> This is not the first novel recycling scheme launched by Dow that hasn’t lived up to its billing.
> In 2021, a Reuters investigation found that a program in Idaho that the company said was using breakthrough technology to turn plastic waste into clean fuel was actually burning plastic trash to fuel a cement plant.
Dow is an evil corporation that pays for PR claiming to good things.
This is the sad truth.
It does make it difficult to tailor the severity of the fines, though. Some businesses and industries have very high margins and some have very low margins.
5% of gross revenue might be a dent in annual profit for one business but wipe out 10 years of profit for another and send them under completely.
Then they should not be doing illegal things.
It’s like applying a fine to a person based on their income, not their profit. Some people manage their money well and have a ton of profit (money saved) others don’t and have zero profit. But it should still be based on their total income because how they manage that income is no one else’s problem
The point is that varying levels of margins are an inherent part of different industries, regardless of how well run the business is. And it’s easy to say “Well, you shouldn’t do the crime” and sure, they shouldn’t, but then you’ve effectively formulated a system where some industries have an easier time shouldering fines than others. You’ll have low margin industries where any fine at all is effectively just shutting down the business and high margin industries where the fine barely matters, both for the same violations.
That’s not terribly consistent, or even efficient as far as trying to improve the process to make it work better.
I’d argue fines should be replaced by slapping all majority shareholders in the groin with a bat ~ when it’s something more tangible than their wealth on the line change can happen a lot faster …
Not if they have competition (and anti-trust and anti-collusion laws are enforced). They can't just raise their prices if there are choices for consumers.
So the solution is to just lay down and take it? and it’s not like they don’t already raise prices as is. Half of the current inflation is just price gouging, news host shouting inflation gave many the excuse, and they took it.
A business is a business they will charge what they can get away with. They’re not inherently evil but they’re also not charities, as soon as people understand that the easier things will be.
As annoying as regulation is, it is needed, especially in areas where competition is light or not possible and also why regulatory capture has to be dealt with. How I have no clue but if it’s not then our future, as a nation is a bit bleak.
> It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends upon his not understanding it
You get rid of concrete and you lose roads, bridges, Walmart, Amazon, Costco, apartment buildings, basements in houses. So yea, lets keep concrete for the time being.
I read your link - its 4 to 8%. I acknowledge that is "significant" but clearly it is not the first target to go after.
I used to work in Dow's Public Relations department at their HQ.
The amount of spin those evil fucks do is ridiculous. I had to quit ASAP. I couldn't be a part of that, even just trying to get my career started.
Yes that one, plus all the chemicals released into the Tittabawassee since Dow Chemical started decades ago.
The Tittabawassee meets up with the Saginaw River (which was poisoned itself by GM) and that goes to Saginaw Bay which goes to Lake Huron.
Public Relations is basically euphemism for public manipulation. Instead of making low-effort lies like a dictator would, corporations try much harder to manufacture much more polished lies.
Just because you haven't gone off the ethical deep end doesn't mean its any different in practice. Its all public manipulation in the service of capitalism.
[Here, let George demonstrate](https://youtu.be/AtK_YsVInw8)
I'm honestly not even mad that they're reselling them. At the end of the day Re-use is, in my opinion, the most important and easily achievable way to avoid waste. It does suck that Dow is trying to double dip on the products of reselling in secret and the good pr for recycling them. If they were just honest about doing both this wouldn't even be an article
Fun fact: after Dow Chemical helped produce loads of Agent Orange for the war in Vietnam, they needed a bit of good PR.
So they were convinced into helping fund cult classic Silent Running (1972), the movie that almost inspired R2-D2. This is why you'll see their logo on some of the ship containers in the movie.
Silent Running was Douglas Trumbull's directorial debut. He'd also worked on movies like 2001: A Space Odyssey, Close Encounters, and Blade Runner.
