Even our Council, which burns every last penny it receives; hasn't yet started to charge people to use litter bins. Why is it then that if you walk through a nice area, there is very little of it blowing around, but
Scuzzzyville is knee deep in the stuff?
12 comments:
Because it's my human rights not to have to bother to think about the consequences of dropping my crisp packet, innit? And because it gives someone a job pickin it up, innit?
Or put another way, it requires a small but repeated effort to instil in a child the idea that they should not pollute their immediate environment, and that small but repeated effort is too much for most of the underclass.
Easy. Some of us go to our local hardware store and spend a few bucks on a rubbish picker-upper. We then walk up and down the street once or twice a week, picking up the crap that people leave behind and making sure it ends up in a bin.
And I mean crap. I've collected quite a few full nappies in my time from the gutter.
This is the sort of rubbish picker-upper I refer to:
http://notsep.blogspot.com/2009/03/697-worth-of-doing-good.html
We also teach our kids not to drop rubbish. I bought the youngster an ice cream when we were out for a walk once. Some time later, I noticed he was no longer carrying the cup and spoon that it came in. After asking him where it was, and determining that he had just dropped it, we sent him back to pick it up, and made sure he carried it home with him.
He was not particularly happy, as it was a long walk back to where he dropped it, but he's been a lot more careful with his rubbish since then. He knows we have zero tolerance when it comes to littering, so he doesn't do it (at least not when we are around).
It's actually mind-boggling simple.
Not many of my friends, neighbours and family fall into the category of "Scum" but far too many of them fall into the category of "child-worshipper". How could you make poor ickle NSEP Jnr walk ALL THAT WAY to pick up his carton? How could you BEAR to see his dear ickle face twisted with unhappiness at being made to do something he didn't fancy? How could you make him feel that your love is conditional upon certain behavioural standards being met? That's not going to give him a self-esteem the size of Canada, is it.
Parents who can't bear to fall out of the sunshine of their child's adoring love (a love I have found that, beyond a certain age, is heavily dependent upon receipt of material goods), even when it's in both their and the child's best long term interests, make me VOMIT.
I'd echo what Lily said - my kids have been taught not to drop rubbish, but far too many of their friends haven't.
Their parents are too busy being their "bestest friends" to concentrate on something so nasty as discipline. It isn't a parent's job to be a friend to their child, it's their job to raise them to be decent, worthwhile citizens. Sometimes that means they don't like what you make them do, but, as I tell mine, it's not a popularity contest.
I was going to be a squaddie.
But then I got beaten up at the bus-stop by a bunch of 14 year old girls from on my way back working as a life guard in a swimming baths . ( It was a revenge attack.... you know.)
Then I joined the Met.
Then I read Peter Hitchens and plagiarised him mercilessly in order to start my blog and get my book off the ground.
Then with my mate DC Richard, "Dick", Horton being outed and all , I ran scared and battened down the hatches.
In an item on Northern Ireland news today children from an area on the Lower Shankill pointed out the problem of glass in any open (potential play) area near their housing. Apparently this glass had been there for up to months and was presenting a danger and should be the responsibility of the local authority to clean up. No investigation of how the glass got there (perhaps teenagers hanging around drinking?pictures of broken beer bottles broadcast!) Also no questioning of local adult residents. The children were wheeled out to get the sympathy vote but what are the root causes of the problem?
More shoddy journalism from BBC NI - appeal to local feelings rather than representing the truth of a significant litter problem.
CFM
On the other hand, you would actually have to have a death wish to politely request to the scum of the earth that it would be much appreciated if they wouldn't mind putting that bottle into a bin. You know, in case a little child cuts itself?
Communication is generally considered more effective if it is delivered in the host language.
I teach my middle class kids to drop their litter in the shit part of town.
Just yet another example of falling standards of good manners, decency, and consideration for others.
My little girl knows it's wrong to litter, and often points to 'naughty people' who drop their litter in the town centre.
If a 4 year old can understand it; why can't a twenty or a thirty year old?
It seems to me that rude, aggressive, and in considerate behaviour is now the norm: Push in front of a bus queue, cycle on the pavement, or run red lights at predestrian crossings, and all that's okay! Better yet when the bus queue or shop queue comes to a halt, becuase someone's in discussion with bus driver or shop assistant, don't wait patiently behind the person who's immediately in front of you: no simply push your trolley, pram or pelvis/chest right up their arse/back, and use your boddy weight to move them on.
Object to any of this behaviour and you are an 'arsehole' yes your the one with the problem, your the one being unreasonable: After all it's everyone's right to behave exactly as they please innit now!
Maybe it's because the people in nice areas tend to want to keep them nice whilst the slummies don't give a toss. Aftr all, people in nice areas more often own their houses so care about the environment they live in whilst those on multiple benefits have no personal pride in the hovels they live in, paid for by the tax-payer. so their attitude is "it's not mine, so why care about it).
I spend quite a lot of time redistributing rubbish into bins in our street since the moronic students, to whom the area has been handed over, can't grasp the three-bin, two-week emptying system, which has led to a rat problem. We are one of only three families left who are owner-occupiers. None of the transients cares if the place goes to shit. And since I do, I have to clean it up.
Just typing that has made me feel depressed.
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