The Green Thing

[Auskart]

Anyone over the age of 35 should read this, as I copied this from a friend...

Checking out at the supermarket recently, the young cashier suggested I should bring my own carrier bags because plastic bags weren't good for the environment. I apologised and explained, "We didn't have this green thing back in my earlier days." The cashier responded, "That's our problem today. Your generation did not care enough to save our environment for future generations."
She was right about one thing -- our generation didn't have the green thing in “Our” day.
So what did we have back then…? After some reflection and soul-searching on "Our" day here's what I remembered we did have.... Back then, we returned milk bottles, fizzy pop bottles and beer bottles to the store. The store sent them back to the plant to be washed and sterilised and refilled, so it could use the same bottles repeatedly. So they really were recycled.

But we didn't have the green thing back in our day.

We walked up stairs, because we didn't have an escalator or lift in every store and office building. We walked to the supermarket and didn't climb into a 300-horsepower machine every time we had to go two minutes up the road.

But she was right. We didn't have the green thing in our day.

Back then, we washed the baby's nappies because we didn't have the throw-away kind. We dried clothes on a line, not in an energy gobbling machine burning up 220 volts -- wind and solar power really did dry our clothes back in our early days. Kids got hand-me-down clothes from their brothers or sisters, not always brand-new clothing. But that young lady is right.

We didn't have the green thing back in our day.

Back then, we had one TV, or radio, in the house -- not a TV in every room. And the TV had a small screen the size of a handkerchief (remember them?), not a screen the size of England. In the kitchen, we blended and stirred by hand because we didn't have electric machines to do everything for us. When we packaged a fragile item to send in the mail, we used screwed up old newspapers to cushion it, not Styrofoam or plastic bubble wrap. Back then, we didn't fire up an engine and burn petrol just to cut the lawn. We used a push mower that ran on human power. We exercised by working so we didn't need to go to a health club to run on treadmills that operate on electricity.

But she's right. We didn't have the green thing back then.

We drank from a fountain when we were thirsty instead of using a cup or a plastic bottle every time we had a drink of water. We refilled writing pens with ink instead of buying a new pen, and we replaced the razor blades in a razor instead of throwing away the whole razor just because the blade got dull.

But we didn't have the green thing back then.

Back then, people took the bus, and kids rode their bikes to school or walked instead of turning their mums into a 24-hour taxi service. We had one electrical outlet in a room, not an entire bank of sockets to power a dozen appliances. And we didn't need a computerised gadget to receive a signal beamed from satellites 2,000miles out in space in order to find the nearest pizza joint.

But isn't it sad the current generation laments how wasteful we old folks were just because we didn't have the green thing back then?

[steran50]

HI,
That is pretty much how it was.

[.RC.]

And back in those days people died at 65-70. just a few years after you finished working.. Holidays were usually somewhere local since flipping off on a plane somewhere was only for the rich.. Air conditioning was a luxury only the rich could afford... Overseas holidays were virtually unheard of...

Sorry but people look back on those days with rose coloured glasses, they forget all the hardship and only remember the good things... I doubt anyone would willingly want to go back to those days...

[Abratool]

Auskart
A good summary.
We see more waste today than ever before.
Recycling is a nice warm thing to talk about, but in reality, we are just consuming & wasting more.
regards
Bruce

[morrisman]

Fish n Chips wrapped in newspaper .. did anyone ever die from that

I had a old pram .. I scrounged the neighbourhood for Tarax lemonade bottles and when it was full, wheeled it to the milk bar for the cash . The milk bar owner got sick of it and said "enough for now".

There was a local dairy. Ralph's in Hampton .. he delivered milk each morning with a horse drawn cart . This is 1960's . The horses were in a paddock next to the dairy -- those slow big horses knew the route and plodded along . Glass pint bottles with silver caps were washed and reused.

Bad side of it was the dickensian school setup .... being assualtled by the penguins

MIKE

[Abratool]

Fish n Chips wrapped in newspaper .. did anyone ever die from that

I had a old pram .. I scrounged the neighbourhood for Tarax lemonade bottles and when it was full, wheeled it to the milk bar for the cash . The milk bar owner got sick of it and said "enough for now".

