Reluctance to Confront

As a society we have failed to make littering socially unacceptable.  We did it with smoking, unsafe sex and spitting, but haven’t stigmatized littering yet.  

When non-smokers grew sick of forced exposure to fuming cigars and cigarettes indoors they spoke up.   Public health officials and others decried the practice of spitting and passed ordinances to control it.  Somehow littering has dodged the stigmatization bullet despite despite its status as a trillion dollar problem worldwide.  

It’s time to put litter prevention into the spotlight in a serious way.

There are hurdles.  Chief among them is overcoming our reluctance to confront people who litter.  We need to get over that.  Recognize that speaking to someone who litters is not a confrontation.  It’s a conversation that has you in the driver’s seat.  

Let me tell you about an encounter I had with a fellow I sat beside on a transit vehicle who was about to leave his discarded lunch bag and wrappers under his seat as we approached the last stop.  I politely pointed out that I had noticed his litter there and I asked he wanted me to take it for him to deposit in the correct bin. 
He looked startled and sheepish simultaneously, hastily gathered his scatterings and assured me he would take care of them.  And he did.  People litter in large part because they can do so largely unchallenged.  They only want to litter when they think either no one is watching or no one’s going to say anything.   So speak up, litter loathers.  Let’s get that stigma started!