Invisibility and Vulnerability in the Plasticine
“Plastic substances are now a ubiquitous planetary presence, far beyond the human places for which they were meant” (20). One of the biggest issues with the global presence of plastic waste is that it is experienced firsthand differently depending on who you are and where you live. The differential experience of plastic waste is often the result of the users of single-use products enjoying the benefits of their lifestyle, unaware or uncaring as to the true end destination of what they so quickly discard. People, animals and ecosystems thousands of miles away bare the burden of living with our trash as it is carried out to sea along various currents. So, to truly understand the impact of the Plasticine, we must look to the places beyond our immediate surroundings. We need to make visible where our trash goes, and recognize the how much more vulnerable certain entities are to plastic pollution than ourselves.
Where does it go?
The map above shows the greatest contributors to global plastic waste, with the top two being the United States and China. However, in places like the united states in particular this is not where our waste stays. No, instead it is swept away to places far from our influence, our attention, or our cares. It is these places that suffer the most. While in the popular beaches and tourist designations of the world you may see a number of disposed of items along the coast, it is nothing in comparison to the coastlines of other parts of the world where they don't actively have the infrastructure to keep the waves of trash at bay.
In places like Indonesia, Vietnam, India, the Philla pines, and the Dominican republic, during times of heavy storms and rainfall, the coastline can become a seaside landfill, overflowing with plastic trash. Though a combination of both internally produced waste and that which was imported through ocean currents, these occasional trash waves make the conditions that many popular beaches try to hide visible. While in many cases these do eventually get cleaned up, one should consider not only the beaches that are not tended to, but the ocean itself that is left unattended, the animals who are victims of these plastic-soup conditions, and the possible future that these occurrences become the dominant conditions of our coastlines and oceans. These are innocent people and creatures that do not have the opportunity to simply move away or ignore it. While we live intimately with our plastic products, they live intimately with our plastic waste.
To understand the plasticine is to understand that these people, these places, and these ecosystems, are the victims of our wasteful economic trends. We must consider not just our own complex relationship to plastic, but the undeniable trends of plastic production, and the experiences of the most vulnerable human and non-human entities to try and mitigate the damages that our collective action and perpetual inaction has caused.