Addicted to Plastic

Earlier this year, I went to the coast of Maine with my children. Typical of beachcombers, we went hunting for shells. Part of our search was smell shiny pellets which I thought were shells. We would shift through the water and sand to find these oddly shaped particles. Oddly enough, I did not give them a second thought until I saw the documentary I am writing about today.

Addicted to Plastics is a very detail oriented documentary regarding the impact of plastics on our global and local economy. Extremely detailed and possibly, a warning that we need to examine our use of plastics. Plastics today, may have reached levels that lead reached in our environment during the late 60s and early 70s.

To understand the significance of the is documentary, I had the benefit of watching the episode of Cosmos that explained the significance of lead in our environment. We were literally damaging our existence with high lead levels to the point that it could have been potentially irreversible. Lead had the ability to possibly mutate our genes and change the cognitive abilities of humans if it was left unchecked.

While watching this documentary, I could not help be find comparisons to the lead problems of our past. One could conclude that a failure to honestly reflect the dangers of plastics in our ecosystem, human DNA and abilities could be permanently damaged. It is a huge problem that is not garnering the attention it deserves.

What made the documentary meaningful to me was the examination of our oceans. The vastness of our oceans, it would be hard to imagine that we could saturate our oceans in such a short period of time. Plastic pollution has saturated our oceans with waste to the point that it is not debatable. It is in our food chain, and we are consuming plastic waste.

Another part of the documentary is the social-economic impact of recycling plastics in many world economies. The impact of plastic is diverse and different on many world economies. Some of the best solutions to plastics are coming from remote parts of the world that had to ban or greatly reduce plastics our of necessity.

The solution is not going to be reducing our dependence on plastic. It most likely is not going to change unless we come up with another safer alternative. The solution from this documentary that seems to be most prominent is recycling. What is mind blowing is that dormant capsulated landfills may one day be turned into profitable resources. It would seem that capitalism is finding a was to make recycling profitable. The delicate balance of social responsibility and capitalism seem to be the solution to the problem.  Overall, the production value of this film can be disjointed. However the content makes up for the production values that are lacking at times. Overall, a great documentary that could change our habits regarding our addiction to plastics