No Green Party at the Japanese Parliament means a lot

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Originally Posted by Maciamo

you still didn't answer whether they put all the PET bottles, cans, paper, cardboard, etc in the same truck or not.

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There are several types of recycling trucks (資源回収車) to collect different categories of waste. Ex.: http://www.shinwa-d.com/newpage25.html

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And you still haven't talked about the important points.

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Below are some important facts that have been established so far:

1. Waste is managed by each city in Japan, not by prefecture or the national government.
2. Most cities in Japan have more than three categories of waste for collection.
3. Maciamo didn't know the fact #1, and wrongly believed that the government of Japan (then of Tokyo) takes care of waste management previously.
4. Maciamo didn't know the fact #2, and wrongly believed that there are only three categories of waste, namely ``burnable, non-burnable, bottles,'' in Japan (later in Tokyo) previously.
5. Maciamo is criticizing the mindset of the whole nation of Japan being environmentally insensitive.
6. Maciamo lives in a city in Tokyo.

And some important inferences from the facts above:

1. From fact #3, #4, it is rather Maciamo himself who is quite ignorant or undereducated on the issue of waste management.
2. From fact #3, #4, #5, Maciamo is quick to make a blanket generalization and judge an entire nation negatively with wrong and scant information. I.e., Maciamo is a prejudiced person.
3. From fact, #2, #6, The city in which Maciamo lives most likely has more than the three categories of waste mentioned by himself in fact #4.
4. From fact #4 and inference #3, Maciamo is quite possibly not sorting and preparing waste for collection properly as required by the waste management plan of his city. I.e., Maciamo is poisonous to the environment of his locality.

If that makes you happy to believe that I don't sort my waste properly and my not knowing whether it is the local or national government that collect the wastes is your only defence against your total ignorance of the other points I mentioned, I think we can just stop this discussion, because nothing constructive is going to come from your side.

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Maciamo is criticizing the mindset of the whole nation of Japan being environmentally insensitive.

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I think I can maintain that because of the other points, and especially because not even a 0,3% of the Japanese voters necessary to elect one of the 480 Representatives have cared to elect a single member of the Green Party. Given that not enough Japanese seem to care enough about the issues I cited to make things change about what matters most.

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From fact #3, #4, #5, Maciamo is quick to make a blanket generalization and judge an entire nation negatively with wrong and scant information. I.e., Maciamo is a prejudiced person.

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Let's see. How many issuses did I mention to make my "blaket generalization with wrong or scant information" ? Let me remind you that the original article was not only about environmental but also health issues (which are related anyhow). I have classified them in order of importance (for me at least) :

1) medical incompetence
2) lack of Green Party (as it would solve most of the problems below, given enough power at the Parliament)
3) carcerigenic incinerators in residential areas
4) industrial waste (=> Minamata)
5) nuclear safety
6) lack of concern and awareness regarding AIDS
7) lack of realization that "the avoidance of unnecessary junk is even more valuable ecologically than its recycling" (citing from the Neuer Zuricher's article)
8) sorting of commercial waste (combini)
9) sorting of domestic waste
10) whale and dolphin hunting
11) "concretization" of the Japanese nature (rivers, hills, coast...)
12) lack of organic food in supermarkets

The order is of course debatable as I have just done it quickly and some could be inverted depending on one's point of view or sensitivities. Nevertheless, there are 12 points (I may have forgotten others), and the only want that was based on "wrong or scant information" was number 9, i.e. one of the least important. And you call me judgemental after your last post ! :mad:

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Originally Posted by Maciamo

I think we can just stop this discussion, because nothing constructive is going to come from your side.

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1. Inquire about how to sort and prepare waste for collection as specified by the waste management plan of the city and start sorting out your waste properly asap.
2. Stop making a hasty negative judgement about someone with wrong, scant knowledge and prejudice, esp. when you are criticizing such a large group of people in the lump as the Japanese.

These two lessons for you should make the argument ``constructive'' in my opinion.

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Originally Posted by fugue

[*]Inquire about how to sort and prepare waste for collection as specified by the waste management plan of the city and start sorting out your waste properly asap.

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FYI, if you are worrying about me, I do put PET bottles, glass bottles and cardboards separately, next to the others at the waste collection point. I in fact rarely take the wastes outside myself. My wife usually does it because of our different schedule. When I do it, it's more often the burnable (twice a week) or non-burnable, than the recyclables. Anyway, we have very little recyclable apart from PET bottles, given that I never buy newspapers or magazines (no, not even one in 3 years in Japan) and we very rarely buy glass bottles for drinks. Cardboards are nicely crushed and tied with a rope. But as I said, it's not me who takes these out anyway. As you have seen on the attached picture, my ward only has 4 cats (大型ごみ never used so far, and not much else than PET bottles in our case for the recyclable) and does not have many subcategories.

I don't know if you guys heard this news - but it is official - the Midori no Kaigi - the Enviormental Green party - which had no seats elected - has dissolved.

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And some important inferences from the facts above:
From fact #3, #4, it is rather Maciamo himself who is quite ignorant or undereducated on the issue of waste management.
From fact #3, #4, #5, Maciamo is quick to make a blanket generalization and judge an entire nation negatively with wrong and scant information. I.e., Maciamo is a prejudiced person.
From fact, #2, #6, The city in which Maciamo lives most likely has more than the three categories of waste mentioned by himself in fact #4.
From fact #4 and inference #3, Maciamo is quite possibly not sorting and preparing waste for collection properly as required by the waste management plan of his city. I.e., Maciamo is poisonous to the environment of his locality.

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Hi. I'm a jackass who blindly insults a guy about environmental causes and effect in a country without bothering to bring up any countering arguments or proof of my own.

Japan sucks. Japan sucks. Japan sucks. Your country sucks, Fugue, and so do you.

Now that that's out of the way, let's talk about recyling point by point and ask some questions about Japanese recycling that needs to be said.

1. How much of the materials in Japan have been re-used in other products? (Water bottles, tin cans, paper of any kind?)

2. If Japan recycles plastic, what numbers are they? (There are official names on the bottom of the bottles ranging from 1 to 10; as of 1992 the United States was officially recycling types 1 and 2 while disposing of the rest.

3. If Japan recycles paper, how much of the paper products availble for consumer purchase (everything from fast food resturant bags to newspaper to cardboard boxes)
come from recycled goods?

4. Does Japan have an official environmental department that is part of the government no matter what? In the United States, we have the Environmental Protection Agency, which does an average-to-above average job of enforcing environmental criminal and civil activity in law and courts.

5. Are environmental issues taught in the Japanese school system, and if so, is there a stronger emphasis in teaching these issues in public or private schools?

6. Are there any other methods of disposing trash in Japan other than incineration?

Answer these questions with more than a one-liner and I'll get back to you.

I'm not an expert on enviornental issues, so I can't respond to your questions.

About the green party, is the "niigata new party for people", the left-wing regional party of Niigata considered an enviornmental party?

and you would think Tokyo would be at the forefront of foreward thinking ( :wave: ) but apparently they aren't, I lived in a small town in Nara prefecture and they had three types of bags like you said:

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1) combustible (可燃ごみ)
2) incombustible (不燃ごみ)
3) recyclable (資源)

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But he recyclables actually had about 4 or 5 catagories that were only picked up once a month at a more centralized collection point that was a couple of blocks from my house. For example the first Friday of the month was aluminum cans and the 2nd Friday was PET bottles I don't remember the others cuz 80% of my reclyclables fit those 2 catagories. You used the same recyclable bags which were see through and if you brought the wrong thing on the wrong day it would get left behind. I really felt the locals were at least trying to be responsible. I always felt the area they needed to improve on was eliminating overpackaging, My neighbor had beer delivered to his apartment once a week and they picked up his old bottles to reuse them. I thought that was a step in the right direction.

The smaller the city the more efficient.

as consumers and citizens we have to pay the price for changing bad ideas and bad ways of doing things. My wife always bought this bulk rice where she brought her own container and they filled it I got looking at the price and it was slightly more than the big plastic bags. I suggested we buy the cheaper and she told me that the world already had too damn much plastic in it. If you are unhappy with local recycling efforts maybe you should start a grassroots campaign to raise awareness and provide a place for those who do want to recycle.

I would... but would anyone take a 14 year old seriously? At this forum alone people don't take me seriously because of my age.

You would have to make a bigger ruckus than a 40 year old but many 14 year olds have effected change through preserverence

I'd take ya serious anyhow :cool:

Indeed. Thanks for your support. :)

Hiroshi, your thoughtful and clear answers have earned more respect from me than some of these other, "older" members will. Keep it going. ^_^

Xkavar-san, thanks. :) Sometimes people wonder, "What's a 14 year old non-Japanese doing standing up for Japan and giving his opinion, etc." but its much better than joining my classmates at their "ventures"... ^^; Thanks for your support and your kind message. :)