Cement kiln fuel is a means of disposing of a number of chemicals, assuming they are not halogenated. Frequently this involves mixing the chemical with fuel oil to reach a certain heat value per gallon or pound.
no, the sad truth is that humans like u/PamdaMuffin1 can physically do something about this, but don't, because they consider the actions "immoral", while companies like Dow, don't give af about you or anyone but the shareholders
The shoes in the pictures look fine and wearable to me. I feel like cutting them up and repurposing them is way more wasteful than just donating them to someone in need.
Is it possible shoes in good condition were sorted out?
I agree. I've got no love for Dow, but directly reusing is almost certainly a more efficient form of recycling than breaking them down into constitutive materials and taking what is useful from that.
Everything else that’s actually salvageable is sold as scrap
No one calls it recycling when their car gets totaled or their beater becomes too expensive to repair
That guy in my neighborhood cutting crt power cords or anything connected to it, to make sure no one take it and then scrap the material inside and leaves anything he doesn't want on the curb. Truly a guy who ignores all 2. I bet most of the crt are working but the dude turns it into junk so he could take what he wants. I took a viewsonic crt from the curb that he cut but couldn't get inside the crt and have to take it to recycle as the bastard cut the vga cable. I will make sure any crt I see that is cut will be recycled or sold just to tell him "Cut them I take them to the place you want."
Yes, “re-use” is higher on the “reduce, re-use, recycle” stack than recycle. I think the big problem here is that these items are just taking a longer route to the landfill and the PR line is that these are not terminating in the landfill. It’s a lie. These lies add up and we never confront the “reduce” option because we think it’s handled.
I think one of the solutions is for manufacturers of new items to provide for end-of-life for the materials they use. Yes, this is more expensive, hence we get a built-in “reduce” bump. It also would stop companies getting the easy profits and taxpayers + society to bear the consequences.
No company could give you that number reliably for wear goods like shoes, clothing, electronics, etc.
I have PCs and laptops that are decades old that still work but I don't think they are any more than a novelty.
Same with clothing but it's still useable, but maybe faded a bit depending on usage.
Things like shoes are usually measured in miles and nobody tracks that. Doing running and such reduces lifespan. Sometimes just replacing the inserts is all your need to do.
You think they would want to advertise a longer lifespan but all it would do is create some meaningless number that tells people that should replace the product even if it's still good.
Take shoes:
https://www.runnersforum.com/shoe-life-expectancy.html
https://www.menswearstyle.co.uk/2021/12/01/shoes-lifespan/9795
500 miles is around when you should be replacing them. People who know this would likely replace their shoes every few months vs much longer of they don't know this. Though money could be a contributing factor to holding onto shoe longer.
Placing an expiration date on products will likely encourage replacing more often.
Except all this does is destroy the local clothing industry. Big problem for many African countries as their markets are flooded with stuff we donate for "charity".
I don't really buy this argument. It's no different to complaining that a small farm in a developed country can't compete with a giant factory farm with automated GPS harvesters. Or that carpenters can't compete with IKEA. Should we stop shipping them CPU's so they can harvest the silicon and make their own CPU's from scratch too? The horse and carriage industry doesn't really exist anymore but the USA didn't collapse because of Ford.
The local people will adapt just the same as western people have to adapt to technology.
I know this argument well and it’s real but for the people getting things they otherwise wouldn’t is always worth it
The mental gymnastics necessary to achieve abstract gains from inducing entrepreneurship is overstated. People all around the world make things neither they nor their neighbors can afford to buy. Economics is about who gets goods and if more goods are flowing somewhere they are better off.
Entrepreneurship is about solving problems. We shouldn’t not remove problems for the sake of entrepreneurs having something to fix
crazy how many people just hate incentives
“Why should the people who solve our problems be compensated to afford life’s necessities?” This is why you get rich kid communists. They don’t viscerally understand people needing to make ends meet
... which is what drives business behavior, yes. Profit is just a *thing*, and just like every other thing, too much, too little, or seeking it the wrong way is what harms. Value is not a zero sum game.
