[Closed] When did it become acceptable to leave your rubbish behind?

As a teen I worked in McDonald's mostly looking after the eating area. The expectation is that people throw away their own rubbish and we'd wipe the tables. Throwing the rubbish is a pretty easy thing to do but so many didn't.

I wonder if it's something to do with peoples' perception of respect - some think it's beneath them? Seems to me there's a pretty strong correlation between how well off you are and how likely you are to deal with your litter - for some reason the worse off are more likely to think it's beneath them, the better off not.

I used to live near Hammersmith and the litter on the main shopping street there at the end of the day was often unbelievable - a lot of council estates around there.

Edinburgh's inverleith park is truly horrible after a sunny weekend.

The littering between Inverleith and Granton is taking on some fairly epic proportions, think it's bordering on fly tipping in some instances but in others it just seems to be people leaving random black bags of household garbage lying around.

The cyclepath from Granton up to Broughton Road is even worse, some of it is genuinely inexplicable, to the point where you wonder if people are actually doing it deliberately in some way, as if they bear the outdoors some sort of grudge 😕

We hiked the West Coast Trail in Canada last year which was advertised as being a tough, committed trek for serious hikers only who were required to pay for permits months in advance and also arrange/pay for some fairly convoluted transport logistics to get there and back. You would think that might weed out the lazy/ill educated/****less littering types. You would be wrong 🙁

It absolutely boils my piss!

I think littering makes a statement. The statement is 'I don't give a flying **** about the rest of society!'. It just demonstrates an utter contempt for everyone else other than yourself.

We were in Hebden over the weekend. Saturday afternoon, the standard bunch of scrotes were sat in the park drinking wifebeater and generally being obnoxious. When I walked past the same spot on Sunday morning, the whole area was littered with empty beer cans, take-away packaging, fag packets. 6ft to each side of where they were sat there were bins. Apparently walking 6ft to put sometime in a bin is waaaaaay too much trouble.

My solution to this is simple. If you're quite happy to sit surrounded by your own detritus, then you surely wouldn't mind living surrounded by everyone else either. So, as punishment we should take this to its logical conclusion. Just fence off a landfill site, and throw the lot of them in there, where they'll obviously be quite happy, and carry on dumping....

When I'm running the world comrades......

I wonder if it's something to do with peoples' perception of respect - some think it's beneath them? Seems to me there's a pretty strong correlation between how well off you are and how likely you are to deal with your litter - for some reason the worse off are more likely to think it's beneath them, the better off not.

I'm failing to see the link. If you're loaded you tend not to drop litter?

Drive through (or "thru") fast food joints encourage eating and drinking in cars. But people can't have rubbish in their cars can they? So it all goes out of the windows. These outlets should be made to install number plate recognition systems linked to bar codes on the packaging. A few £100 fines through the post might make people think twice about how they dispose of their garbage.

I wonder if it's something to do with peoples' perception of respect - some think it's beneath them?

for some reason the worse off are more likely to think it's beneath them, the better off not.

As a teen I worked in McDonald's mostly looking after the eating area. The expectation is that people throw away their own rubbish and we'd wipe the tables. ...

I wonder if it's something to do with peoples' perception of respect - some think it's beneath them?

In most restaurants the waiter/server clears the table - so perhaps the problem in that particular instance is that some people mistake McDonalds for a restaurant? 😀

Drive through (or "thru") fast food joints encourage eating and drinking in cars. But people can't have rubbish in their cars can they? So it all goes out of the windows. These outlets should be made to install number plate recognition systems linked to bar codes on the packaging. A few £100 fines through the post might make people think twice about how they dispose of their garbage.

Didn't we discuss this kind of thing a while back? Some form of ID printed onto packaging to unique code or something and linked to your payment card?

Not sure punishing people into doing the "right" thing works, then you get into who decides what's "right"..it just struck me when I was leaving the cinema, that I was very much in the minority when it came to taking my rubbish out, and it made me wonder why.

There's a primary school just up the road from us, and the amount of sweet, crisp and drink detritus that gets blown into our drive does my head in. I've given some thought to putting a bin on our front wall.

There are some cyclists who drop litter - when we went to one of the trail centres in Wales we were disgusted at all the plastic drinks bottles thrown down by the trail for the first mile out of the trail centre.

There are some cyclists who drop litter - when we went to one of the trail centres in Wales we were disgusted at all the plastic drinks bottles thrown down by the trail for the first mile out of the trail centre.

