September 23, 2020 • 50 mins
Look around -- how many objects in your immediate vicinity contain plastic? This malleable, durable material has become ubiquitous -- you can find in the depths of the oceans, at the summits of the highest mountains. And, if you're like most people, plastic will be here long after you're gone. Historically, manufacturers have claimed plastic pollution can be solved by recycling... but what if there's something they don't want you to know?
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
From UFOs to psychic powers and government conspiracies. History is
riddled with unexplained events. You can turn back now or
learn the stuff they don't want you to know. A
production of I Heart Radio. Hello, and welcome back to
(00:25):
the show. My name is nol our writer or Die,
compatriot and colleague, our better third math Frederick is on
adventure somewhat off the grid, but will be returning soon.
So say hello if you see him in the wild.
They call me Ben. We're joined today with our super
producer Alexis code named Doc Holiday Jackson. Most importantly, you
(00:48):
are you, You are here, and that makes this stuff
they don't want you to know. Before we begin today's episode,
take a take a second if you're in a safe
place and driving and look around just your immediate area.
Don't think outside of your room, don't you Just the
stuff you can see or the stuff you can touch.
(01:09):
Try counting how many things you can identify as being
made of plastic. Just take a second and think about it. Yeah, man,
just on my desk right here, I've got like, I've
got this tiny little plastic gummy bear that my kid
uses to make necklaces. So there's one and a McDonald's cup.
I've got a bunch of little trinkets, you know. We've
(01:32):
got a little plastic squirrel with a beanie like this guy.
Is is the camera focusing on this cute little I'm
really bad at centering on this because it's off to
the side. Uh. Got a bunch of like a bottle,
a hand sanitizer um chords, you know. Like I've got
an like an Ethernet core that's wrapped in rubber with
(01:53):
plastic ends on into the very least. Yeah. Man, a
lot of the camera that we're recording into these little
lots of key care is I live with a life
size plastic skeleton because That's where I'm at. And like
I wanted to believe that Agent Scully was in fact
a real skeleton. I think it is a huge injustice
(02:17):
for us to say that the nature of her physical
material decides whether or not she's real. But I'm very
you know, I'm just like a pro pro be what
kind of person. But but but you're right, you know,
and and a lot of our fellow listeners just at
the same thing. You see the objects on nearby counters, shelves, tables, right,
(02:39):
and and also think about the furniture, think about the
device you're using to play this episode. Think about the
clothing you're wearing, right, what percentage of that is a
synthetic polymer? The short answer is there probably for many
of us in the audience today, there are more plastic
things around you than you can easily count. Plastic ubiquitous.
(03:00):
Plastic is everywhere. So today's question, how did it get here?
When did we know about it? And what does this
mean for the future. To to answer this, we do
have to start it, but maybe kind of a boring place,
but but it's important for the rest of the episode.
So here are the facts. Uh, plastic A brief history
(03:25):
of plastic. Yeah, technically, plastic is a it's like a
catch all term sort of. Uh. It's a word or
for a group of things, for any material that can
be shaped, molded, or manipulated into any form um. Some
of these things occur naturally, These substances occur naturally, but
most are man made. And today the word plastic is
(03:48):
really used to refer to a category of materials that
we collectively call polymers, m hmmm and plastics. Uh. First,
shout out to everybody who's already remembering that scene and
the graduate's great scene. Uh. Plastics were often for times
seen in the future that the science is fascinating. A
(04:10):
lot of children don't know this growing up in school,
but plastics are made from oil, right, the same kind
of oil that is the roughly speaking, the same kind
of oil that's used to make gas. Oil is carbon rich.
That's what makes it such a popular fat these days.
And plastics are these large carbon containing compounds, if you know,
(04:32):
like you pointed out and well, we're referring to them
in the modern sense. These polymers, these large molecules, they're
composed of these repeating units of shorter and shorter carbon
containing compounds called monomers. Chemists combine these different types of
monomers to make up vast a panopoly of plastics that
(04:54):
all have different chemical the chemical properties, like how in
the Justice League or in the X Men the Avengers
people have different superpowers. Most of this stuff is inert
and the big, the big wind for humanity is that
it often won't react chemically to other substances. You can
put soap in plastic, right. It makes me think of
(05:14):
that that scene and Breaking Bad, where you know they
want to dissolve some bodies right in acid, and the
material that Walter White asks Jesse to go get are
these plastic bins, which seems like, you know, acid would
melt right through polymer bins um instead. Jesse thinks this
(05:36):
is absurd, so he does it in the bathtub, uh,
and the acid dissolves right through the floor, showering, you know, goo,
and dissolve body parts all over the living room. But right,
isn't that right? Then? Like there's something about the chemical makeup,
the inertness of plastic that even something as caustic as
acid won't react with it, right, Yeah? And it depends
(05:59):
on in It depends on the plastic exactly. Yes. And
I think that's a big plot point in Breaking Bad,
which I just rewatched a lot of it, but in
a very lazy way. I just rewatched my favorite scenes.
So I think it holds up. So how do we
get here? How do we get How did our lives
become inundated with this stuff? The story of plastic dates
(06:20):
back to the eighteen hundreds. In eighteen fifty six, a
guy named Alexander Parks created something called park Scene. This
is generally considered the first thermoplastic. A guy named John
Wesley Hyatt in eighteen sixty nine saw a an offer
by a business in New York to give away ten
(06:41):
thousand dollars to anyone who could make a substitute for ivory,
you know, ivory elephant tusk, and this inspired John Wesley
Hyatt to invent what we call cellul lloyd today. The
whole reason there was an ivory shortage, by the way,
was because billiards was growing massively popular. It was the
(07:03):
pogue or the Pokemon of its time, right, So this
guy invents this guy invents celluloyd, and people were like, whoa,
this is amazing. But it didn't stop there. That's not
even the real revolution yet. Yeah, and sell celluloid, which
is a tongue twister and of itself is also still
what people think of when they think about film. For
(07:23):
from cinema, it's printed on celluloyd. It's it's sort of
I think that's probably not exactly accurate anymore, but it's
certainly what the original material was that was used to
project film. Um. Then, in nineteen o seven, a guy
by the name of Leo Bakeland invented what he very
self aggrandizingly referred to as bake light, which was the
(07:46):
first fully synthetic plastic, so that meant that it had
no molecules that were found in nature. It was pure
laboratory magic. You're right, nol uh Bakeland definitely definitely had
his eye and some more get in there. Uh. These
two major publicly known successes got the attention of the
(08:07):
big players in the chemical industry, and so they just
started throwing money into the potential of plastic, the R
and D the development. As a matter of fact, there
was a time when they just started seeing They decided
that they would just discover and invent new types of plastic,
and then later they would figure out what that stuff
was good for. They just wanted to be kind of
(08:28):
the first past the post in in the invention game.
And then World War let's fast forward World War two.
Uh sparks this massive, unprecedented expansion of the plastic industry.
Think about it. Natural resources are at a premium. We
want a safe, viable, affordable alternative. And that's why production
(08:50):
of plastic increased by three hundred percent in the US.
And this pattern continued in one way or another at
the end of the war. For a time, people thought
plastic would save the world. Plastic was a miracle substance,
uh that that may one day prove as historically important
(09:10):
as the so called Philosopher's Stone of alchemy. Except plastic
was real, or at the very least sliced bread. You know,
but sliced bread. It's got this cool thing about it
where you know, you eat it and then it's gone
and you don't have to worry about it hanging around
for generations. But it turns out as far back as
the sixties, folks in the US already we're realizing the plastics,
(09:33):
while they were durable and lightweight and may be able
to be molded into any number of amazing shapes, um
stuck around for a long long time, and they're already
kind of started to be this I don't know if
this trust is the right word, but a certain awareness
and trepidation around, like should we really throw our whole
(09:55):
lot in with this material when we're already seeing that
studies are showing that it causes problems with the environment. Yeah,
the apprehension was growing. In nineteen sixty one study found
that five percent of birds had plastic of some sort
in their stomachs. And then people also, uh, very prescient
(10:15):
people started raising concerns about the possible long term effects
of plastic on human health. But here's the problem. We're
already passed the point of Prometheus and Pandora. The lid
of the jar had been unscrewed. We knew the fire
of this new technology. We as a society had already
doubled down upon plastic. And today plastic is virtually irreplaceable.
(10:43):
I mean, there are obviously biodegradable alternatives in certain fields, right,
Like you can get biodegradable straws, cups, bags, and so on,
And there are a lot of environmental clean up programs,
they're recycling initiatives. But better or worse, plastic is here
(11:04):
to stay, and I will stay. Ben. You're right, there
are alternatives, right, But those biodegradable straws they suck, They deteriorate,
they fall apart. They just don't work as well as
a plastic straw. Uh. And this is coming from someone
who tries to avoid getting a plastic straw whenever humanly possible.
Um Metal straws, Okay, that's cool, but they make everything
(11:25):
you drink taste kind of metallic, and that's not cool.
It's really just that the the Pandora's box you are
describing Ben is less the greed of monopolistic corporations and
more just the malaise of consumers and just realizing that, Okay,
sure there are problems, but gosh, it's sure it's convenient, isn't.
(11:48):
It's like, we know all these problems with Amazon today,
but you don't see very many people giving up their
Amazon despite knowing all the labor problems and the monopoly
problems and all that stuff. It's a very similar example.
Um and uh. And it really does all translate to
the almighty dollar at the end of the day. Agreed.