There was a local dairy. Ralph's in Hampton .. he delivered milk each morning with a horse drawn cart . This is 1960's . The horses were in a paddock next to the dairy -- those slow big horses knew the route and plodded along . Glass pint bottles with silver caps were washed and reused.

Bad side of it was the dickensian school setup .... being assualtled by the penguins

MIKE

Mike
You talk my language, thanks I fully understand. They were good times that worked !
regards
Bruce

[19brendan81]

Not to mention that back in the "ungreen" days the worlds population was half of what it is now and no amount of banning plastic bags, carbon trading or any other environmental initiative will ever mitigate the effect that rampant population growth is having on the planet.

[Shedhand]

its called evolution...just get on with it!

I'm almost 60 and the good old days were bloody rotten for me....Ming the Merciless (Pig Iron Bob Menzies for those too young to remember) was in charge of the hill and we lived on charity because there was no Workers Comp when my old man got injured at work and there were 8 of us.
These starry eyed individuals who keep carping on about the so called good old days must have very selective amnesia or were one of the few lucky ones who had it easy.

more beer!

[Auskart]

It's not so much a rant about the good old days, it's more about what the BS of being green today is, they all seemed to have jumped on the Band Wagon about being green today, when people of a by gone era were already doing these things. !!!

[_fly_]

And now nothing is repairable. If your drill got sick you got new brushes and put them in. Now you throw it away and buy a new one. When the element in the kettle died you got a new one and put it in the kettle, Now you throw it away and buy a new one. When my niece threw her mobile and broke it, Its ok I'll get a new iphone. When they lose their ipod, its ok, you can get me a new one for my birthday. If its under thousand bucks to buy new its a throw away item.

[Master Splinter]

Don't get me started at how much rubbish was generated by the move to plasma and LCD TVs, or LCD monitors....not to mention phones being 'disposable' because they won't run the latest software upgrade and you can't access Facebook without it....and you get up-sold on a new one every two years....

Or the much higher percentage of cheap equipment that is cheap enough to be thrown away after it has done a few jobs (and will probably have to be because of its poor quality)!!!

[Drillit]

Hello Auskart,
How rude eh... and yes we all played in the open air at the local park without threat. Walked everywhere without a quibble and yes wrapped our scraps in - not plastic - newspaper. Fed foodscraps to the animals. Fished without a licence. Oh..and I repeat respected our elders. Thanks for the opportunity to add to your thread. John M.

[eskimo]

. I doubt anyone would willingly want to go back to those days...

The Greens are trying hard to get us back there...

[Handyjack]

Instead of plastic bags the stores packed or let you pack your goods in cardboard boxes that were used to bring the goods to the store (which is what Bunnings does), or the goods were placed in strong paper bags. The bags could be reused unless wet or torn and they were not an environmental problem. Sure they did not have handles but people managed.

Who said we were not green.

If homes or building did not have air conditioning you adapted. Outside and/or inside blinds to keep cool and dress appropriately to stay warm. Not everyone runs there heating/cooling unit 24/7.

My $2 worth (inflation).

[Bushmiller]

For me it is the difference between real green and apparant green. We are also confusing the ease and convenience of life between the eras.

Go back to 1900 (just to take a year) and the people were as tough as they come. You could hardly kill them with an axe. They had adapted to a tough way of living. Would we want to go back to that? Probably not.

Just as a point of interest life expectancy is an average which includes deaths in infancy and childbirth. An average can be a very distorted statistic with nothing at the average in some instances. The further we travel back in time the greater the deaths in our childhood years. However if you made it past 20 years you were tougher than goat's knees and you tended to live to a reasonable age. To some extent the survival of the fittest phenomena compensated for the lack of medical technology.

However when we are talking about the wasteful society, I think it is the present that is most culpable. We live in a society adicted to disposable products much of which is not biodegradeable. We are consumers.

Just returning to Auskart's original post, my memory from childhood is that we took our own shopping bags because if you didn't you had to stuff your purchases in your pockets. That severely limited your carrying capacity (cargo pants hadn't been invented then).

In that regard we have come full circle.

Regards
Paul