The Great Pacific Garbage Patch is a ‘raft of life’ for animals in the open ocean

originally posted by: CptGreenTea
a reply to: generik

How are human created garbage patches a natural part of the environment?

Wildlife finds a way to use our mistakes but it is nowhere natural. And we often destroy ecosystems and pollute the ocesn with trillions of broken down plastic particles.

I feel like you're making excuses for how human product waste is destroying our environment.

those garbage patches were there long before the plastic. created by natural winds and currants. it's just the plastic in them that is new. so it's not as you say "wildlife finding a way to use our mistakes", but instead wildlife going on as they always have.

and you apparently missed were i said that much of it was not waste at all. but instead used and cherished things taken away by natural storms and weather. "plastic" is a hugely used product, especially by the poor, because it is cheap, affordable, and lasts, even in natural environments that easily destroy other materials. things like plastic chairs, plastic tables and other plastic furniture, as well as things things like plastic plates and cups are rather common. not to mention things like plastic boxes and containers used to protect things like foods from moisture and rain/flooding, and pests like ants, roaches, mice, and rats. even my "chest of drawers is plastic, and is what is available to buy in normal stores. even things like plastic coke bottles are reused. both to hold other stuff (glass bottles for example are often filled with gas and sold especially to tricy drivers, a motorcycle/sidecar public transit vehicle everywhere), or cut down into cheap pots for plants. even art is made out of them. and when your house is destroyed, or carried away in a typhoon, or flood, it all ends up in the ocean.

oh sure those with more money can get crap made out of press-board, heck we even have Ikea now. but in the heavy humidity of most of the year, you can imagine how short a life such things have. things like leather, and fabric also have issues due to humidity, such as molding, and rotting. metal isn't much better due to corrosion. such as those cookie tins made famous from grannies storing sewing supplies in them, i have a couple just covered in rust, just from sitting in my bedroom (you don't even want to know how bad it is for electronics, and especially standard batteries). although storing such things in plastic bags and containers helps keep the moisture at bay. people even will keep their TV remotes in ziplocks to protect them and to try to keep the batteries from leaking. stores even use saran-wrap on things like computers, phones and other electronic products on display in stores, completely wrapping them up to protect them, they even do it with things like shoes put out on display, especially leather shoes. or putting things like stuffed animals in bags or plastic containers to protect them. even those foil/paper sachets used in places like North America for things like soup and juice mix, are useless, and highly susceptible to moisture getting in them, in a short period of time unless stored in a decent plastic container, which is why plastic sachets are used instead. the fact is that plastic is extremely important as a material, in the very places, most likely to have such things end up in the oceans. until you can come out with an equally cheap and light, material that can be just as effective against things like moisture and pests, there really is no choice but to use it. not an "excuse", just a fact of life.