(12:09):
And there's one Leviathan One big piece of this story
that does not get as much press as it deserves.
It's this, how much did the big manufacturers know about
the dangers of plastic and when did they know it?
Perhaps most importantly, what did they do about it? We'll
(12:30):
tell you after a word from our sponsor. Here's where
it gets crazy. Well, they knew about it. They they
were They knew way more about it than the average person.
And they went on their merry way to the factories
(12:52):
and to the banks. And then the average person knew
enough about it already for it to be a red flag.
I mean, there were these studies about the herd stomachs
and all of that stuff that was out there. But yeah,
you're right, Ben, they just waltzed their happy asses to
the bank and cash those checks like for forever. I mean,
because this really is the kind of thing where you're
(13:13):
placing a long term bet on on plastics if you're
one of these companies. So concerns about plastic became even
more mainstream in the seventies, you know, ecology and recycle, reduce,
reuse and all of that stuff. Um, the oil, chemical
and plastic industries grew a little bit anxious because they're like,
how do we spend this? You know, we don't want
(13:34):
to be the big bad guys. We gotta figure out
a way to sell plastic back to the consumers in
a way that they can feel good about. Right. So
they hatched what can accurately be called a conspiracy. It's
an insidious one. In fact, it is a conspiracy that
you may have participated in with the best of intentions.
It's one that many of us have have played a
(13:56):
role in. This conspiracy and a large way, and I
hate to ruin this for everybody is the concept of
recycling plastic that is the conspiracy in today's episode. At
the first National Conference of Packaging Waste in nineteen sixty nine,
the chief environmental manager of Dow Chemical presented a paper
(14:17):
on the explosive growth of what are called single use plastics.
We've all seen those. You know, you go to a
fast food place, you get your bag and your you
get your whopper. Uh. In these trying times. Two that's
an Easter egg for just the three of us talking
off air. Uh. And then you get here with you,
(14:38):
here with you with your flame world whopper to give
you comfort during these are trying times. Dandy DeVito with
an egg, but now it's a whopper. So you see
these in cafeterias, universities, restaurants, etcetera. And this environmental manager
takes an interesting approach because he says, you know, he
(15:02):
extols the virtues of these things. They're durable materials, they
might conceivably last forever. But he also points out the
disposal problem, that's what he calls it. He says, there's
a coming deluge of plastic waste and the industry is
turning a blind eye to it. Uh, and that they're
(15:22):
going to continue turning a blind eye to it as
long as possible. We are. A lot of people didn't
know the extent of this conspiracy until reporters working with
National Public Radio and a couple of other outfits found
documents that proved from the very beginning, the same corporations
(15:43):
telling customers that recycling was on them. Those same corporations
knew that large scale plastic recycling was a pipe dream.
Was a plastic pipe dream. It was unrealistic to think
it would actually work in an economically feasible way at
that scale. Man, I'm pretty sure we've talked about this
on the show before, But remember that iconic ecological ad
(16:08):
campaign with the Native American gentleman and the single tier,
you know, because there's like piles of garbage behind him
and was presumably his his native land or whatever, you know.
I remember free of the guy's name. It turns out
that dude wasn't even a Native American at all. I
think he's like Italian. And that ad campaign was developed
(16:29):
by a lot of these waste producing corporations. That's right, Yes, yeah,
that's an actor from Spaghetti westerns uh. And we're talking
about to Keep America Beautiful campaign also known as K
A B. Yeah, this is a great example of how
big Plastic. That's just what we'll use his mental shorthand
(16:52):
for all these trade groups, Big Plastic decided that instead
of putting money into a solution for the problem of
plastic waste, which they correctly predicted would grow out of control,
instead of trying to solve that, they spent money funding
pr campaigns to blame you, the customer, for the pollution.
(17:13):
The world is going to hell in a handbasket, not
because of these massive corporations throwing this stuff everywhere, but
because you use the plastic straw, you monster. You know,
I would call it brilliant if it wasn't so evil,
you know what. You know what, let's say it's both.
It can be both. It's brilliant and evil, because that's right.
(17:33):
Then they're punting the responsibility from them because they're just
giving you what you want. They're just you know, continuing
that legacy of convenience. It's your fault for for throwing
it in the in the in the ocean. You're the
one throwing it and making that Indian cry. You did that,
even if you've never been to the ocean. Yeah, I
(17:55):
let's see if the importmanteau that, how about aviliant? Love
it for levil it's also done done with gusto. No,
I like your villiant because it makes me think of
it bulliant. So it's sort of like it's evil and brilliant.
And it's done with a bulliance, because how do you
sell it if it's not like, got some rasmutaz to it,
you know what I mean? Viliant? Yes, all right, booked,
(18:19):
We'll we'll get Matt. We'll get Matt on board with
that too. Actually, let's we'll tell let's mess with his
mind and tell him that we always use that word
right exactly. So. Uh so this large scale mind and
media manipulation is quite successful today. A lot of people
(18:41):
still don't know that Keep America Beautiful to your POINTNAL
was founded by that industry and through twisting the narrative
right of littering, which you shouldn't litter that's that's not
even a hot take, put stuff in trash cans um.
Through that, through that reviliance move, uh, they were able
(19:04):
to get public support. Even though Keep America Beautiful was founded.
Two prevent state bands on single use plastic packaging like
it was it was founded to keep the one time
use fork spice flowing. For lack of a better word. Yeah,
(19:26):
and we know this because there are documents from these companies.
That's right. Um, you know, it's sort of like it
reminds me of the story we did on the material
that's in non stick pans with the lawyer um who
kind of spearheaded the whole investigation into uncovering very similar
kind of secret documents about what they knew, when they
knew it, and how they essentially colluded or you know. Good, Yeah,
(19:49):
that's that's that's probably accurate to cover it up and
to keep it from the public. Um. And this is
this is no different. So what they did was they did,
like you said, Ben, manipulation of this narrative too. They
did have a solution at least to the whole like
making everyone sad, about making the Indian cry and about
feeling this guilt of all of this stuff they've been
pumping out into the world. No, no, no no, no, there's
(20:11):
another way, folks. It's called recycling, and it's something that
you too can be a part of and making America beautiful,
keeping America beautiful. You can be a part of that
How cool is that bend? That's like, you know, they're
literally selling you a gold star of the ability to
feel like you're doing your part. Not only can you
(20:32):
have your cake and eat it with a plastic fork, two,
you can then turn that plastic fork into another plastic
fork or or whatever else the tupperware. The sky's the
limit recycling plastic and it feels good to do it too.
Right where you are, somehow you are, somehow more aware,
(20:55):
you're a better steward of the planet. That's that's the
idea that they're selling. And if recycling worked the way
that they described it, then this would to a large
degree be true. But the problem is multiple internal company
documents have indicated that this was a move of self
(21:17):
preservation on the part of the plastics industry. They needed
to make people believe plastic was sustainable. When I throw
that fork in the right bin, then I am really
just giving someone else in the future another fork, or
another jug of milk or something like that. The lobbyists
(21:42):
in the plastic and oil industry fought very hard and
quite successfully to mandate that triangle recycle symbol. It's like
the ecological or a burros, but like in a good
way where it kind of like feeds back into itself,
you know what I mean. So it's, uh, what could this?
(22:02):
It says all you need to know. It's like, hey,
you can be part of this amazing continuum of manufacturing.
Always the yeah, I always thinking ecological illuminati. I think
both answers are acceptable. I would even say, you know,
all of the above there. It did make an impact
because it gave us this belief that all of those
(22:24):
items bearing that mark could potentially be turned into new products.
The thing is, the vast majority of them were not
turned into new products. The vast majority of them are
still not turned into anything new. They can be we
have the technology. There's just not a market for these things.
It's not a market for this recycled plastic, and in
(22:47):
many cases there's not a compelling financial reason to make them.
And that's because recycling has problems. When we talk about plastics,
they're huge problems with recycling. Yeah, I mean, remember we
were talking to the top of the show about how
like this one particular type of plastic might you know,
be able to hold acid, and these other types of
(23:08):
plastic that can hold rubbing alcohol and et cetera. I mean,
you know, typically polymers are versatile and nonreactive in that way.
But to your point, Bend, there are different ones. There's
a bunch of different ones, and so you know, they
don't all necessarily play nice together because you would actually
have to combine them and they would have to gel
(23:28):
chemically and in order to be repurposed into something else.
And so all of the plastic that that this that
would be needed to UM do this properly or effectively
would have to be sorted by hand to to separate
out this is this type of plastic, This is this
type of plastics. This is this type of plastic. They
can't commingle um so consumers don't know what that is, right,
(23:50):
I mean, that's not and there's not enough bins in
a recycling you know, container to even deal with that
on the front end, right, So that means it's way
expense of to sort all of the plastics to make
new plastic from old plastic. Then it would be just
to make it from oil, yep, just to make new stuff.
(24:10):
It's true that this is the episode where we somewhat
ruined recycling. It's the subtitle that's the But I mean
this isn't to say that no plastic is recycled, right, Ben.
I mean we do read about usually kind of bespoke
products often that are more expensive to buy to the consumer,
that are in fact made of all recycled materials, are
(24:32):
all recycled plastic. But that's you're paying a premium for
that privilege of knowing that you're buying something that was
made with recycled plastic. That's because it takes more work
to make it that way, has to be sorted by hand. Uh,
you know, like you said, you have to find the
plastics that play well together. Uh. And then just for
an example, yeah, there is there is actual recycling plastics.
