Blogs that don't like plastics

Did you know there are blogs devoted almost entirely to criticizing plastics? I stumbled across a few today that I had not seen before, thanks to a story in Mother Jones.

The story is about the "new ascetics" -- activists (and, typically, authors) in the mold of Henry David Thoreau, who try to live in ways that have minimum impact on the earth. It's an interesting story, and here's the passage that sent me to an anti-plastics blog:

In all of these self-deprivation experiments, there comes a moment when self-denial becomes self-defeating. An Internet entrepreneur from San Diego named Dave Bruno has received a lot of back pats for his "100 Thing Challenge," a goal to limit his possessions to that magic number. It's a useful thought experiment, but do shoes count as one thing, or should each shoe count as a separate item? The point -- how much crap do you really need? -- can quickly get lost in the details. Ascetics often become distracted by the rules or take things too far. Consider the fervent subculture of people who try to live plastic-free lives. Another perfectly worthy goal, but then you stumble upon advice like this on the blog PlasticLess.com: "Get a Vasectomy: Children are the target market for pointless plastic stuff. Most temporary forms of birth control involve some plastic packaging." (Uh, okay.)

So I decided to check out PlasticsLess.com, and found a blog with pretty frequent posts dating back to May 2007. The author (who doesn't seem to have a page explaining who he or she is, or why the blog exists) has posted on topics including marine debris, bag bans, BPA safety. But the overlying theme is that people should use less plastics stuff. It's interesting that it's specifically less plastic stuff -- some of the posts highlight products that aren't made of plastics that people can buy instead of plastic varieties.

That blog included links to "The Great Plastic Challenge, Eliminating plastic from our lives...one week at a time," and "Life Less Plastic," a blog about a Chicago woman's "quest to protect the environment and my health by reducing the amount of plastic" that she uses every day. (Check out her list of "What I'm doing to be mostly plastic-free.")

Thanks to Mother Jones for sending us on this look at the "fervent subculture of people who try to live plastic-free lives."