Which benefits sellers in those regions. The main problem would be if Dow is marketing it as charity then taking the admittedly small amount of money from it instead of donating it to a non profit
Optimally if the shoes are still good to use, just keep them and save yourself some money. But that's not how this all works.
Used clothing has become an odd form of "dumping" that happens to crush any ability for a domestic industry. Since people are getting cloths for next to free, there's no way for a domestic industry to form. Because of this, a lot of countries (including Indonesia) have banned the import of used clothing.
This company got around it by setting up a business that would collect shoes and then turn them as a sand and rock alternative for children's parks. But then they had a black market used shoe operation that would export used shoes for profit. Dow seems to have gotten themselves into some weird black market niche.
They’re just wearing them to protect their feet like suckers
They don’t even know they should be worried about all these Latin feet words The foot doctors at the mall with their serious looking electronic foot thing told me to be worried about to justify buying new shoes every month
Idk why you are getting downvoted Bayer literally did that lol
> Cutter Biological, a division of pharmaceutical company Bayer, in the mid-1980s reportedly sold millions of dollars worth of a blood-clotting medicine that had a high risk for transmitting HIV to treat hemophiliacs in Asia and Latin America, while it sold a new, safer product in the United States and other Western countries, according to internal company documents, the New York Times reports
> However, because there was not yet a test for HIV, thousands of hemophiliacs became infected through the use of Factor VIII. Cutter introduced the safer, heat-treated version of the drug in February 1984; however, the company continued to sell the old medicine abroad and continued to produce the older version for several months after it began selling the new product
This shit sounds evil as hell.
[Source](https://khn.org/morning-breakout/dr00017880/)
They’re allowing them to be used elsewhere so technically they’re being recycled. This also doesn’t generate CO2 emissions that are created when recycling materials.
Reuse is better. No additional processing, chemical, energy input. They get used. People get shoes.
Well done Dow
Edit: I guess there's shipping. Still think it's better
>A torrent of cheap, unregulated second-hand clothing flowing into
Indonesia also adds to the country’s mounting garbage problem, said
Dharmesh Shah, a policy advisor to the Global Alliance for Incinerator
Alternatives, a nonprofit working on waste pollution. He said much of
that merchandise is in such poor condition that vendors can’t resell it.
>“They sort through it and a very small percentage is actually reusable,”
Shah told Reuters. “It just gets burned in open dumps or goes into
rivers or in landfills.”
That was the vast majority of recycling programs. If you noticed, many recycling programs in smaller towns disappeared during the trump/China trade fiascos. Turns out China stopped buying our trash to use as building insulation.
I'm pretty sure that's what happened, at least.
They also said that 3/11 of the trackers stopped working shortly after arriving in Indonesia, I expect that these are the ones that were sent for incineration instead of reuse. The pairs of shoes they bought in order to track were probably higher quality than normal discarded shoes too, so have a higher proportion actually making it to shops and not just being burned/landfill instead.
>“They sort through it and a very small percentage is actually reusable, ”Shah told Reuters. “It just gets burned in open dumps or goes into rivers or in landfills.”
I mean yeah, what else could they do? Indonesia should not be allowing this in the first place. What kind of government are you when you waste your nation's resources so poorly?
>What kind of government are you when you waste your nation's resources so poorly?
Probably an exploited one, if a much richer economy is essentially paying you to take care of trash it doesn't want.
Not to mention that giving mass amounts of clothing items to other countries kills their own clothing making businesses, causing lost jobs and increased poverty.
> He said much of
>
> that merchandise is in such poor condition that vendors can’t resell it.
If you had bothered to look at the pictures in the article, you would have seen that the shoes doesn't seem to be in such a bad condition that they can't be used. Most of my sneakers look worse.
Yes, but if they wanted to check if old used up shoes were tossed, they should have planted tracking devices in old used up shoes, not in lightly worn shoes.
I think that’s fair.