We hiked the West Coast Trail in Canada last year which was advertised as being a tough, committed trek for serious hikers only who were required to pay for permits months in advance and also arrange/pay for some fairly convoluted transport logistics to get there and back. You would think that might weed out the lazy/ill educated/****less littering types. You would be wrong

We walked the WCT in about 1990 and I don't remember seeing litter, so I can only thnk that littering is due to the increase in the amount of crap that people buy in shops and takeaways and lack of education of younger people.

I'm failing to see the link. If you're loaded you tend not to drop litter?

Well if you come from a better off background. I live in a Surrey village and don't notice litter here - or in my parents' Shropshire town. Maybe it's a city thing? Do state schools make a big deal about litter?

Some interesting articles if you search 'psychology of littering'

[url= http://www.chron.com/sports/outdoors/article/Psychology-of-litter-in-the-great-outdoors-5649298.php ][/url]

[url= http://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2014/08/littering-and-following-the-crowd/374913/ ][/url]

I'd like to think that the 'no litter begets no litter' theory held water, but it seems like it would only vindicate those who think 'someone else will do it'.

We walked the WCT in about 1990 and I don't remember seeing litter, so I can only thnk that littering is due to the increase in the amount of crap that people buy in shops and takeaways and lack of education of younger people

Or, to undermine my own point to a degree, just due to an increase in popularity, I think despite the alleged toughness of the hike there's still a huge number of people doing it today as opposed to in 1990! (for what it's worth I wish I could have done it 25 years ago too, thankfully I got to do the NCT two weeks prior which for the first three days at least was more rugged and less trashy, until you reached the beaches that were within hiking distance of a car park anyway... 🙄 )

Selfishness and dont give a shit about anyone else is why people do it.

^^ this

People tend to do this too often, it's like second nature leaving coffee cups, beer cans, newspapers etc on the train.. my wife politely tells them 'excuse me I think you left something behind - to which the more civil one's pick up their crap and take it with them or she just gets a look of contempt'

On the other hand I have seen some of young kids walking towards the bus stop on a windswept morning picking up blown trash and depositing it in the bin. Perhaps there is hope left or just good civic sense taught in school and at home.

Poor parenting of kids who become poor parents themselves. It applies to lots of things, there are so many people without any respect for their surroundings.

Walking up Ben Nevis last year we were sat just above the trail about 1/3 of the way up eating some lunch and watched a dad with three young kids (5-9ish) explain to them how they had to put their rubbish in a bag and hide it so that it couldn't be seen.

Very nearly went postal on him. And made a point of taking an empty bag and and walking ahead of them picking up rubbish off the trail as we went.

I'm failing to see the link. If you're loaded you tend not to drop litter?

It's generaly true.

The exception being shotgun cartriges for some reason. I hypothesise that it's a cost of being there Vs disposable income.

McDonalds for poor people, is an expensive treat, therfore more likely to litter as they feel they've paid for the privelage and are above the hoi-poloi cleaning up.
[s]McDonalds[/s] [i]Pret[/i] for rich people, is cheap, therefore they feel that they got value for money from the food and the cost therefore didn't cover clearing up.
Phesant Shoot, at £1000 a ticket for some meat full of shot at the end you're back to thinking that someone really should be cleaning up after you for that expense.

Similar concept might explain MTB'ers. They pay to play at a trail center or enter a race, so they're thinking the organisers are beneath them and should do the tidying up.

From observation on the That London Subterranean Hell-mobile, I can say that people are filthy scum. What was a bit of a surprise was to realise that it's not just the usual horrible yobs that leave litter behind, but people of all economic groups, sexes and cultures.

After seeing how much it's going to cost me to take the tribe to the new avengers movie I'm considering taking a load of rubbish in with me to leave there as it's slightly cheaper than a skip!

The exception being shotgun cartriges for some reason

Well I can understand them not picking them up at the time as presumably they are concentrating on shooting stuff, plus the freshly fired cartridges might be kinda hot.

But yeah, they [i]should[/i] still get picked up.

After seeing how much it's going to cost me to take the tribe to the new avengers movie I'm considering taking a load of rubbish in with me to leave there as it's slightly cheaper than a skip!

Some interesting articles if you search 'psychology of littering'

People do get fined for littering I think?

Maybe just get a team each evening from litterers caught that day to clean up the littered area - too costly?

The exception being shotgun cartriges for some reason
Well I can understand them not picking them up at the time as presumably they are concentrating on shooting stuff, plus the freshly fired cartridges might be kinda hot.

But yeah, they should still get picked up.

