Thursday, March 06, 2008

Cloth vs. Disposable

When my daughter was a baby I used cloth diapers. I was proud of this, and have to admit it made me feel like a good mom AND a good person. The cloth diapers were ready to go for baby #2 and I was looking forward to using them again to save the world.

Then I found this website and put them away again. My state has had water restrictions since last summer, so it's actually better for the environment for us to use disposables. This is so counterintuitive!

Guess what else? Plastic bags are better than paper bags. More amazingly, disposable cups can be better than the kind you wash and gas cars can be responsible for less CO2 emissions than electric cars.

How can we know for sure what's best for the Earth? It seems like Green living is becoming more and more of a Grey area.

2 comments:

Lahdeedah said...

You are going to make green people cry.

While what you say may be true, using cloth "FEELS" more green.

It's hard to carry off "I use disposable diapers because I care for the environment" with the same moral dignity one can assume saying the same thing about cloth diapers.

If I ever became insane and lost my brain and had another kid, my motto would be 'this kid will not cost me any money' and so, when people say 'oh you breastfeed, it's soo good for the child' i'd reply with, 'yes and far cheaper.' When I sport those cloth diapers with disposable pad inserts (the green compromise) I can both tout a moral environmental responsibility, and a desire to not go broke.

p.s.
help i'm supposed to be writing my paper but can't because it's so boring.

RainyPM said...

A friend asked me on Friday why I breastfeed and looked shocked when my first reason was convenience. My next reason is cost. It is quite the lucky coincidence that it happens to be good for the baby too. If formula feeding was as easy and free as breastfeeding who knows what he'd be eating.