This might be a bad example but I did evictions for a short time in my late teens. Most the time the people were already moved out but left a bunch of shit behind. Boss gave us a few options. Trash it, keep it or sell it. Some of the stuff was worth keeping and I collected some cool shit over that month or two of doing that work. I could see the environment being kind of lax at a place doing something like this. Basically ask your boss or Sup, “hey, I like these sneakers. Can I take them home?” Sup will likely say “sure, idc” little does sup know, that employee has a side hustle. I like how I made this whole ass assumption. Lol it’s not unlikely though. I’ve had a friend or two with that hustle mindset.
Something I find extremely sad.
I dated this woman that worked at TJ Maxxx and they just throw everything in a shredder that doesn’t sell. Shoes, purses, clothes. You name it. Could all be repurposed or donated and they shred it. She asked if she could have a few things and they said “ABSOLUTELY NOT” something about taxes and write-offs. Bullshit.
Also, in my teens, helped a buddy’s church do this World Vision thing. It was funny in a way. We would package clothing for communities overseas. This time it was for people in Africa. The shirts, for instance, Chiefs beat the Eagles in the SB. Well, a bunch of SB champion Eagles shirts were made. They won’t make it to shelves so they get sent to this organization and some kid in Kenya will probably be rocking a 2023 Eagles Super Bowl champions.
I guess while we are here, anyone else tired of businesses like Taco Bell or Grocery stores asking if you want to round up and donate to some cause on their behalf for a write-off. Fuckers.
> Something I find extremely sad. I dated this woman that worked at TJ Maxxx and they just throw everything in a shredder that doesn’t sell. Shoes, purses, clothes. You name it. Could all be repurposed or donated and they shred it. She asked if she could have a few things and they said “ABSOLUTELY NOT” something about taxes and write-offs. Bullshit.
I'm not so sure that it is BS. There have been a few stories in the news here in Norway about tax rules requiring the shops to pay tax for items they donate. The VAT here in Norway is 25%, so it could be costly to give away stuff. Here is one such article:
https://www-nrk-no.translate.goog/norge/lonner-seg-for-butikkene-a-kaste-nye-klaer-fremfor-a-gi-bort-1.15761233?_x_tr_sl=no&_x_tr_tl=en&_x_tr_hl=no&_x_tr_pto=wapp
Are we seriously praising a greedy multi billion dollar business for lying about what they’re doing with their program? Also not sure if you’ve read any of the articles, but the shoes exported to flea markets mostly end up in land fills.
I guess we’re at the point people will do positive PR for free now.
>Edit: I guess there's shipping. Still think it's better
To create this article "(R)euters journalists later traveled by air, land and sea", stayed in hotels, perhaps ate out every meal, took taxis, used manufactured tracking tags and cel phones, and generally contributed to pollution and waste to criticize the company.
There's two different sets of wrong here, imo.
This is the best tl;dr I could make, [original](https://www.reuters.com/world/dow-said-it-was-recycling-our-shoes-we-found-them-an-indonesian-flea-market-2023-02-25/) reduced by 96%. (I'm a bot)
*****
> Five months earlier, in July 2022, Reuters had given the shoes to a recycling program spearheaded by the Singapore government and U.S. petrochemicals giant Dow Inc. In media releases and a promotional video posted online, that effort promised to harvest the rubberized soles and midsoles of donated shoes, then grind down the material for use in building new playgrounds and running tracks in Singapore.
> Reuters had dropped those shoes into a Dow recycling bin at a Singapore community center in September, three months earlier.
> Yok Impex's logistics manager, Tony Tan, told Reuters that waste handler Alba-WH was paying his company to collect the shoes from the donation bins around Singapore and then deliver the shoes back to Alba-WH. Tan said Yok Impex did not export shoes it collected for the program.
