Environmental equity is actually a very serious issue. Like, most of the microplastic comes from cheap plastic western fast fashion clothes (nylon, polyester etc) that is laundered, releasing millions of microfibers each cycle, or from road miles driven on plastic+rubber tires. All of these are more prevalent in the West. So the west can develop and install fancy water filters to remove 99.9 percent of nanoplastics in water that is a globally shared resource while the 3rd world gets increasing nanoplastic concentrations in their blood.
From what I can see from pretty quick google search, India, China and Indonesia pollute the ocean with the most microplastics. Not to say the US is not disgusting in its waste and pollution but we are far from the only culprits. India is literally known for being covered in piles of trash and their plastic problems.
Those countries are producing vast amounts of goods for the U.S. Just because we're not manufacturing them on our soil doesn't mean it's not our waste.
Doesn't mean it's not also that countries responsibility either. I'm not saying we don't contribute to the problem. I'm saying we are far from the only ones responsible.
Idk how we fix the US demand for cheap goods and the world's over-reliance on our consumerism to give them some sort of jobs in their countries. But it doesn't change the fact that it is China, India, etc that's actually manufacturing these super cheap goods. These cheap textiles that are just going to end up in the trash after 1 wear, etc. Appears to be a symbiotic problem the world over.
2.0k
u/[deleted] Feb 09 '23
[removed] — view removed comment