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LETTER: Ocean plastic out of sight, out of mind

Editor:
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Editor:

I doubt that notably less plastic waste will occur even a decade from now, particularly when – regardless of ocean divers’ reports of the immense tangled messes – so much of it is not immediately observable.

Out of sight, out of mind.

It doesn’t surprise me, as general human mentality allows us to throw non-biodegradable garbage down a dark chute like we’re safely dispensing it into a black-hole singularity.

And then there’s the astonishing short-sighted selfishness. I observed this last year when a local TV news reporter randomly asked a young Vancouver man what he thought of government restrictions on disposable plastic straws.

“It’s like we’re living in a nanny state, always telling me what I can’t do,” he retorted.

I wondered whether he’d be the same sort of individual who’d likely have a sufficiently grand sense of entitlement to permit himself to dump a whole box of unused straws into the Strait of Georgia, just to stick it to the authorities who’d dare tell him that enough is enough with ourmassive dumps of plastics into our oceans.

This way, he would figuratively be giving the middle finger to any new government rules.

No wonder so much plastic waste eventually finds its way into our life-filled oceans, where there are few, if any, caring souls to see it.

Frank Sterle Jr., White Rock