(24:56):
Sometimes it's sold as at a premium as you mentioned. Uh.
But the stuff that's recycled is often not used in
the ways you think it would be used. Like take
a plastic milk jug down with your plastic milk jug,
you wash it out because you don't want it to
smell up your house or your trash bag. Uh. And
then while you're doing that, you say, oh, wait, I recycled,
(25:17):
so I'm gonna put this in the blue the blue receptacle.
And then you think, okay, off on your journey little
plastic jug, bro, I wish you luck in this your
secular version of reincarnation. That plastic jug can only get
recycled a few times because it degrades in quality every
(25:38):
time it's recycled. So this means it can only happen.
It can only be recycled a finite number of times.
Uh so what happened to the use plastic Well in
the US, we did something that's very popular in a
lot of disposal strategies of this country. We shipped it
somewhere where we couldn't see it, you know what I mean,
(26:01):
out of sight, out of mind, like a child. It's
not I can't see it. It's not there anymore. We Yeah,
And unfortunately that is an all too common thing that
we as Americans, uh, fall victim to um and and
to your point, Ben, like even like the idea, this
is interesting to me, and this has maybe more a
question than I have. If you can only be recycled
(26:21):
for a number of times, like how do you know
when you're done? Like when when you when you've no
longer got a viable product? Isn't that something you have
to track as well? Yeah? I mean that's a really
good point, because then we have this whole logistic aspect
to it, right logistical aspect to it, where we can't
just do our best to recycle stuff. We also have
to make sure that we're recycling something into something viable. Uh.
(26:45):
The complications alone are could cripple the entire project. So
shive it off to China. Right. For a long time,
labor was cheaper there. Also, environmental laws were lacks right,
or at least on pay paper. Uh. The U S
laws were more strict the country of China and businesses
(27:06):
in China. Eventually, we're no longer able to find uses
for all of this discarded plastics, so now they've largely
stopped accepting it. There's just not much of a market
for this recycled stuff. And that means that a lot
of the plastic in this country, in the US ends
up getting discarded and it piles up, piles up. And
(27:26):
I don't know about you, this gives me an existential crisis.
There's there's a question I have to ask at the
very end of this. Yeah, and you know, and maybe
you can answer this, Ben, I know, you know, and
I live Indicator, Georgia, and the city of Decatur has
been plagued with corruption in terms of like you know,
overcharging people for utilities, and there was like a big
lawsuit all the stuff. But I've also heard rumor that
(27:49):
my little blue recycling ben hopper that I you know,
roll out KIIIII kick onto the curve every Monday, that
that just ends up in the land fill more often
than not, that a lot of me pnicipalities don't do
a good job of recycling, even when you think that's
what you're doing. Yeah, that's true, and that's that's something
that is unfortunately not historically uncommon, you know what I mean. Like,
(28:14):
consider a lot of office buildings where you know, people
think they are throwing that aluminum can, that plastic bottle
into the recycling bin, and then one night, maybe you're
working late, then you see that the people who do
custodial services in that office just throw it all in
the same place. And then maybe you tell yourself there's
a magical Susian sorting machine that handles everything like a
(28:39):
Harry Potter hat of some sort, you know. Yeah, But
but it goes to the whole point that we started
with here, is that it's all about optics. It's all
about selling you the dream. It's not actually about the practice,
it's more about like the image, right, So, uh, what
happened um as as this continued, you know, especially after
(29:00):
China's sort of rejecting this material. I believe that that
study Rereforence earlier about birds having plastics in the stomachs,
and the number then was about five percent. But by
the eighties, uh, you know, in true eighties excess fashion,
that number increased to eight percent. Eighty percent of birds
in a similar studies twenty years later had plastic in
(29:23):
their stomach And now as we record this, multiple studies
indicate that almost nine percent of all birds have some
sort of plastics somewhere in their system. Today, as we
record this, about a million birds going to die this
year due specifically to their stomachs being stuffed with plastics.
(29:45):
And you know, my qualms with with the bird population then,
but even I don't think they deserve to go out
like that. I agreed. And so you know, the one
thing you want for an enemy you respect, I would
imagine from your perspectivele is to is that they have
an honorable death right. I mean, at least spectacular. Let
(30:09):
their stomachs explode from eating wedding rice or something. You know,
I'm I'm kidding and burn people out there. Please don't
don't cancel me. I'm I'm very very much kidding. But no.
It turns out that the concept of recycling as it's
been sold to the United States public and other places
around the world is at the very very least misleading.
(30:29):
Is an optics first kind of thing, as opposed to like,
what's the actual end result of this, uh, this whole operation? Right, yeah, exactly.
I like the way one industry insider put it. They said,
selling recycling sells plastic. Uh. And then there's an interesting
statement by a guy named Larry Thomas, who is a
(30:50):
former president of the Society of the Plastics Industry, which
today is known as p I, a Plastics Industry Association.
He uh, he was at the helm of one of
the most powerful trade groups for the industry in d C.
And he said that if the public thinks that recycling
is working, then they are not going to be as
(31:12):
concerned about the environment. And to be fair, the industry's
current position is that there is no conspiracy of foot
and wanted to give voice to the the other side
to their perspective. Guy named Steve Russell, a representative for
the plastics industry who was for a while the vice
(31:32):
president of plastics for the American Chemistry Council, says the
industry has never intentionally mislead the public about recycling and
that they're committed to ensuring one day that all plastic
is recycled. And he says, uh, you know, public commitment
(31:53):
to recycling programs, public pressure, uh, and evolving technology will
all play huge roles in helping recycle all plastic. Essentially,
he's saying, no one ever intentionally misled anyone, and maybe
one day recycling can do what the industry for decades
(32:16):
claimed it was already doing. Just think about the double
thinking that statement. It's Orwellian. Yeah, it's kind of mind blowing. Um.
I don't even know how to respond to that, Ben,
I mean, we're not saying, we have to be clear,
We are not saying recycling is anything other than an amazing, awesome,
(32:36):
potentially world changing, world saving concept. Do you remember, though, Ben,
like being a kid and going to like the recycling center,
getting a tour and all that stuff. I mean, it
was something that sold to you as early as as uh,
you know, elementary school, recycled, reduced, reuse all of that
stuff and again, and we're gonna We're gonna continue on.
(32:57):
But I do want to say, like recycling paper, it's
great recycling paper works. You can smash all that stuff
together and make all kinds of cool stuff, uh, you know,
and pulp and you know, make You can even buy
recycled paper for your copy paper if you want. There's
all kinds of uses for recycled paper. But the plastic
parts just a much more tricky. Uh, let's call its
(33:18):
supply chain problem, right, yeah, And again, like I I'm
conflicted about this because I love, uh, I love the
idea of recycling, and I love the idea of individual
people being able to make a fundamental difference in the
(33:38):
world around them, you know what I mean. I love
the power of the individual. But what we are saying
here is that the idea of recycling in the world
of plastic the way it's been practiced is not near
as widespread as the plastic industry would want you to believe.
(33:59):
And this will probably continue to be the case until
there's some revolutionary technology that Harry Potter trash hat, which
is a great phrase, uh, until it comes online or
until it becomes somehow more profitable to recycle and reuse
plastic rather than to make new plastic. Neither of those
things have happened yet not not neither of them. And
(34:21):
to compound the issue here, we are still learning the
full scope of this problem. We may not know the
long term consequences of this issue for gears and years
and years to come. And that doesn't mean it doesn't
affect us. It means that we don't know what's going
to happen. This's never happened on Earth before. We have
(34:42):
no idea what plot twister ahead. Yeah, I mean, each
year human beings produced three hundred and sixty million tons
of plastic UH, and according to one study, around eight
million tons of it enters the ocean UM and until recently,
UH the fate of what's called microplastics, which is plastics
(35:03):
that contain particles less than five millimeters in size UM
in the ocean has been unclear, but to your point,
been a recent study. We're at least starting to get
a whiff of what these microplastic particles are doing when
they settle in marine sediments UM, following the pattern of
a lot of other pollutants. So We're not just talking
(35:26):
about like hard goods that stick around. We're talking about
the chemical impact of plastics and how it can actually
saturate and and uh contaminate soil and water and and beyond. Yeah,
you're right, no, uh. Microplastics and nanoplastics, which are the
they have a diameter of less than point zero zero
(35:48):
one millimeters. Both of these form from the abrasion of
larger pieces of plastic dumped into the ocean, so the
stuff keeps kind of breaking itself in the smaller and
smaller chunks, and research in wildlife and in laboratory animals
has established some pretty compelling links to between tiny plastic
(36:12):
and infertility, inflammation, even cancer. Microplastics have polluted the entire planet,
from the Arctic to your neighborhood park to the depths
of the ocean. Like you probably saw not too long ago,
scientists being startled to get to a very remote part
(36:36):
of the world under the ice and antarctica and then
see that there was plastic there. This is happening. Yeah,
you ever heard you ever thought of the concept of
airborne plastic ben Again, this the old school model of
plastic pollution as much more just a nuisance, right, or like, okay,
it gets in birds, the physical chunks of things get
(36:57):
in birds and like choke them or cause them to
have horrible digestive problems that can that can ultimately kill them.
But yeah, airborne plastic apparently human beings. According to a
previous study that we found UH for this episode, UM
have shown people eat and breathe in at least fifty
(37:18):
thousand particles of microplastic a year, and that microplastic pollution
is absolutely just raining down upon city dwellers and it's
not going away anytime soon. No, it's not, which means
that to a large degree, this conspiracy was successful because
(37:40):
the profit margins stayed consistent, UM. But now it's coming
to a head, and we have to ask ourselves what
does this mean for the future. We'll tell you after
a word from our sponsor. We've returned. Let's open this
segment about the future with a quote from Rolling Stone
(38:05):
that gives us a troubling summation of the dilemma we face. No,
could I ask you to do the honors here? Absolutely, sir.
Rolling Stone puts it out like this, More than half
the plastics down on Earth has been created since two
thousand two, and plastic pollution is on pace to double
(38:26):
by tw At its root, the global plastics crisis is
a product of our addiction to fossil fuels. The private
profit and public harm of the oil industry is very
well understood. Um. Again, this is all quote from this
Rolling Stone article by Tim Dickinson, UM, which absolutely recommend
fully reading. Uh, but let's let's continue um. Oil is
(38:51):
refined and distributed to customers who consumers rather who benefit
from gasoline's short useful lifespan in a combustion engine, leaving
behind atmosphere pollution for generations by the same pattern, and
the same tragedy of the commons is playing out with
another gift of the oil and gas giants whose drilling
draws up the petroleum precursors for plastics. Yeah. Yeah, it's
(39:16):
they're troublingly similar cycles, right, And you know the proof
is out there. Oil companies knew about the issues with
fossil fuels dating back to the seventies and didn't say
a word about it. So that's where we're at. Since
nineteen fifty, the world has created six point three trillion
(39:37):
kims of plastic waste of that has never been recycled
even once. This trend is only going to accelerate as
emerging economies increase their plastic consumption. Like think about this,
In ten advanced economies in the world, we're using twenty
(39:58):
times more plastic than and uh per capita than consumers
and places like Indonesia or in India and now people
are on the way up. Right, there's a higher demand
for plastic, and the industry itself, Big Plastic, is counting
on that growing demand to keep selling stuff even though
(40:19):
a great deal of it will still be around long
after and probably long after everyone listening to this podcast,
we're watching this YouTube clip today has been long dead
and and this is this is that existential crisis. I
wanted to ask you about this. Uh everyone, you know
you doc all of us listening along at home or
(40:43):
in our cars are counting the pieces of plastic around us.
Do you experience existential dread when you hold like like
a plastic fork and realize just how much longer it
will be around than you, how much more permanent it
is in the scheme of things than you a living
(41:06):
being that it bothers me, yeah, bothers me too, and
you know who else it bothers been uh kids who
as you well know kids these days, say that as
someone who's essentially becoming an old grandpapa. But kids these
days are are what the kids these days called pretty woke.
Uh there they are hip to all these societal problems,
(41:28):
political and environmental and otherwise. And you know what else,
kids like legos UM and apparently a lot of kids
who are fond of Legos begged the Lego Corporation in
the form of letters that they wrote, uh to the
company to stop using single use plastic bags in their packaging.
(41:50):
So Lego heard them. The Lego Group chief executive Officer
Niel's B. Christiansen said, we have received any letters from
child and about the environment asking us to remove single
use plastic packaging. UM. We've been exploring alternatives for some time,
and the passion and ideas from children inspired us to
(42:11):
begin to make changes. Uh. So apparently they are looking
to UM roll this out in the very near future
and it will be replaced with paper, which again, like
we said earlier in the episode, is much more viable
as a recyclable good. UM for single use materials. UM.
It's investing four hundred million dollars over three years to
(42:34):
improve its sustainability efforts overall the Lego Corporation. Uh unfortunately, um,
you know, legos themselves uh made of plastic. But at
least kids aren't throwing their legos in the ocean. Presumably
it's something to keep around and pass down to siblings,
and you know, so that's I think that's fine. Um.
I mean they're expensive, they are quite expensive. You're aware
(42:57):
of that. I am aware of that. They're also uh
murder here on your bare feet, as every parent knows
when you're walking around. Thankfully, my kids more into bracelets
than she has legos, but that's plastic beads. Um. But
again those are meant to be kept around and given
to friends and hopefully not just chucked. But yeah, our
super producer Doc holiday Off Mike just kind of during
(43:20):
our ad break exasperatedly exclaimed, Oh, this is depressing, you know,
And then you're not wrong, Doc, you're not wrong. But
hopefully we can sort it out before we break the
planet Entirely, not to sound too tree huggry about it,
but sure feels like we're hitting a tipping point with
all this stuff. It's not a look extinction doesn't care
(43:43):
about vague, the vague stories we have made up for ourselves.
Extinction does not care about political leanings. It doesn't care
about religion. It doesn't care about money the economy, which
again is just another religion. I out the clearing call
a long time ago. I don't think anybody has successfully
(44:04):
proven a difference between the concept of an economy and
the concept of a religion. But there is one fascinating point,
and I appreciate it so much, man that you that
you brought a little bit of light here. Uh, there's
one fascinating point. The plastics crisis is different from climate change,
at least in the way it's been treated. Remember, like
(44:25):
I mentioned, oil corporations put a lot of money into
denying the concept of climate change for a very long time.
But the the folks over what we call big plastic.
And to be fair, there there are a lot less
like two separate entities, and a lot more like fingers
on the same hand. But whatever you wanna call big plastic.
(44:48):
They are not denying the problem anymore. They're seeking to
convince consumers and regulators that, despite the fact they put
all this pollution out in the planet, they can be
the trusted experts to make plastic use sustainable and something
they call the circular economy, so that plastic does actually
(45:09):
get recycled continually and doesn't degrade. Uh. The cynical way
to translate that, honestly is this recycling. But you know,
for real this time? Sure, I like that. It's got
a nice ring to and not not do on a
down note, but it does. Something just popped into my head,
And we hadn't even talked about what about plastic garbage bags? Like?
(45:30):
I mean, don't they just end up in like landfills
like forever? I don't know, it's it's I'm sorry, I
took us down a peg. You brought us up a
peg and took us right back down. But what I
don't know? Are there any environmental scientists out there, any
polymer scientists out there? You know, Lego is talking about
(45:51):
exploring alternatives even to the plastic bricks. What does that
look like? Why are we so hooked on plastic? Let
us know? Yeah, let us know, let us know how
you think this is going to work out? We are
all ears, honestly, everybody should be. Uh. We cannot predict
the future, but we do see troubling trends and we
(46:13):
want to hear from you. You can find us on Instagram.
You can find us on Twitter, you can find us
on Facebook. We love to recommend our favorite page on
the good old Internet, and that is our Facebook community page.
Here's where it gets crazy. But wait, you can find
us as individuals too, should the spirit move you to
do so, you certainly can. You can find me exclusively
(46:36):
on Instagram where I am at how now Noel Brown? Um?
You know I post a lot of like crazy cosplay
videos from my kid, who's a delight and also very
much into the environment. Um and uh, you know, cooking experiments,
under lockdown, occasional drumming exercises, and I'm starting getting yoga ben.
(46:56):
I just did like three days straight of a beginner
yoga you tube video. Starting to really enjoy that. So
maybe you'll see me in uh in cow pose or
I don't know the names yet, but you could see
that where where are you been on the Internet's uh?
You know, it's interesting you mentioned the yoga stuff. My
pal Alex your pal as well, it's got super into
(47:17):
yoga recently. He's the one who told me videos to
watch yoga with Adrian for anyone else out there, that's
trying to dip their toe in in the yoga pool.
Nice credit to you, Alex. If you're listening to the show. Uh.
If you're already on the internet, you can find me
having any number of misadventures on Instagram where I'm at
ben Bowling. You can find me on Twitter where I'm
(47:39):
at ben Bowling hs W. You will recognize it's me
because you'll see a tweet that I wrote before I
came into this episode, saying that the research really got
to me. The plastic is everywhere. I will aim to
make less depressing tweets in the future. It's when you
started getting into the airborne plastic that I really started
(47:59):
getting dark. Uh, this is all pretty dark, but I
don't know. It's always dark as before the dawn. How
far away are we from children being born with plastic
in them? Anyhow? Tell us about it. You can also
give us a phone call if you are not the
type to sip the social needs, that's all right. We're
one eight three three S T d W y t K.
(48:21):
Leave us a voice mail memo message. UH, try to
keep it concise. You're much more likely to get on
one of our handy dandy listener Mail episodes if you
do that. But if you've got something that needs to
be broken up into a couple of these, I think
what's the limit been a couple of minutes for each
of these. Uh, feel free, but you know, we we
may have to condense it a little bit. And also
please let us know if we can use your name
(48:43):
on the on the show and get weird with it,
you know what I mean. My favorite listener mail is
still that guy with the uniquely infectious laugh. If you're listening, sir,
you made my day. The truck driver, the cookie truck
driver with the Hong Kong Yeah, more residents check it out.
That's somewhere in the title of that episode. Absolutely, As
we've said time and time again, you can also join
(49:03):
our Facebook group Here's where it gets crazy, or you
can exchange memes and barbs and and now not barbs,
definitely polite discourse with your fellow listeners. All you gotta
do is name one of the members of the crew
of this conspiracy posse and then you will find yourself
in the door. Um, if you don't want to do
any of that stuff and you'd rather just get in
(49:24):
touch with us in an older of fashioned ways. You
can do so by sending us an email. We are
conspiracy at iHeart radio dot com. Stuff they don't want
(49:51):
you to know is a production of I heart Radio.