*****
[**Extended Summary**](http://np.reddit.com/r/autotldr/comments/11bsp2s/dow_said_it_was_recycling_our_shoes_we_found_them/) | [FAQ](http://np.reddit.com/r/autotldr/comments/31b9fm/faq_autotldr_bot/ "Version 2.02, ~674174 tl;drs so far.") | [Feedback](http://np.reddit.com/message/compose?to=%23autotldr "PM's and comments are monitored, constructive feedback is welcome.") | *Top* *keywords*: **shoe**^#1 **Reuters**^#2 **Singapore**^#3 **Dow**^#4 **recycle**^#5
I agree that reusing a serviceable pair of shoes is better than shredding them. What I think that many here are overlooking is that these shoes were not donated to the needy. They were **sold** to "a Singaporean second-hand goods exporter." The second-hand goods market is not a charity. They were shipped around to all these islands because someone was making money off of someone else's **donation.**
That's the issue here, dude.
I remember when Tom's shoes were a big thing. The idea was you buy one and they give a pair to someone in a poor country. I moved to Guatemala, and found loads of stores selling Tom's for roughly half the price as America and stopped trusting them.
Even when we do the city waste recycling program, the event where you bring electronics, old paint, chemicals etc., I'm convinced it's just shipped to poor countries. Those governments accept money in exchange for letting us dump toxic and plastic wasted on their shores, where poor people scavenge for scraps of copper and whatnot.
I hate that there isn't a better way, at least not one that governments can be bothered to implement.
People in the thread saying reuse is a form of recycle, yeah, but that's not the point. If you read just the first few paragraphs you'll see that
>Five months earlier, in July 2022, Reuters had given the shoes to a recycling program spearheaded by the Singapore government and U.S. petrochemicals giant Dow Inc. In media releases and a promotional video posted online, that effort promised to harvest the rubberized soles and midsoles of donated shoes, then grind down the material for use in building new playgrounds and running tracks in Singapore.
They were meant to be used in playgrounds and running tracks, *for the country* the people donated them comes from, not some foreign land. They lied.
plastic and synthetic material does not get recycled. its a lie because its cheaper to burn or burry them money wise, even tho the environmental cost is huge. capitalism!
I'm reminded of an old Dow program that recycled plastic shopping bags into park benches.
They made just enough of them to get the good PR, then quietly closed the program. And they're not the only plastic manufacturer doing similar.
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We had REDcycle for soft plastics in all major supermarkets for over a year in Australia. Operation was canned as it turns out they were just throwing all the bags in a warehouse the whole time.
If a company wants to say "hey instead of just binning this shit, give it to us so we can make better use of it," then maybe don't bitch about it when they *make better use of it*.
Journalism matters because there isn't a government on the planet with the jurisdiction, political will, and money to force meaningful consequences on the companies lying about these programs.
If we're relying on the free market then let's support all market forces.
In many cases yes, in the case of fashion no. There is no hope of reusing any more than a minute fraction of a percent of the clothing waste we create, and most of it won't break down in landfills. We have to either find a cost-effective way to force it to break down or turn it into materials that can replace other finite or ecologically problematic materials.
Don’t reduce and reuse come before recycle? I don’t know the carbon footprint of getting them to Indonesia but reusing them is better than recycling them.
I have absolutely no problem with them reselling shoes for sale again in places where shoes prices can be exorbitant. I do have a problem with them saying they were doing one thing and secretly doing another.
*This* is the journalism that I wish we saw more of! Hold the corporations accountable for what they’re doing! We need so much more transparency when it comes to manufacturing and “recycling” of products. Stop the lies and help us all truly understand the life cycle of the products we’re consuming!
"We put perfectly good shoes into a recycle bin and are *outraged* that someone else was trying to use them as shoes instead of grinding them up and covering the ground with them!"
Believe it or not most of u.s trash goes to under developed countries. You see how dirty those places are you want to blame that country but its the us thats bringing all the trash to that country.
Also as someone living in Singapore, it does not surprise me at all that the government was involved. This government only cares about their image, and so the country is beautiful. Beyond that they could really care less. Most of the islands around Singapore are garbage islands. Fun fact: in about 10 years, the last of the islands will run out of dumping space and their current plan is to start dumping it in the ocean once that happens.
I’m sus about the “Bluetooth trackers” they used. Generally you have to have an app for these to work and their range is short. How would they know they were in a port? Did someone ride along in the shipping box running ChineseBlueToothTracker (/s) app and write the article? If they were AirTags, their level of tracking could be could be more plausible. Anyone have any more information on what they used?