Much as I find shooting distasteful, I don't think I've ever seen a big pile of cases that would be produced by a shoot - I think the keepers are well aware it's not a good thing to do and tidy up after themselves and their clients.

The odd one or two thoug from vermin shooters, probably explained by the heat. Although I'm not convinced thats an excuse either.

Loads of McD / KFC bags on the trails near me. Nearest of said 'restaurants' is about 8 miles. So people drive somewhere pretty, eat their slop, then through the rubbish out all over said pretty spot because it 'mucks their car up'. There is no reasoning with that mindset.

Equally baffling - a byway near me, reasonably tricky ride up an over a hill, rutted with low overhanging branches. Halfway up - a fridge thrown into the side. There is no way that could be easier than taking it to the tip, but still in someones mind it was.

The cinema I can sort of understand (even if I wouldn't do it myself), they charge way too much and don't put bins in the cinema so it is unlikely that people will carry rubbish out into the hallway to queue up at the small bin to throw stuff away. IMO, they are not helping themselves...

The one I don't understand is people who walk to somewhere scenic and then litter. Do they not understand that it is scenic because it is not full of stella cans?

I don't think people think about littering at all when they do it,
Rather it's an automatic response when they finish what ever it is, and one hand is on its way to dropping the litter while the other is on its way to depositing the last piece of whatever it is into their mouth.

I grew up on a council estate were there was a place we used to meet and smoke drugs and at some point some or all of us would go on a munchies run.
One day at the age of 14 or 15 despite being sat practically next to a bin I threw my litter on the floor, when a school freind who did not live there said "do you want to live in a shit hole" and I looked at him not understanding what he meant.
He then added you have to live here, so why would you throw your rubbish on the floor unless you wanted to live in a shit hole.

Until that day I had never given litter or littering a thought but have never dropped any since.
Where I live now some local kids (live three doors down) were sat on a wall out side my house surrounded by their litter and I gave them the same speech, and they did not do it again.

Once at work while fitting a cornice to some kitchen cupboards the customers teenage son came in and made something to eat. When he walked away the micro wave door was left open with the light on, the bread was left out and open surrounded by crumbs, the butter, dirty butter knife and what ever he had heated up spilt on the work top and floor.
Five minutes later he returned with his dirty plate and cutlery which did not even make it to the sink but rather left in the middle of the work top.

As he walked away I asked who is going to clear that up?
And his stunned silence led me to beleive that untill I had asked him it was not something he had given a moments thought.
But when I explained his mess was in my way he apologised and cleaned it up.

I live near the canal and morons feeding the ducks boils my p155, saw a guy with five carrier bags filled with loaves of bread happily chucking handfuls in at a time, no f***** ducks to be seen. I'd bet my left testicle he didn't take his bags home.
These people are good old fashioned thick as pig shit.

Bread is bad for ducks anyway so double fail there.

I often wander about the play park when the wee one is out, sadly it's usually down to the bins being overflowing and nobody bothering to enmpty them. I did walk home with two sections of exhaust with the cats still on one day though (lying on a bush) so it evens out somewhere.

Im on a FB Group which loosely discusses local heritage past and present. Now you'd expect most of the membership to be probably mid to late 30s anf upward and therefore mature intelligent adults.
Someone had suggested that if we each spend 15 minutes A WEEK picking up rubbish etc then the world would be a much nicer place to inhabit.
Mostly positive responses, however one was to suggest that people are employed to do do such things for us and therefore we would be doing someone out of a job. Someone else basically said he didnt believe it was his job to sort other peoples failings and that his principles would not permit him to do otherwise.
Neither poster would let themselves be swayed from their viewpoint, which suggests that whilst littering is the problem, the issue is people attitudes.
I've taken kids to task before now about dropping rubbish and got a mouthful of abuse, so to avoid being charged with assault on a minor I don't try and correct their behavior now.

I'd be interested to know where people who espouse the view that littering is creating jobs imagine the money comes from to pay the wages of the litter-pickers.
Anyway, unless you make a specific complaint the roadside litter here never gets cleared up.

Someone else's taxes?

I blame Thatcher's crowd and bad parenting.

And we have a winner! Well, almost. I seem to remember that there have always been folk that dropped their crap everywhere, but it has got worse in the last thirty years or so.

Its funny how little things such as dropping litter and P*ss poor driving attitudes reflect the change of attitude in society. Its the "I Can't be wrong" generation.

I suppose the government could do more to get the message across that these sort of things aren't done, like they have in the past, but that would be viewed as too Nanny State by right wing lunatics.