For more podcasts from my heart Radio, visit the iHeart
radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your
favorite shows.
From UFOs to psychic powers and government conspiracies. History is
riddled with unexplained events. You can turn back now or
learn the stuff they don't want you to know. A
production of I Heart Radio. Hello, and welcome back to
(00:25):
the show. My name is nol our writer or Die,
compatriot and colleague, our better third math Frederick is on
adventure somewhat off the grid, but will be returning soon.
So say hello if you see him in the wild.
They call me Ben. We're joined today with our super
producer Alexis code named Doc Holiday Jackson. Most importantly, you
(00:48):
are you, You are here, and that makes this stuff
they don't want you to know. Before we begin today's episode,
take a take a second if you're in a safe
place and driving and look around just your immediate area.
Don't think outside of your room, don't you Just the
stuff you can see or the stuff you can touch.
(01:09):
Try counting how many things you can identify as being
made of plastic. Just take a second and think about it. Yeah, man,
just on my desk right here, I've got like, I've
got this tiny little plastic gummy bear that my kid
uses to make necklaces. So there's one and a McDonald's cup.
I've got a bunch of little trinkets, you know. We've
(01:32):
got a little plastic squirrel with a beanie like this guy.
Is is the camera focusing on this cute little I'm
really bad at centering on this because it's off to
the side. Uh. Got a bunch of like a bottle,
a hand sanitizer um chords, you know. Like I've got
an like an Ethernet core that's wrapped in rubber with
(01:53):
plastic ends on into the very least. Yeah. Man, a
lot of the camera that we're recording into these little
lots of key care is I live with a life
size plastic skeleton because That's where I'm at. And like
I wanted to believe that Agent Scully was in fact
a real skeleton. I think it is a huge injustice
(02:17):
for us to say that the nature of her physical
material decides whether or not she's real. But I'm very
you know, I'm just like a pro pro be what
kind of person. But but but you're right, you know,
and and a lot of our fellow listeners just at
the same thing. You see the objects on nearby counters, shelves, tables, right,
(02:39):
and and also think about the furniture, think about the
device you're using to play this episode. Think about the
clothing you're wearing, right, what percentage of that is a
synthetic polymer? The short answer is there probably for many
of us in the audience today, there are more plastic
things around you than you can easily count. Plastic ubiquitous.
(03:00):
Plastic is everywhere. So today's question, how did it get here?
When did we know about it? And what does this
mean for the future. To to answer this, we do
have to start it, but maybe kind of a boring place,
but but it's important for the rest of the episode.
So here are the facts. Uh, plastic A brief history
(03:25):
of plastic. Yeah, technically, plastic is a it's like a
catch all term sort of. Uh. It's a word or
for a group of things, for any material that can
be shaped, molded, or manipulated into any form um. Some
of these things occur naturally, These substances occur naturally, but
most are man made. And today the word plastic is
(03:48):
really used to refer to a category of materials that
we collectively call polymers, m hmmm and plastics. Uh. First,
shout out to everybody who's already remembering that scene and
the graduate's great scene. Uh. Plastics were often for times
seen in the future that the science is fascinating. A
(04:10):
lot of children don't know this growing up in school,
but plastics are made from oil, right, the same kind
of oil that is the roughly speaking, the same kind
of oil that's used to make gas. Oil is carbon rich.
That's what makes it such a popular fat these days.
And plastics are these large carbon containing compounds, if you know,
(04:32):
like you pointed out and well, we're referring to them
in the modern sense. These polymers, these large molecules, they're
composed of these repeating units of shorter and shorter carbon
containing compounds called monomers. Chemists combine these different types of
monomers to make up vast a panopoly of plastics that
(04:54):
all have different chemical the chemical properties, like how in
the Justice League or in the X Men the Avengers
people have different superpowers. Most of this stuff is inert
and the big, the big wind for humanity is that
it often won't react chemically to other substances. You can
put soap in plastic, right. It makes me think of
(05:14):
that that scene and Breaking Bad, where you know they
want to dissolve some bodies right in acid, and the
material that Walter White asks Jesse to go get are
these plastic bins, which seems like, you know, acid would
melt right through polymer bins um instead. Jesse thinks this
(05:36):
is absurd, so he does it in the bathtub, uh,
and the acid dissolves right through the floor, showering, you know, goo,
and dissolve body parts all over the living room. But right,
isn't that right? Then? Like there's something about the chemical makeup,
the inertness of plastic that even something as caustic as
acid won't react with it, right, Yeah? And it depends
(05:59):
on in It depends on the plastic exactly. Yes. And
I think that's a big plot point in Breaking Bad,
which I just rewatched a lot of it, but in
a very lazy way. I just rewatched my favorite scenes.
So I think it holds up. So how do we
get here? How do we get How did our lives
become inundated with this stuff? The story of plastic dates
(06:20):
back to the eighteen hundreds. In eighteen fifty six, a
guy named Alexander Parks created something called park Scene. This
is generally considered the first thermoplastic. A guy named John
Wesley Hyatt in eighteen sixty nine saw a an offer
by a business in New York to give away ten
(06:41):
thousand dollars to anyone who could make a substitute for ivory,
you know, ivory elephant tusk, and this inspired John Wesley
Hyatt to invent what we call cellul lloyd today. The
whole reason there was an ivory shortage, by the way,
was because billiards was growing massively popular. It was the
(07:03):
pogue or the Pokemon of its time, right, So this
guy invents this guy invents celluloyd, and people were like, whoa,
this is amazing. But it didn't stop there. That's not
even the real revolution yet. Yeah, and sell celluloid, which
is a tongue twister and of itself is also still
what people think of when they think about film. For
(07:23):
from cinema, it's printed on celluloyd. It's it's sort of
I think that's probably not exactly accurate anymore, but it's
certainly what the original material was that was used to
project film. Um. Then, in nineteen o seven, a guy
by the name of Leo Bakeland invented what he very
self aggrandizingly referred to as bake light, which was the
(07:46):
first fully synthetic plastic, so that meant that it had
no molecules that were found in nature. It was pure
laboratory magic. You're right, nol uh Bakeland definitely definitely had
his eye and some more get in there. Uh. These
two major publicly known successes got the attention of the
(08:07):
big players in the chemical industry, and so they just
started throwing money into the potential of plastic, the R
and D the development. As a matter of fact, there
was a time when they just started seeing They decided
that they would just discover and invent new types of plastic,
and then later they would figure out what that stuff
was good for. They just wanted to be kind of
(08:28):
the first past the post in in the invention game.
And then World War let's fast forward World War two.
Uh sparks this massive, unprecedented expansion of the plastic industry.
Think about it. Natural resources are at a premium. We
want a safe, viable, affordable alternative. And that's why production
(08:50):
of plastic increased by three hundred percent in the US.
And this pattern continued in one way or another at
the end of the war. For a time, people thought
plastic would save the world. Plastic was a miracle substance,
uh that that may one day prove as historically important
(09:10):
as the so called Philosopher's Stone of alchemy. Except plastic
was real, or at the very least sliced bread. You know,
but sliced bread. It's got this cool thing about it
where you know, you eat it and then it's gone
and you don't have to worry about it hanging around
for generations. But it turns out as far back as
the sixties, folks in the US already we're realizing the plastics,
(09:33):
while they were durable and lightweight and may be able
to be molded into any number of amazing shapes, um
stuck around for a long long time, and they're already
kind of started to be this I don't know if
this trust is the right word, but a certain awareness
and trepidation around, like should we really throw our whole
(09:55):
lot in with this material when we're already seeing that
studies are showing that it causes problems with the environment. Yeah,
the apprehension was growing. In nineteen sixty one study found
that five percent of birds had plastic of some sort
in their stomachs. And then people also, uh, very prescient
(10:15):
people started raising concerns about the possible long term effects
of plastic on human health. But here's the problem. We're
already passed the point of Prometheus and Pandora. The lid
of the jar had been unscrewed. We knew the fire
of this new technology. We as a society had already
doubled down upon plastic. And today plastic is virtually irreplaceable.
(10:43):
I mean, there are obviously biodegradable alternatives in certain fields, right,
Like you can get biodegradable straws, cups, bags, and so on,
And there are a lot of environmental clean up programs,
they're recycling initiatives. But better or worse, plastic is here
(11:04):
to stay, and I will stay. Ben. You're right, there
are alternatives, right, But those biodegradable straws they suck, They deteriorate,
they fall apart. They just don't work as well as
a plastic straw. Uh. And this is coming from someone
who tries to avoid getting a plastic straw whenever humanly possible.
Um Metal straws, Okay, that's cool, but they make everything
(11:25):
you drink taste kind of metallic, and that's not cool.
It's really just that the the Pandora's box you are
describing Ben is less the greed of monopolistic corporations and
more just the malaise of consumers and just realizing that, Okay,
sure there are problems, but gosh, it's sure it's convenient, isn't.
(11:48):
It's like, we know all these problems with Amazon today,
but you don't see very many people giving up their
Amazon despite knowing all the labor problems and the monopoly
problems and all that stuff. It's a very similar example.
Um and uh. And it really does all translate to
the almighty dollar at the end of the day. Agreed.
(12:09):
And there's one Leviathan One big piece of this story
that does not get as much press as it deserves.
It's this, how much did the big manufacturers know about
the dangers of plastic and when did they know it?
