.
I watched people get in and out of their cars, go in and out of the stores, oblivious to the fact. Ignorant to the point that the litter was clearly just white noise to them.
We completed our little shopping trip and began the trek back home. As we traversed the mall, I couldn't take it anymore. I had to do my share and hopefully contribute in a little way to cleaning the place up. I bent down and picked up so rubbish and placed in the garbage can not 5 feet away. I continued on our walk, only to find myself picking up garbage every few feet and placing it in the bins that were placed, seriously, every 10 feet or so. There is no excuse people!
There was a garbage can beside every store entrance and yet somehow people just drop litter as they enter and exit on their way to their cars. It doesn't take much. Just walk the extra few feet. In fact, this just reinforces my previous post about laziness.
What kind of example are we leaving our children. We all laugh at how kids say the craziest things, likely from over hearing the adults around them. It also extends to our actions. Didn't we all learn as kids that littering was "bad"? Why do we choose to ignore those lessons? Or worse, teach those same lessons to our kids at home and at school and then provide a poor example.
On the remainder of our walk home I began to notice the garbage that was all along the main road. It is one thing to casually drop a receipt on the sidewalk, not that I can excuse that behaviour, but it is something else to be driving along at 50km/h, open a window, take the last gulp out of your slurpee and jettison the extra-extra large cup out the window to join the cigarette boxes, water bottles, shoes, napkins, coffee cups etc along the roadside.
We should all be ashamed of ourselves for this behaviour. We are fortunate enough to live in a country as vast, beautiful and largely clean as Canada. We should not be acting like this. You would just drop your empty coffee cup on the floor of your living room would you? Or would you?
Take responsibility for your actions, your home, you town, your province and your country. Clean up after yourself - it really isn't that hard.
We walked down the residential street to the sidewalk that ran along the main road. From there is was about a 10 minute walk to the mall with the grocery store, hair cutter, gym, coffee place etc that all these generic suburban settings have.
As we walked along the pathway the surrounded the parking lot, in front of all the stores, I was blown away with the amount of litter strewn everywhere. Receipts, coffee cups, candy wrappers etc.
I watched people get in and out of their cars, go in and out of the stores, oblivious to the fact. Ignorant to the point that the litter was clearly just white noise to them.
We completed our little shopping trip and began the trek back home. As we traversed the mall, I couldn't take it anymore. I had to do my share and hopefully contribute in a little way to cleaning the place up. I bent down and picked up so rubbish and placed in the garbage can not 5 feet away. I continued on our walk, only to find myself picking up garbage every few feet and placing it in the bins that were placed, seriously, every 10 feet or so. There is no excuse people!
There was a garbage can beside every store entrance and yet somehow people just drop litter as they enter and exit on their way to their cars. It doesn't take much. Just walk the extra few feet. In fact, this just reinforces my previous post about laziness.
What kind of example are we leaving our children. We all laugh at how kids say the craziest things, likely from over hearing the adults around them. It also extends to our actions. Didn't we all learn as kids that littering was "bad"? Why do we choose to ignore those lessons? Or worse, teach those same lessons to our kids at home and at school and then provide a poor example.
On the remainder of our walk home I began to notice the garbage that was all along the main road. It is one thing to casually drop a receipt on the sidewalk, not that I can excuse that behaviour, but it is something else to be driving along at 50km/h, open a window, take the last gulp out of your slurpee and jettison the extra-extra large cup out the window to join the cigarette boxes, water bottles, shoes, napkins, coffee cups etc along the roadside.
We should all be ashamed of ourselves for this behaviour. We are fortunate enough to live in a country as vast, beautiful and largely clean as Canada. We should not be acting like this. You would just drop your empty coffee cup on the floor of your living room would you? Or would you?
Take responsibility for your actions, your home, you town, your province and your country. Clean up after yourself - it really isn't that hard.
posted by fruit fly at 4:22 PM
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