Plastic pollution, while sometimes funny in theory, pretty much always sucks the life out of, well, life. No more so than in the ocean, which is starting to look a lot like a garbage disposal.
Fortunately, some people refuse to accept this load of garbage. Activists, innovators, explorers, and artists are gathering in Los Angeles on November 6 for TEDx:GreatPacificGarbagePatch, an independently organized TED event. It’s featuring a day jam-packed with videos and live speeches from such famous ocean-lovers and plastic-pollution-haters as Her Deepness Sylvia Earle, plastic-boat sailor and heir David de Rothschild, former “green jobs czar” Van Jones, discoverer of the Pacific Garbage Patch Captain Charles Moore, 3rd-generation sea-explorer Fabien Cousteau, advocate for the plastic-free life Beth Terry, and photographic artist/activist Chris Jordan.
This event aims to be:
a forum where issue experts, youth leaders, activists, visual and performing artists, actors, musicians, politicians and many others will share observations on how plastic pollution affects ocean/environmental health and public health; explore solutions for reducing our plastic footprint, and begin to develop ideas about eliminating plastic pollution through individual action as well as public- and private-sector innovation.
In addition to live-streaming this event, the organizers put together a REFUSE campaign to refuse plastic refuse. It encourages the “4 R’s”:
- Refuse: Say no to single-use and disposable plastics
- Reduce: Cut waste whenever possible
- Reuse: Reuse nontoxic containers (read: not plastic)
- Recycle: It’s the one next to the trash can
Watch the whole day of events, starting at 8 a.m. Pacific on Saturday, Nov. 6, live here:
