We are taught good manners when we are very young. We are shown what is right and what is wrong. As soon as we start walking, we are told that litter should be put in the bin, that it is not nice to bite our nails or to be rude. With every day that passes by, new rules of civilised behaviour are added to the list. Many of us grow up with these values and the norms that we follow become part of our reflexes at one point… for some.
When we are children, we find out that the essential rules of good behaviour are the same everywhere: that we should keep our bodies and nature clean, that we should be polite and good-mannered.
However, we grow up and start making our own decisions, after having gone, of course, though the rebellion years. We no longer do things because it’s nice and proper. We are more interested in what’s cool, we follow our mates and copy their actions. This is the moment when the environment gets a new meaning, which is defined by the people around us rather than by the education that we received.
The difference between what ‘is right’ and what ‘looks cool’
Young people start doing what ‘looks cool’ rather than what they know to be right. It is the period when peer pressure is the main influence in our lives and our behaviour often changes. And the examples around us are not always positive.
Nevertheless, examples are not always negative either and it is not always the friends we deliberately choose that have a bad influence on us. The rebellion years come and go and we enter a new stage, or this period becomes boring and we feel the need for a change. Just as we once decided to be rebels, we can now choose to become responsible – and to remain so.
As adults, it wouldn’t be bad to go back to the good rules that we learned when we were children. It would be good to open our eyes and see that nature, too, needs a little respect from us. We dislike passing by a pile of rubbish with flies swarming around. We would like everything to be clean, wouldn’t we?
It may be hard to believe, but throwing waste wherever it comes handy for us means harming nature and ourselves deliberately. It is like hiding the rubbish in our homes under the carpet, and when it becomes a source of infection, we wonder why it is so expensive to treat the diseases we got because of it. There is a price to our ignorance. Even if we don’t pay it ourselves, our children will.
We should remember and be aware of the fact that throwing the litter off the balcony is not merely ‘not nice’, but that the pile of rubbish below the window is a source of disease.
Before turning up our refined noses, it would be recommended to stop throwing litter out of the elegant cars we proudly drive on the roads of our wonderful country – roads which are already in a poor state – only to grumble later ‘what a beautiful country, too bad it’s inhabited!’
Yes, it is inhabited by us, those who forget the teachings of our parents, grandparents, teachers or mentors. At the end of the day, the choice is entirely ours. Nobody obliges us to throw off litter wherever we feel like.
However, some of us are lucky. We have a child who comes back from school and speaks like an old wise man about ecology. In other words, he or she is teaching us good manners all over again. Because we are talking good manners when discussing selective collection or recycling.
‘Planet Earth is getting ill,’ wrote a pupil who took part in the essays competition organised by our association, not long ago. How comfortable would we feel if a kindergarten kid looked us in the eye and asked: ‘Why do you want to make me ill?’
Electrical and electronic equipment is often found in the piles of litter that we see around. These appliances should normally end up in recycling plants where they are properly treated so that they do not leak toxic substances that pollute the water or the air.
The selective collection of waste means a healthier environment and a significant reduction of the risk of getting ill because one day we drank a glass of tap water. Not everybody can drink only bottled still water.
Recycling means correct management of resources, as an important percentage of the elements can be reintroduced in the industry at lower costs. This, of course, means lower prices when purchasing a new product.
Many times we are caught in our everyday worries and we forget about the important things near us. Children, however, start explaining to us that it is wrong to spread rubbish all over our country. It would be good to listen to them and follow their advice.
Children’s knowledge about the environment and ecology shows a constant concern mixed with passion, motivating them in their fight for a cleaner world.
In other words, children and parents change roles. Children are often the main actors in activities that call for common sense. It is a reason to be happy, as it confirms our hope for a clean Romania, where each type of waste will reach the place where it is recycled in a way that is entirely safe for the environment and where it cannot leave any mark on the face of the old and beautiful Planet Earth.
However, we should not turn children into dustmen! The enthusiasm they show when they get involved in green activities should not be transformed into an obligation to clean up the ‘1 May’ barbecues rubbish left behind by people who do not care what they throw away and where, or by those who will pay no attention to the environment.
We, the adults, have the obligation to protect children and offer them a beautiful life. Correct recycling means small gestures whose effect may not be visible from the very beginning but it can prove extremely important for the next generations.
Are we willing to harm our children through our careless behaviour, ignoring the air that may suffocate them tomorrow? Or is it high time to remember our manners?
Antonia Tucheac – associated editor