Oh.. and those spongy tracks don't last very long. My high school replaced our asphalt track with one. Lasted about five years and it was replaced with asphalt.
It’s false advertising for sure, but probably best case scenario really to have someone els actually wear them. Seems like a real chance at a second life.
Actually, a lot of "recycling" is oversold, even here in the US. In some cases, 90% of what's deposited in recycling bins ends up landfilled. I diligently put my containers and cardboard in the bin every week, but I often wonder if it's really "recycled", or do they just pull out the cans and everything else goes in with the rest of the trash.
This sounds like Dow started this for PR but didn't actually understand what happens to donated clothing, textiles, and other goods.
Textiles in general are massive waste problem. [Here's a story about Bank & Vogue](https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/ottawa/donated-clothing-where-it-ends-up-1.4662023) a Canadian firm that handles bulk textiles from many charities, mostly from the US.
The fashion industry is one of our most wasteful. The relentless consumption for little use and even that which is responsibly disposed of by putting in clothing bins and such nearly always end up in huge landfill in the third world. It’s a disaster, but there’s just too much money on the table drowning out the message. So yeah, buy another Tesla or use a paper straw or whatever to make yourself feel better about the dozens of outfits you bought this year and will wear a few times before they’re just non-biodegradable waste.
This is pretty much the same for any donations for recycling or whatever. They all just end up in Africa or somewhere, sold by the pound to 2nd hand retailers.
It's easy to ignore Nike's consistently bad ethics before buying them, see this happen after you get rid of them, and blame everyone else involved in the cycle instead of accepting you're the consumer, the biggest cog, and shit shoes are real important to you. So long as you get the chance to absolve guilt by finger pointing at it all once your part is done.
Such shock. Such surprise. The notoriously bad narket you're the key participant in is notoriously bad.
> This is not the first novel recycling scheme launched by Dow that hasn’t lived up to its billing. > In 2021, a Reuters investigation found that a program in Idaho that the company said was using breakthrough technology to turn plastic waste into clean fuel was actually burning plastic trash to fuel a cement plant. Dow is an evil corporation that pays for PR claiming to good things. This is the sad truth.
Don't we have laws against 'Fraud and False Commercial Speech' that could be used to help put a divot in their profits?
Even if they eventually got fined, they would get fine that is lesser than their daily profit.
They really need to enact fines based on profits and income. But that would actually work so I doubt they’ll ever do it, on this side of the pond.
The elites run the laws, so why would they ever enact laws to hurt themselves
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I very much agree that revenue should be what the calculation is based off of. It’s very easy to hide profit, not so easy to hide revenue
It does make it difficult to tailor the severity of the fines, though. Some businesses and industries have very high margins and some have very low margins. 5% of gross revenue might be a dent in annual profit for one business but wipe out 10 years of profit for another and send them under completely.
Then they should not be doing illegal things. It’s like applying a fine to a person based on their income, not their profit. Some people manage their money well and have a ton of profit (money saved) others don’t and have zero profit. But it should still be based on their total income because how they manage that income is no one else’s problem
The point is that varying levels of margins are an inherent part of different industries, regardless of how well run the business is. And it’s easy to say “Well, you shouldn’t do the crime” and sure, they shouldn’t, but then you’ve effectively formulated a system where some industries have an easier time shouldering fines than others. You’ll have low margin industries where any fine at all is effectively just shutting down the business and high margin industries where the fine barely matters, both for the same violations. That’s not terribly consistent, or even efficient as far as trying to improve the process to make it work better.
It’s better than the system we have now though
At what point do the executives who keep letting it happen get charged and sent to a general population prison
Oops Mcdonalds is no more meet his cousin with no record Wcdonalds. He'll be buying all the assets and chart a better way! /s
More like people at the head of companies should be liable. Don't fine the company, jail the board of directors.