Perhaps most importantly, what did they do about it? We'll
(12:30):
tell you after a word from our sponsor. Here's where
it gets crazy. Well, they knew about it. They they
were They knew way more about it than the average person.
And they went on their merry way to the factories
(12:52):
and to the banks. And then the average person knew
enough about it already for it to be a red flag.
I mean, there were these studies about the herd stomachs
and all of that stuff that was out there. But yeah,
you're right, Ben, they just waltzed their happy asses to
the bank and cash those checks like for forever. I mean,
because this really is the kind of thing where you're
(13:13):
placing a long term bet on on plastics if you're
one of these companies. So concerns about plastic became even
more mainstream in the seventies, you know, ecology and recycle, reduce,
reuse and all of that stuff. Um, the oil, chemical
and plastic industries grew a little bit anxious because they're like,
how do we spend this? You know, we don't want
(13:34):
to be the big bad guys. We gotta figure out
a way to sell plastic back to the consumers in
a way that they can feel good about. Right. So
they hatched what can accurately be called a conspiracy. It's
an insidious one. In fact, it is a conspiracy that
you may have participated in with the best of intentions.
It's one that many of us have have played a
(13:56):
role in. This conspiracy and a large way, and I
hate to ruin this for everybody is the concept of
recycling plastic that is the conspiracy in today's episode. At
the first National Conference of Packaging Waste in nineteen sixty nine,
the chief environmental manager of Dow Chemical presented a paper
(14:17):
on the explosive growth of what are called single use plastics.
We've all seen those. You know, you go to a
fast food place, you get your bag and your you
get your whopper. Uh. In these trying times. Two that's
an Easter egg for just the three of us talking
off air. Uh. And then you get here with you,
(14:38):
here with you with your flame world whopper to give
you comfort during these are trying times. Dandy DeVito with
an egg, but now it's a whopper. So you see
these in cafeterias, universities, restaurants, etcetera. And this environmental manager
takes an interesting approach because he says, you know, he
(15:02):
extols the virtues of these things. They're durable materials, they
might conceivably last forever. But he also points out the
disposal problem, that's what he calls it. He says, there's
a coming deluge of plastic waste and the industry is
turning a blind eye to it. Uh, and that they're
(15:22):
going to continue turning a blind eye to it as
long as possible. We are. A lot of people didn't
know the extent of this conspiracy until reporters working with
National Public Radio and a couple of other outfits found
documents that proved from the very beginning, the same corporations
(15:43):
telling customers that recycling was on them. Those same corporations
knew that large scale plastic recycling was a pipe dream.
Was a plastic pipe dream. It was unrealistic to think
it would actually work in an economically feasible way at
that scale. Man, I'm pretty sure we've talked about this
on the show before, But remember that iconic ecological ad
(16:08):
campaign with the Native American gentleman and the single tier,
you know, because there's like piles of garbage behind him
and was presumably his his native land or whatever, you know.
I remember free of the guy's name. It turns out
that dude wasn't even a Native American at all. I
think he's like Italian. And that ad campaign was developed
(16:29):
by a lot of these waste producing corporations. That's right, Yes, yeah,
that's an actor from Spaghetti westerns uh. And we're talking
about to Keep America Beautiful campaign also known as K
A B. Yeah, this is a great example of how
big Plastic. That's just what we'll use his mental shorthand
(16:52):
for all these trade groups, Big Plastic decided that instead
of putting money into a solution for the problem of
plastic waste, which they correctly predicted would grow out of control,
instead of trying to solve that, they spent money funding
pr campaigns to blame you, the customer, for the pollution.
(17:13):
The world is going to hell in a handbasket, not
because of these massive corporations throwing this stuff everywhere, but
because you use the plastic straw, you monster. You know,
I would call it brilliant if it wasn't so evil,
you know what. You know what, let's say it's both.
It can be both. It's brilliant and evil, because that's right.
(17:33):
Then they're punting the responsibility from them because they're just
giving you what you want. They're just you know, continuing
that legacy of convenience. It's your fault for for throwing
it in the in the in the ocean. You're the
one throwing it and making that Indian cry. You did that,
even if you've never been to the ocean. Yeah, I
(17:55):
let's see if the importmanteau that, how about aviliant? Love
it for levil it's also done done with gusto. No,
I like your villiant because it makes me think of
it bulliant. So it's sort of like it's evil and brilliant.
And it's done with a bulliance, because how do you
sell it if it's not like, got some rasmutaz to it,
you know what I mean? Viliant? Yes, all right, booked,
(18:19):
We'll we'll get Matt. We'll get Matt on board with
that too. Actually, let's we'll tell let's mess with his
mind and tell him that we always use that word
right exactly. So. Uh so this large scale mind and
media manipulation is quite successful today. A lot of people
(18:41):
still don't know that Keep America Beautiful to your POINTNAL
was founded by that industry and through twisting the narrative
right of littering, which you shouldn't litter that's that's not
even a hot take, put stuff in trash cans um.
Through that, through that reviliance move, uh, they were able
(19:04):
to get public support. Even though Keep America Beautiful was founded.
Two prevent state bands on single use plastic packaging like
it was it was founded to keep the one time
use fork spice flowing. For lack of a better word. Yeah,
(19:26):
and we know this because there are documents from these companies.
That's right. Um, you know, it's sort of like it
reminds me of the story we did on the material
that's in non stick pans with the lawyer um who
kind of spearheaded the whole investigation into uncovering very similar
kind of secret documents about what they knew, when they
knew it, and how they essentially colluded or you know. Good, Yeah,
(19:49):
that's that's that's probably accurate to cover it up and
to keep it from the public. Um. And this is
this is no different. So what they did was they did,
like you said, Ben, manipulation of this narrative too. They
did have a solution at least to the whole like
making everyone sad, about making the Indian cry and about
feeling this guilt of all of this stuff they've been
pumping out into the world. No, no, no no, no, there's
(20:11):
another way, folks. It's called recycling, and it's something that
you too can be a part of and making America beautiful,
keeping America beautiful. You can be a part of that
How cool is that bend? That's like, you know, they're
literally selling you a gold star of the ability to
feel like you're doing your part. Not only can you
(20:32):
have your cake and eat it with a plastic fork, two,
you can then turn that plastic fork into another plastic
fork or or whatever else the tupperware. The sky's the
limit recycling plastic and it feels good to do it too.
Right where you are, somehow you are, somehow more aware,
(20:55):
you're a better steward of the planet. That's that's the
idea that they're selling. And if recycling worked the way
that they described it, then this would to a large
degree be true. But the problem is multiple internal company
documents have indicated that this was a move of self
(21:17):
preservation on the part of the plastics industry. They needed
to make people believe plastic was sustainable. When I throw
that fork in the right bin, then I am really
just giving someone else in the future another fork, or
another jug of milk or something like that. The lobbyists
(21:42):
in the plastic and oil industry fought very hard and
quite successfully to mandate that triangle recycle symbol. It's like
the ecological or a burros, but like in a good
way where it kind of like feeds back into itself,
you know what I mean. So it's, uh, what could this?
(22:02):
It says all you need to know. It's like, hey,
you can be part of this amazing continuum of manufacturing.
Always the yeah, I always thinking ecological illuminati. I think
both answers are acceptable. I would even say, you know,
all of the above there. It did make an impact
because it gave us this belief that all of those
(22:24):
items bearing that mark could potentially be turned into new products.
The thing is, the vast majority of them were not
turned into new products. The vast majority of them are
still not turned into anything new. They can be we
have the technology. There's just not a market for these things.
It's not a market for this recycled plastic, and in
(22:47):
many cases there's not a compelling financial reason to make them.
And that's because recycling has problems. When we talk about plastics,
they're huge problems with recycling. Yeah, I mean, remember we
were talking to the top of the show about how
like this one particular type of plastic might you know,
be able to hold acid, and these other types of
(23:08):
plastic that can hold rubbing alcohol and et cetera. I mean,
you know, typically polymers are versatile and nonreactive in that way.
But to your point, Bend, there are different ones. There's
a bunch of different ones, and so you know, they
don't all necessarily play nice together because you would actually
have to combine them and they would have to gel
(23:28):
chemically and in order to be repurposed into something else.
And so all of the plastic that that this that
would be needed to UM do this properly or effectively
would have to be sorted by hand to to separate
out this is this type of plastic, This is this
type of plastics. This is this type of plastic. They
can't commingle um so consumers don't know what that is, right,
(23:50):
I mean, that's not and there's not enough bins in
a recycling you know, container to even deal with that
on the front end, right, So that means it's way
expense of to sort all of the plastics to make
new plastic from old plastic. Then it would be just
to make it from oil, yep, just to make new stuff.
(24:10):
It's true that this is the episode where we somewhat
ruined recycling. It's the subtitle that's the But I mean
this isn't to say that no plastic is recycled, right, Ben.
I mean we do read about usually kind of bespoke
products often that are more expensive to buy to the consumer,
that are in fact made of all recycled materials, are
(24:32):
all recycled plastic. But that's you're paying a premium for
that privilege of knowing that you're buying something that was
made with recycled plastic. That's because it takes more work
to make it that way, has to be sorted by hand. Uh,
you know, like you said, you have to find the
plastics that play well together. Uh. And then just for
an example, yeah, there is there is actual recycling plastics.
(24:56):
Sometimes it's sold as at a premium as you mentioned. Uh.
