apartment therapy changing the world, one room at a time

When discussing this point with non-green friendly people I always keep it basic.. and appeal to their needs.

It saves you money (people love their $$$)!

It keeps our cities and towns cleaner

It saves animals and the environment..

Making a better world for us and the next generations

and sometimes, in the end, i throw in "but mostly it will save you money!" to really stick that idea in their minds.




Generally, people have an easier time understand the value of something when you relate it to a tangible monetary form.


(:

if they are kid people, my reply would be do it for your kids and future grandkids.

my family is super bad with recycling and I am usually going through the trash rinsing and sorting all the cardboard and plastics. I even do it here at the dorms. Some people throw in a HUGE bag full of diet pepsi cans and the recycling bin is like literally 2 feet away. :\

if it's someone that skeptical about global warming and the bad state of the environment (as in, they don't believe it's that bad), emphasize the easy aspects of it. "well, even if we don't know what will happen, we might as well change the way we do some things just in case, and it's so easy after all." or there's that classic 'don't be wasteful because there are starving/poor people in (insert country/region here)' argument that has been the favorite of mothers for generations. "yeah, I could use that paper plate, but I feel bad throwing something away every day that many people around the world would appreciate much more that I would."

the key to not sounding preachy is keeping it brief and keeping a friendly tone, (or you'll just be tuned out). also, use "I" statements, (like in relationship arguments), and phrase it in a way that focuses on the positive more than the negative: "I like to use canvas grocery bags so I don't end up with a bunch of plastic bags cluttering my house" rather than "you shouldn't use plastic bags because they're so wasteful and you're killing the planet!"

and, of course, lead by example!

Because you can buy cute accessories like re-usable shopping bags and travel mugs to match your outfits. I am ashamed to admit that I've used this reasoning.

A lot of it comes down to money. Why would you buy paper plates if you can just reuse the same ones? It's silly, even in an office (especially if it's small like mine).

My city has by-laws about recycling and compost. I don't know about homeowners, but landlords can be fined for not providing proper recycling/compost for tenants. So for legal reasons.

Also I always tried to use the 3 Rs in my life, ever since I was a kid. It comes naturally to me.

At my office we have a machine that makes coffee one cup at a time (yes, all those individual packets are bad environmental juju, but it's what we have), and many of my co-workers who use cups that are too big to fit the machine take a styrofoam cup, brew the coffee, pour it into their own cup, and toss the styro. Whenever I see this I say, in a mock school teacher-y tone, "Did I just see you [do that]? What am I going to do with you people?" And when they ask what alternative they have, I point out the company mugs we all were given a couple of years ago to encourage a reduction in the use of styrofoam cups. So far they've all thanked me for pointing this out to them, usually with the comment, "It never occurred to me." (The most recent followed up by saying, "And I'm so diligent about recycling at home. I buy way too much, but I recycle it!" [!] which provided the opportunity to mention that the first of the three Rs is Reduce, then Reuse, THEN Recycle. Not sure how much impact that made, but at least she listened).

We have the single cup coffee maker at our office too and my mug is a bit oversized (so I dont spill when i'm rushing back to my awesome job!) and I just take out the base.
I've done it with the k-cup one (former) and flavia (now) so I'm pretty sure they can also do that if they dont want to use a different mug--as someone suggested I use the other smaller one I have....um, ew.

yesterday, I mentioned to my boyfriend that I had ordered a set of "unpaper towels" for our kitchen.
He said responded without a beat, "I'm not going to use those."
When I asked him why, he asked "what do you do with it after you use it?"
I said, when it's dirty, you wash it & reuse it.
He said, "so instead of throwing away a paper towel, you waste a more precious resource: water."
I countered by telling him that they use tons of water converting trees into paper, including paper towels, and then we just use them once & throw them away..which is like throwing money away too. (he doesn't buy many groceries and none of the house supplies, like t.p. or paper towels.)
That seemed to quiet him for the time being but I'm wondering if there's anything more effective I could have said. Any suggestions?
I didn't have any figures to back up my argument & I think that might have helped...going to look some up now so that I can counter any resistance he puts up when the unpaper towels arrive.
He should really just be happy I'm not going fully green on him and telling him I'm not buying t.p. any more & he has to wipe his bum with a rag from now on!