I am busy and don’t have time to research all of the ways corporations have poisoned us.
What are some good rules on how to avoid microplastics?
Eat local foods? Avoid processed foods? Walk/bike? Use dry soaps? Don’t use any take away containers? Avoid walking near busy roads? Use cotton/wool for all clothing?
Clothing and textiles from natural fibres. No rubber tires as they are major shedders of micro plastics.
Where are you supposed to get tires not made of rubber?
Tires are made of vulcanized “rubber” which is actually an oil product.
Rubber tires would be fine as rubber is a natural material but they would expensive and not as durable
I had a similar thought, but when I looked into it, the difference between natural and oil based rubber is not significant. Natural rubber would be just as bad.
Why? Wouldnt it just rot away instead ofinger for 300 years?
It’s a polymer just like synthetic rubber. It isn’t like other natural products. Wood can rot because it’s made of cellulose, but rubber can’t. Nothing eats it.
They do still contain a good portion of rubber; the natural type farmed from trees.
Trains use steel wheels (unless the government is in the pocket of Big Rubber, like the Michelin trains in Paris)
That would work great on cars too, all we need is all the roads to be as smooth and even as steel rails.
Drive less would best the recommendation. Though I feel this doesn’t directly help yourself so much as everyone.
well then fuck that then, I only care about myself …
That’s the fun part. You don’t.
Some people here say space, but anything that takes you to space contains microplastics, in fact you yourself contain microplastic. The only way to avoid microplastics is simply to not exist at all. And I don’t mean dying, when you die you still have microplastics in your body.
Removed by mod
It’s too late to avoid them. Microplastics are being found literally everywhere on the planet.
Don’t cook with Teflon or otherwise coated pans. Stainless steel, carbon steel or cast iron (can be enameled).
Avoid anything that comes in plastic packaging and distill your own water. You will still need to drink normal water but I can’t imagine any municipality is currently equipped to deal with microplastic so reducing your intake is probably a good idea.
Short of moving somewhere very rural and growing all your own food, it is close to impossible.
As a resident in a pretty rural area you might want to avoid moving to rural areas due to increased cancer rates due to pesticide use and poor water conditions. But don’t you worry about our poor corporations that are wrecking shit, our lovely governer passed legislation that prevents people from suing them. though her and the corporations assure us there is nothing to worry about. They pinky sweared and everything.
Nice! I’m glad it all worked out in the end!
Become a communist and start advocating for workers to run the economy because we wouldn’t fuck ourselves over like capitalists will.
you don’t. you can try to mitigate it by using less plastic yourself, buying local foods, whatever, but it won’t make much of an impact.
the less bad news is that plastic, by its own properties, is chemically relatively inert, so they’re really not that harmful. they’re still bad, mind you, just not all that hyped up to be.
PFAS are extremely inert, yet they wreak all kinds of havoc in the bodies of humans and animals.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Per-_and_polyfluoroalkyl_substances
Scientists thought, as you say, that them being chemically inert means they wont be dangerous to living creatures. Sadly they were proven wrong on that.
I’m going to take a different approach than most of the other comments here: you can’t. Microplastics are in the air and a large chunk of it comes from car tire residue. You’re breathing it, likely right now. Research is still in the early phases and we just don’t know how bad it is yet, both from the proliferation and the impact side of things.
Source is Breaking the Plastic Wave and Overview on the occurrence of microplastics in air.
“Plastic came out of the Earth; the Earth probably sees plastic as just another one of its children. Could be the only reason the Earth allowed us to be spawned from it in the first place: it wanted plastic for itself, didn’t know how to make it, needed us. Could be the answer to our age-old philosophical question: “Why are we here?” Plastic, assholes!”
George Carlin.
Carlin the King.
Move to a different planet? I think this cat is out of the bag, they are everywhere now, it’s the lead of the current generation.
The steps you listed seem like reasonable action anyway, but there simply isn’t anything you can do to avoid them here.
You can’t outright, but you can at least try to minimize your exposure. Easiest way is to avoid buying products that use plastic packaging, especially if the product that you’re planning to buy is food. Don’t microwave plastics, even the supposedly “food safe” one - that releases a ton of microplastics into your food. Don’t order takeout - again, lots of plastic in the containers. Even paper food containers contain a plastic coating.
Don’t touch receipts, especially with wet hands. Or at minimum, wash your hands thoroughly after touching it
The receipt thing, is about the general carcinogenic properties of the thermal paper, and if anyone is a cashier that handles them regularly, wear gloves.