But the stuff that's recycled is often not used in
the ways you think it would be used. Like take
a plastic milk jug down with your plastic milk jug,
you wash it out because you don't want it to
smell up your house or your trash bag. Uh. And
then while you're doing that, you say, oh, wait, I recycled,
(25:17):
so I'm gonna put this in the blue the blue receptacle.
And then you think, okay, off on your journey little
plastic jug, bro, I wish you luck in this your
secular version of reincarnation. That plastic jug can only get
recycled a few times because it degrades in quality every
(25:38):
time it's recycled. So this means it can only happen.
It can only be recycled a finite number of times.
Uh so what happened to the use plastic Well in
the US, we did something that's very popular in a
lot of disposal strategies of this country. We shipped it
somewhere where we couldn't see it, you know what I mean,
(26:01):
out of sight, out of mind, like a child. It's
not I can't see it. It's not there anymore. We Yeah,
And unfortunately that is an all too common thing that
we as Americans, uh, fall victim to um and and
to your point, Ben, like even like the idea, this
is interesting to me, and this has maybe more a
question than I have. If you can only be recycled
(26:21):
for a number of times, like how do you know
when you're done? Like when when you when you've no
longer got a viable product? Isn't that something you have
to track as well? Yeah? I mean that's a really
good point, because then we have this whole logistic aspect
to it, right logistical aspect to it, where we can't
just do our best to recycle stuff. We also have
to make sure that we're recycling something into something viable. Uh.
(26:45):
The complications alone are could cripple the entire project. So
shive it off to China. Right. For a long time,
labor was cheaper there. Also, environmental laws were lacks right,
or at least on pay paper. Uh. The U S
laws were more strict the country of China and businesses
(27:06):
in China. Eventually, we're no longer able to find uses
for all of this discarded plastics, so now they've largely
stopped accepting it. There's just not much of a market
for this recycled stuff. And that means that a lot
of the plastic in this country, in the US ends
up getting discarded and it piles up, piles up. And
(27:26):
I don't know about you, this gives me an existential crisis.
There's there's a question I have to ask at the
very end of this. Yeah, and you know, and maybe
you can answer this, Ben, I know, you know, and
I live Indicator, Georgia, and the city of Decatur has
been plagued with corruption in terms of like you know,
overcharging people for utilities, and there was like a big
lawsuit all the stuff. But I've also heard rumor that
(27:49):
my little blue recycling ben hopper that I you know,
roll out KIIIII kick onto the curve every Monday, that
that just ends up in the land fill more often
than not, that a lot of me pnicipalities don't do
a good job of recycling, even when you think that's
what you're doing. Yeah, that's true, and that's that's something
that is unfortunately not historically uncommon, you know what I mean. Like,
(28:14):
consider a lot of office buildings where you know, people
think they are throwing that aluminum can, that plastic bottle
into the recycling bin, and then one night, maybe you're
working late, then you see that the people who do
custodial services in that office just throw it all in
the same place. And then maybe you tell yourself there's
a magical Susian sorting machine that handles everything like a
(28:39):
Harry Potter hat of some sort, you know. Yeah, But
but it goes to the whole point that we started
with here, is that it's all about optics. It's all
about selling you the dream. It's not actually about the practice,
it's more about like the image, right, So, uh, what
happened um as as this continued, you know, especially after
(29:00):
China's sort of rejecting this material. I believe that that
study Rereforence earlier about birds having plastics in the stomachs,
and the number then was about five percent. But by
the eighties, uh, you know, in true eighties excess fashion,
that number increased to eight percent. Eighty percent of birds
in a similar studies twenty years later had plastic in
(29:23):
their stomach And now as we record this, multiple studies
indicate that almost nine percent of all birds have some
sort of plastics somewhere in their system. Today, as we
record this, about a million birds going to die this
year due specifically to their stomachs being stuffed with plastics.
(29:45):
And you know, my qualms with with the bird population then,
but even I don't think they deserve to go out
like that. I agreed. And so you know, the one
thing you want for an enemy you respect, I would
imagine from your perspectivele is to is that they have
an honorable death right. I mean, at least spectacular. Let
(30:09):
their stomachs explode from eating wedding rice or something. You know,
I'm I'm kidding and burn people out there. Please don't
don't cancel me. I'm I'm very very much kidding. But no.
It turns out that the concept of recycling as it's
been sold to the United States public and other places
around the world is at the very very least misleading.
(30:29):
Is an optics first kind of thing, as opposed to like,
what's the actual end result of this, uh, this whole operation? Right, yeah, exactly.
I like the way one industry insider put it. They said,
selling recycling sells plastic. Uh. And then there's an interesting
statement by a guy named Larry Thomas, who is a
(30:50):
former president of the Society of the Plastics Industry, which
today is known as p I, a Plastics Industry Association.
He uh, he was at the helm of one of
the most powerful trade groups for the industry in d C.
And he said that if the public thinks that recycling
is working, then they are not going to be as
(31:12):
concerned about the environment. And to be fair, the industry's
current position is that there is no conspiracy of foot
and wanted to give voice to the the other side
to their perspective. Guy named Steve Russell, a representative for
the plastics industry who was for a while the vice
(31:32):
president of plastics for the American Chemistry Council, says the
industry has never intentionally mislead the public about recycling and
that they're committed to ensuring one day that all plastic
is recycled. And he says, uh, you know, public commitment
(31:53):
to recycling programs, public pressure, uh, and evolving technology will
all play huge roles in helping recycle all plastic. Essentially,
he's saying, no one ever intentionally misled anyone, and maybe
one day recycling can do what the industry for decades
(32:16):
claimed it was already doing. Just think about the double
thinking that statement. It's Orwellian. Yeah, it's kind of mind blowing. Um.
I don't even know how to respond to that, Ben,
I mean, we're not saying, we have to be clear,
We are not saying recycling is anything other than an amazing, awesome,
(32:36):
potentially world changing, world saving concept. Do you remember, though, Ben,
like being a kid and going to like the recycling center,
getting a tour and all that stuff. I mean, it
was something that sold to you as early as as uh,
you know, elementary school, recycled, reduced, reuse all of that
stuff and again, and we're gonna We're gonna continue on.
(32:57):
But I do want to say, like recycling paper, it's
great recycling paper works. You can smash all that stuff
together and make all kinds of cool stuff, uh, you know,
and pulp and you know, make You can even buy
recycled paper for your copy paper if you want. There's
all kinds of uses for recycled paper. But the plastic
parts just a much more tricky. Uh, let's call its
(33:18):
supply chain problem, right, yeah, And again, like I I'm
conflicted about this because I love, uh, I love the
idea of recycling, and I love the idea of individual
people being able to make a fundamental difference in the
(33:38):
world around them, you know what I mean. I love
the power of the individual. But what we are saying
here is that the idea of recycling in the world
of plastic the way it's been practiced is not near
as widespread as the plastic industry would want you to believe.
(33:59):
And this will probably continue to be the case until
there's some revolutionary technology that Harry Potter trash hat, which
is a great phrase, uh, until it comes online or
until it becomes somehow more profitable to recycle and reuse
plastic rather than to make new plastic. Neither of those
things have happened yet not not neither of them. And
(34:21):
to compound the issue here, we are still learning the
full scope of this problem. We may not know the
long term consequences of this issue for gears and years
and years to come. And that doesn't mean it doesn't
affect us. It means that we don't know what's going
to happen. This's never happened on Earth before. We have
(34:42):
no idea what plot twister ahead. Yeah, I mean, each
year human beings produced three hundred and sixty million tons
of plastic UH, and according to one study, around eight
million tons of it enters the ocean UM and until recently,
UH the fate of what's called microplastics, which is plastics
(35:03):
that contain particles less than five millimeters in size UM
in the ocean has been unclear, but to your point,
been a recent study. We're at least starting to get
a whiff of what these microplastic particles are doing when
they settle in marine sediments UM, following the pattern of
a lot of other pollutants. So We're not just talking
(35:26):
about like hard goods that stick around. We're talking about
the chemical impact of plastics and how it can actually
saturate and and uh contaminate soil and water and and beyond. Yeah,
you're right, no, uh. Microplastics and nanoplastics, which are the
they have a diameter of less than point zero zero
(35:48):
one millimeters. Both of these form from the abrasion of
larger pieces of plastic dumped into the ocean, so the
stuff keeps kind of breaking itself in the smaller and
smaller chunks, and research in wildlife and in laboratory animals
has established some pretty compelling links to between tiny plastic
(36:12):
and infertility, inflammation, even cancer. Microplastics have polluted the entire planet,
from the Arctic to your neighborhood park to the depths
of the ocean. Like you probably saw not too long ago,
scientists being startled to get to a very remote part
(36:36):
of the world under the ice and antarctica and then
see that there was plastic there. This is happening. Yeah,
you ever heard you ever thought of the concept of
airborne plastic ben Again, this the old school model of
plastic pollution as much more just a nuisance, right, or like, okay,
it gets in birds, the physical chunks of things get
(36:57):
in birds and like choke them or cause them to
have horrible digestive problems that can that can ultimately kill them.
But yeah, airborne plastic apparently human beings. According to a
previous study that we found UH for this episode, UM
have shown people eat and breathe in at least fifty
(37:18):
thousand particles of microplastic a year, and that microplastic pollution
is absolutely just raining down upon city dwellers and it's
not going away anytime soon. No, it's not, which means
that to a large degree, this conspiracy was successful because
(37:40):
the profit margins stayed consistent, UM. But now it's coming
to a head, and we have to ask ourselves what
does this mean for the future. We'll tell you after
a word from our sponsor. We've returned. Let's open this
segment about the future with a quote from Rolling Stone
(38:05):
that gives us a troubling summation of the dilemma we face. No,
could I ask you to do the honors here? Absolutely, sir.