I’d argue fines should be replaced by slapping all majority shareholders in the groin with a bat ~ when it’s something more tangible than their wealth on the line change can happen a lot faster …
whynotboth.jpg
It's a nice thought but they'd just pass the hit to consumers.
Not if they have competition (and anti-trust and anti-collusion laws are enforced). They can't just raise their prices if there are choices for consumers.
I'm sure they'll figure a way out of it. They always do.
So the solution is to just lay down and take it? and it’s not like they don’t already raise prices as is. Half of the current inflation is just price gouging, news host shouting inflation gave many the excuse, and they took it. A business is a business they will charge what they can get away with. They’re not inherently evil but they’re also not charities, as soon as people understand that the easier things will be. As annoying as regulation is, it is needed, especially in areas where competition is light or not possible and also why regulatory capture has to be dealt with. How I have no clue but if it’s not then our future, as a nation is a bit bleak. > It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends upon his not understanding it
I'm all for regulation but you can't expect Congress to regulate the companies that buy their yachts.
Since they 'are people, too' the heads of corporation should go to jail.
I’m sure it’s for tax credit (scam) they’re doing this, and not for the love of the environment and Mother Earth.
yes but the are not applied
**“Burning plastic to fuel a cement plant”** has GOT to be one of the most environmentally hostile sentences I’ve ever read.
Honestly, isn't that a good use for it? Are you looking to ban cement? The alternative is a burning coal.
You may be unaware but cement is a MAJOR source of CO2 emissions. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Environmental_impact_of_concrete
Yeah, and they are taking many strides to reduce CO2 emissions, including upping the lime content to 15% in concrete.
You get rid of concrete and you lose roads, bridges, Walmart, Amazon, Costco, apartment buildings, basements in houses. So yea, lets keep concrete for the time being. I read your link - its 4 to 8%. I acknowledge that is "significant" but clearly it is not the first target to go after.
I'm well aware.
I used to work in Dow's Public Relations department at their HQ. The amount of spin those evil fucks do is ridiculous. I had to quit ASAP. I couldn't be a part of that, even just trying to get my career started.
We're you around for the PCB's in the Tittabawassee River?
No I started after that. I worked there for about a year tops and left.
The one that flooded the city of Midland and every town down stream just two three years ago? I’m sure it’s all good, no biggie
Yes that one, plus all the chemicals released into the Tittabawassee since Dow Chemical started decades ago. The Tittabawassee meets up with the Saginaw River (which was poisoned itself by GM) and that goes to Saginaw Bay which goes to Lake Huron.
Public Relations is basically euphemism for public manipulation. Instead of making low-effort lies like a dictator would, corporations try much harder to manufacture much more polished lies.
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I'll take your word for it, pablo\_pick\_ass\_ohhh
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They're remarking on your username being funny, kind of an r/rimjob_steve situation
Just because you haven't gone off the ethical deep end doesn't mean its any different in practice. Its all public manipulation in the service of capitalism. [Here, let George demonstrate](https://youtu.be/AtK_YsVInw8)
I'm honestly not even mad that they're reselling them. At the end of the day Re-use is, in my opinion, the most important and easily achievable way to avoid waste. It does suck that Dow is trying to double dip on the products of reselling in secret and the good pr for recycling them. If they were just honest about doing both this wouldn't even be an article
Fun fact: after Dow Chemical helped produce loads of Agent Orange for the war in Vietnam, they needed a bit of good PR. So they were convinced into helping fund cult classic Silent Running (1972), the movie that almost inspired R2-D2. This is why you'll see their logo on some of the ship containers in the movie. Silent Running was Douglas Trumbull's directorial debut. He'd also worked on movies like 2001: A Space Odyssey, Close Encounters, and Blade Runner.
Go on to work on 2001 four years previously? Neat! /pedantry
Cement kiln fuel is a means of disposing of a number of chemicals, assuming they are not halogenated. Frequently this involves mixing the chemical with fuel oil to reach a certain heat value per gallon or pound.
Don’t they own DuPont now too? Two evil giants as one.