Well, we get the "society" we deserve.

The very sight of someone dropping litter and I become incandescent with rage. Because I feel so strongly about I do ask people to pick up and put it in the bin (which is most cases is just a few paces away).

A few summers ago, I wrote to the head of our local primary school and expressed my dislike of her pupils spilling out at 3.30 everyday and leaving a trail of rubbish that eventually blows up my road. In the letter I mentioned how we lived in a beautiful place where tourists come to visit, where there was a huge population of rats, how it was unsociable behavior. In not one sentence did I blame the children, imo it's the parents fault. In fact many cases it's the parents themselves I've seen throwing down the litter.

The headteacher was amazing. She sent out a letter to each child's household and since then there has been a huge reduction.

Although I am well aware of the consequences I still ask people who I see drop litter to pick it up and put it in a bit. Always I get a foul mouthful, surely if all of us that cared did this things would be better.

Bill Bryson once commented that when he visited Liverpool on one occasion they seemed to be holding a Festival of Litter in his honour.

Just ban McDonalds, in fact all shitty fast food places. It accounts for about 90% of litter out our way (Malvern Hills).

There is definitely a relationship between the good weather and the amount of fast-food rubbish left by scumbags who've driven out to the countryside for the day.

Saying that I've also found tubes and c02 canisters on the hills...

For some reason, every week two or three bin bags of rubbish are carefully placed next to the public litter bin overnight, or in the nearby bus shelter.

Don't people have wheely bins? Why on earth would you neatly bag up your rubbish to dump it in public when there's a ******* bin provided by the council for your personal use.

Just ban McDonalds, in fact all shitty fast food places.

There nearest McDonalds is 20 miles away. Yet there's always packaging lying about. Even on of my favourite road ride routes has been blighted and it's a road connecting nowhere to the middle'f.

It drives me mental!! in all locations.

The "Cinema mentality" is interesting. It's appearing in theatre now as well. It used to be rare to have much mess but now its endemic. even for audiences you wouldn't associate with that sort of thing. I think one school in Glasgow makes their kids clean up after a theatre visit.

Glen etive is being ruined. not just "poor people" doing either!

Stuff yer civil liberties, I want ANPR everywhere for scum like this!!

Whenever I'm out on the bike or walking I always pick up the first bit of rubbish I come accross. Thing is there's so much of it I need to make it the first 10 pieces!

I don't believe most rubbish is dropped maliciously, sadly, many just don't see anything wrong with littering.

What's worse is the litter on the trails, dropped by the mtb'ing community. Lets not absolve ourselves. Was ar Gisburn forest and could not believe the trail rubbish. Energy gel wrappers - the bikers big mack wrapper!

On a couple of occasions now I've given people their cigarette butts back to them. It's quite amusing, in a confrontational sort of way, but you need to have your exit well planned in advance....

I don't believe most rubbish is dropped maliciously, sadly, many just don't see anything wrong with littering.

On a couple of occasions now I've given people their cigarette butts back to them. It's quite amusing, in a confrontational sort of way, but you need to have your exit well planned in advance....

I saw two young ladies in "powered by fairy dust" mobile. Passenger opened the door and tipped a pile of fag butts and couple of packets into the road.

I stopped, scooped the lot up in both hands and threw it over her shoulder into the back of the car.

They sat their open mouthed in astonishment for a second, I called her a disgusting lazy C. Crikey, they went mad, properly mad, car was shaking, bright red faces, spittle on the windscreen. I got out of the area pretty sharpish, they could have taken me easily.

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[img][url= https://farm9.staticflickr.com/8790/17030433989_0f66ff4f96_o.pn g" target="_blank">https://farm9.staticflickr.com/8790/17030433989_0f66ff4f96_o.pn g"/> [/img][/url][url= https://flic.kr/p/rWVqGe ]Untitled[/url] by [url= https://www.flickr.com/people/87864020@N00/ ]CountZero1[/url], on Flickr
This little lot was dumped along the byway along the south edge of West Woods, approximately between the Long Barrow and the 216m height number, just before it meets the Wansdyke.
Hardly a beauty-spot with expansive views of rolling countryside; someone went to a fair amount of trouble to dump a load of trash, mostly bottles and some hairdressing products.

I thought at first somebody had been having a picnic!

"Lay my rug out here..."

One of my pet peeves is chewing gum. Makes such a state of towns / cities and is horrible when you put your hand under a table only to have it stick to a blob of gum. Banned or was banned in Singapore as far as I know.