Rolling Stone puts it out like this, More than half
the plastics down on Earth has been created since two
thousand two, and plastic pollution is on pace to double
(38:26):
by tw At its root, the global plastics crisis is
a product of our addiction to fossil fuels. The private
profit and public harm of the oil industry is very
well understood. Um. Again, this is all quote from this
Rolling Stone article by Tim Dickinson, UM, which absolutely recommend
fully reading. Uh, but let's let's continue um. Oil is
(38:51):
refined and distributed to customers who consumers rather who benefit
from gasoline's short useful lifespan in a combustion engine, leaving
behind atmosphere pollution for generations by the same pattern, and
the same tragedy of the commons is playing out with
another gift of the oil and gas giants whose drilling
draws up the petroleum precursors for plastics. Yeah. Yeah, it's
(39:16):
they're troublingly similar cycles, right, And you know the proof
is out there. Oil companies knew about the issues with
fossil fuels dating back to the seventies and didn't say
a word about it. So that's where we're at. Since
nineteen fifty, the world has created six point three trillion
(39:37):
kims of plastic waste of that has never been recycled
even once. This trend is only going to accelerate as
emerging economies increase their plastic consumption. Like think about this,
In ten advanced economies in the world, we're using twenty
(39:58):
times more plastic than and uh per capita than consumers
and places like Indonesia or in India and now people
are on the way up. Right, there's a higher demand
for plastic, and the industry itself, Big Plastic, is counting
on that growing demand to keep selling stuff even though
(40:19):
a great deal of it will still be around long
after and probably long after everyone listening to this podcast,
we're watching this YouTube clip today has been long dead
and and this is this is that existential crisis. I
wanted to ask you about this. Uh everyone, you know
you doc all of us listening along at home or
(40:43):
in our cars are counting the pieces of plastic around us.
Do you experience existential dread when you hold like like
a plastic fork and realize just how much longer it
will be around than you, how much more permanent it
is in the scheme of things than you a living
(41:06):
being that it bothers me, yeah, bothers me too, and
you know who else it bothers been uh kids who
as you well know kids these days, say that as
someone who's essentially becoming an old grandpapa. But kids these
days are are what the kids these days called pretty woke.
Uh there they are hip to all these societal problems,
(41:28):
political and environmental and otherwise. And you know what else,
kids like legos UM and apparently a lot of kids
who are fond of Legos begged the Lego Corporation in
the form of letters that they wrote, uh to the
company to stop using single use plastic bags in their packaging.
(41:50):
So Lego heard them. The Lego Group chief executive Officer
Niel's B. Christiansen said, we have received any letters from
child and about the environment asking us to remove single
use plastic packaging. UM. We've been exploring alternatives for some time,
and the passion and ideas from children inspired us to
(42:11):
begin to make changes. Uh. So apparently they are looking
to UM roll this out in the very near future
and it will be replaced with paper, which again, like
we said earlier in the episode, is much more viable
as a recyclable good. UM for single use materials. UM.
It's investing four hundred million dollars over three years to
(42:34):
improve its sustainability efforts overall the Lego Corporation. Uh unfortunately, um,
you know, legos themselves uh made of plastic. But at
least kids aren't throwing their legos in the ocean. Presumably
it's something to keep around and pass down to siblings,
and you know, so that's I think that's fine. Um.
I mean they're expensive, they are quite expensive. You're aware
(42:57):
of that. I am aware of that. They're also uh
murder here on your bare feet, as every parent knows
when you're walking around. Thankfully, my kids more into bracelets
than she has legos, but that's plastic beads. Um. But
again those are meant to be kept around and given
to friends and hopefully not just chucked. But yeah, our
super producer Doc holiday Off Mike just kind of during
(43:20):
our ad break exasperatedly exclaimed, Oh, this is depressing, you know,
And then you're not wrong, Doc, you're not wrong. But
hopefully we can sort it out before we break the
planet Entirely, not to sound too tree huggry about it,
but sure feels like we're hitting a tipping point with
all this stuff. It's not a look extinction doesn't care
(43:43):
about vague, the vague stories we have made up for ourselves.
Extinction does not care about political leanings. It doesn't care
about religion. It doesn't care about money the economy, which
again is just another religion. I out the clearing call
a long time ago. I don't think anybody has successfully
(44:04):
proven a difference between the concept of an economy and
the concept of a religion. But there is one fascinating point,
and I appreciate it so much, man that you that
you brought a little bit of light here. Uh, there's
one fascinating point. The plastics crisis is different from climate change,
at least in the way it's been treated. Remember, like
(44:25):
I mentioned, oil corporations put a lot of money into
denying the concept of climate change for a very long time.
But the the folks over what we call big plastic.
And to be fair, there there are a lot less
like two separate entities, and a lot more like fingers
on the same hand. But whatever you wanna call big plastic.
(44:48):
They are not denying the problem anymore. They're seeking to
convince consumers and regulators that, despite the fact they put
all this pollution out in the planet, they can be
the trusted experts to make plastic use sustainable and something
they call the circular economy, so that plastic does actually
(45:09):
get recycled continually and doesn't degrade. Uh. The cynical way
to translate that, honestly is this recycling. But you know,
for real this time? Sure, I like that. It's got
a nice ring to and not not do on a
down note, but it does. Something just popped into my head,
And we hadn't even talked about what about plastic garbage bags? Like?
(45:30):
I mean, don't they just end up in like landfills
like forever? I don't know, it's it's I'm sorry, I
took us down a peg. You brought us up a
peg and took us right back down. But what I
don't know? Are there any environmental scientists out there, any
polymer scientists out there? You know, Lego is talking about
(45:51):
exploring alternatives even to the plastic bricks. What does that
look like? Why are we so hooked on plastic? Let
us know? Yeah, let us know, let us know how
you think this is going to work out? We are
all ears, honestly, everybody should be. Uh. We cannot predict
the future, but we do see troubling trends and we
(46:13):
want to hear from you. You can find us on Instagram.
You can find us on Twitter, you can find us
on Facebook. We love to recommend our favorite page on
the good old Internet, and that is our Facebook community page.
Here's where it gets crazy. But wait, you can find
us as individuals too, should the spirit move you to
do so, you certainly can. You can find me exclusively
(46:36):
on Instagram where I am at how now Noel Brown? Um?
You know I post a lot of like crazy cosplay
videos from my kid, who's a delight and also very
much into the environment. Um and uh, you know, cooking experiments,
under lockdown, occasional drumming exercises, and I'm starting getting yoga ben.
(46:56):
I just did like three days straight of a beginner
yoga you tube video. Starting to really enjoy that. So
maybe you'll see me in uh in cow pose or
I don't know the names yet, but you could see
that where where are you been on the Internet's uh?
You know, it's interesting you mentioned the yoga stuff. My
pal Alex your pal as well, it's got super into
(47:17):
yoga recently. He's the one who told me videos to
watch yoga with Adrian for anyone else out there, that's
trying to dip their toe in in the yoga pool.
Nice credit to you, Alex. If you're listening to the show. Uh.
If you're already on the internet, you can find me
having any number of misadventures on Instagram where I'm at
ben Bowling. You can find me on Twitter where I'm
(47:39):
at ben Bowling hs W. You will recognize it's me
because you'll see a tweet that I wrote before I
came into this episode, saying that the research really got
to me. The plastic is everywhere. I will aim to
make less depressing tweets in the future. It's when you
started getting into the airborne plastic that I really started
(47:59):
getting dark. Uh, this is all pretty dark, but I
don't know. It's always dark as before the dawn. How
far away are we from children being born with plastic
in them? Anyhow? Tell us about it. You can also
give us a phone call if you are not the
type to sip the social needs, that's all right. We're
one eight three three S T d W y t K.
(48:21):
Leave us a voice mail memo message. UH, try to
keep it concise. You're much more likely to get on
one of our handy dandy listener Mail episodes if you
do that. But if you've got something that needs to
be broken up into a couple of these, I think
what's the limit been a couple of minutes for each
of these. Uh, feel free, but you know, we we
may have to condense it a little bit. And also
please let us know if we can use your name
(48:43):
on the on the show and get weird with it,
you know what I mean. My favorite listener mail is
still that guy with the uniquely infectious laugh. If you're listening, sir,
you made my day. The truck driver, the cookie truck
driver with the Hong Kong Yeah, more residents check it out.
That's somewhere in the title of that episode. Absolutely, As
we've said time and time again, you can also join
(49:03):
our Facebook group Here's where it gets crazy, or you
can exchange memes and barbs and and now not barbs,
definitely polite discourse with your fellow listeners. All you gotta
do is name one of the members of the crew
of this conspiracy posse and then you will find yourself
in the door. Um, if you don't want to do
any of that stuff and you'd rather just get in
(49:24):
touch with us in an older of fashioned ways. You
can do so by sending us an email. We are
conspiracy at iHeart radio dot com. Stuff they don't want
(49:51):
you to know is a production of I heart Radio.
For more podcasts from my heart Radio, visit the iHeart
radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your
favorite shows.
Stuff They Don't Want You To Know News
Hosts And Creators
Matt Frederick
Ben Bowlin
Noel Brown
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