How to Combat Climate Change: Pick Up Hair Ties

I’m not sure where the adage, “one man’s trash is another man’s treasure” originally came from (although there’s lots of speculation out there) but one thing is clear: it’s accurate!

Recently I mused on this as I stared at the ring of hair ties in my toiletry bag — half of which are ones I recovered from the ground.

Yes, you read that right. I picked up someone’s used hair tie off of the dirty, muddy, asphalt and strung them onto my hair tie holder.

Well…ok, not exactly. Let me explain.

The problem with hair ties

Hair ties are a real nuisance for the environment.

Hold on, I need to clarify that statement: plastic-based hair ties are a real nuisance for the environment.

By this I mean just about every hair tie on the market today. Cheap and ubiquitous and unremarkable, they pass through our lives as thoughtlessly as any other cheap, ubiquitous, and unremarkable accessory. Because they are cheap, ubiquitous, and unremarkable, there is nothing keeping us from well…losing them!

And lose them we do.

“So what?!” you might be huffing exasperatingly. “They are so small! What is the big deal?! Aren’t there bigger issues to fret over, like climate change and forest fires??”

Well, yes, those two things are very real and very worth fretting over — but how do you think we ended up in the climatic shit-show we’re in now?

In part by pillaging our planet of its natural resources to make cheap, ubiquitous, and unremarkable crap, that’s how.

And it turns out if you add up all the millions of plastic-based hair ties that get lost or discarded every day in just the US alone…

“15 million plastic hair ties are disposed of every day in the US, the weight of a city bus.” — KOOSHOO
For Pete’s sake! This is no longer an insignificant issue!

What’s the connection between hair ties and climate change?

Plastic hair ties are made from synthetic rubber and other petroleum-based materials. This means that in order for you to purchase a 50-pack of Goody hair ties for $5.00, someone in an oil field far away had to pump up a bunch of dinosaur fossils out of the earth, transport them to a processing facility, and manipulate them into a form of plastic that can be stretched and strung out into an elastic hair tie.

There are carbon emissions associated with every step of that process, and likely other greenhouse gas emissions from all the processing and chemical circus that has to happen in order to get the crude oil processed enough for us to wrap our hair in.

Also, gross — the idea of wrapping my hair in oil. But that’s basically what we’ve done with hair ties. And it is killing our planet and doing no favours to our heads.

So what’s to be done?

Phew, we’re at my favourite part. I never like to stay in doom and gloom land for very long. Fortunately, there are many things we can do to remove the scourge of cheap, ubiquitous, and unremarkable hair ties from our lives.

• We can use up our plastic-based hair ties.
• We can invest in accessories that aren’t ubiquitous but that are remarkable, like plastic-free hair ties or other accessories such as metal hairpins, chopsticks, or corkscrews (Yes, it’s a thing. Yes, I was skeptical too).
• We can upcycle other materials and make our own!
• And…we can rescue forgotten hair ties.

It seems weird and gross…and it kind of is, I guess. There’s a level of “ick factor” you will have to overcome. I’m still working on this. But here’s what I do.

If I’m out and about and I see a hair tie on the ground, I will pick it up with a tissue if it is:

1. In good shape (as in, not all stretched out or broken)*
2. Relatively dry (if it’s doused in a mud puddle my nerves fail me)**

But I don’t just whip my hair up into a bun right there on the spot!! Nope. I’ll tuck that hair tie into the tissue, plunk it in my purse and wash it with other hot laundry when I get home (in order to kill any potential buggy bits). Sometimes if I have rescued a few I’ll put them in a cloth baggie so they don’t get lost.

Then I dry them in the dryer (with other laundry of course!) — to further annihilate any buggy bits — and voila. Free hair ties!

*If the hair tie is stretched out or broken, I will still pick it up with my tissue and throw it in the garbage.

**See above

What about you? Do you pick up discarded hair ties? If so, what’s your trick? If not, what’s holding you back?

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This post was previously published on MEDIUM.COM.

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Photo credit: Shutterstock

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