Litter louts and why words now fail me over rubbish on streets – Yorkshire Post Letters
VIEWING the litter that blights our British environment, I have been searching for words to describe the people responsible.
“Careless” was the first to come to mind, followed by “selfish, thoughtless and inconsiderate”. None of which seemed to identify the causes of our British litter problem.
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Hide AdThe other morning, at a Bingley bus stop, I challenged a man who discarded a couple of cellophane wrappers on the pavement, when he was standing two steps from a litter bin.
His response was very negative, first telling me “You pick it up”, then launching into a diatribe about street cleaners, which continued as I got on to the bus.
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Hide AdI wondered how, in this time of Greta Thunberg, Extinction Rebellion and Veganuary, how anybody could not be aware of what they are doing? The man’s response provided me with the word – “disconnected”.
He clearly was disconnected from the effect of his actions on the world around him. The same can be said of drivers who speed through 20mph zones and for the owners of large SUVs and similar vehicles, who are still buying them in spite of their deleterious environmental impact. Unlike the man at the bus stop, these are people who have the wherewithal to set us a good example.
Are we living in a society where many members are actually disconnected from that society?