Laurie Graham

Young recycling zealots are talking rubbish

I’m tired of being guilted by people who only recently learned to tie their shoelaces

issue 05 October 2019

Church attendances may be falling, but there’s a new religion in town: recycling. Its followers are devout and full of missionary zeal. They follow the collection day rubrics to the letter and if you ask them what evidence they have that sorting their polyethylenes from their PVCs is any more effective than lighting a penny candle, they say: ‘But I believe.’

The road to a greener future seems paved with rinsed yoghurt pots that no one knows what to do with and I grow weary of being guilted, particularly by people who only recently learned to tie their own shoelaces. A couple of months ago I ran the gauntlet of a junior school ‘save our planet’ demo. I’d have liked to stop and talk to them about my alleged role in destroying the oceans, but I haven’t been DBS vetted so I thought it best not to linger.

Agreed, I have not led an environmentally blameless life.

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