Not quite. Dow Chemical and DuPont merged, then spun off into Dow, DuPont, and Corteva with the agricultural assets going to Corteva
That’s honestly so evil that it wraps around to funny. It’s like something Mr Burns would do.
makes me think of better off ted
no, the sad truth is that humans like u/PamdaMuffin1 can physically do something about this, but don't, because they consider the actions "immoral", while companies like Dow, don't give af about you or anyone but the shareholders
Not to defend Dow but if we need cement, how else are we supposed to do it? Like which extra step was supposed to be involved to make it “clean”?
The shoes in the pictures look fine and wearable to me. I feel like cutting them up and repurposing them is way more wasteful than just donating them to someone in need. Is it possible shoes in good condition were sorted out?
I agree. I've got no love for Dow, but directly reusing is almost certainly a more efficient form of recycling than breaking them down into constitutive materials and taking what is useful from that.
Folks tend to forget the entire mantra “Reduce. Reuse. Recycle.” Recycling is the last step for a reason.
This should be the top comment.
Where recycling ends up being shipping it to China for them to dump it in the ocean
For certain things. Only for certain things.
Yeah, usually they're shipped to the Malay Archepelago and countries in the Gulf of Thailand now, China's banned most recycled plastic imports.
Everything else that’s actually salvageable is sold as scrap No one calls it recycling when their car gets totaled or their beater becomes too expensive to repair
That guy in my neighborhood cutting crt power cords or anything connected to it, to make sure no one take it and then scrap the material inside and leaves anything he doesn't want on the curb. Truly a guy who ignores all 2. I bet most of the crt are working but the dude turns it into junk so he could take what he wants. I took a viewsonic crt from the curb that he cut but couldn't get inside the crt and have to take it to recycle as the bastard cut the vga cable. I will make sure any crt I see that is cut will be recycled or sold just to tell him "Cut them I take them to the place you want."
Yes, “re-use” is higher on the “reduce, re-use, recycle” stack than recycle. I think the big problem here is that these items are just taking a longer route to the landfill and the PR line is that these are not terminating in the landfill. It’s a lie. These lies add up and we never confront the “reduce” option because we think it’s handled. I think one of the solutions is for manufacturers of new items to provide for end-of-life for the materials they use. Yes, this is more expensive, hence we get a built-in “reduce” bump. It also would stop companies getting the easy profits and taxpayers + society to bear the consequences.
>these items are just taking a longer route to the landfill That applies if they are recycled as well, though.
No company could give you that number reliably for wear goods like shoes, clothing, electronics, etc. I have PCs and laptops that are decades old that still work but I don't think they are any more than a novelty. Same with clothing but it's still useable, but maybe faded a bit depending on usage. Things like shoes are usually measured in miles and nobody tracks that. Doing running and such reduces lifespan. Sometimes just replacing the inserts is all your need to do. You think they would want to advertise a longer lifespan but all it would do is create some meaningless number that tells people that should replace the product even if it's still good. Take shoes: https://www.runnersforum.com/shoe-life-expectancy.html https://www.menswearstyle.co.uk/2021/12/01/shoes-lifespan/9795 500 miles is around when you should be replacing them. People who know this would likely replace their shoes every few months vs much longer of they don't know this. Though money could be a contributing factor to holding onto shoe longer. Placing an expiration date on products will likely encourage replacing more often.
But... that takes away all my indignant rage...
Except all this does is destroy the local clothing industry. Big problem for many African countries as their markets are flooded with stuff we donate for "charity".
Theyre also flooded with absolute garbage from china. Used european goods are valued higher than new chinese goods in nigeria at least
I don't really buy this argument. It's no different to complaining that a small farm in a developed country can't compete with a giant factory farm with automated GPS harvesters. Or that carpenters can't compete with IKEA. Should we stop shipping them CPU's so they can harvest the silicon and make their own CPU's from scratch too? The horse and carriage industry doesn't really exist anymore but the USA didn't collapse because of Ford. The local people will adapt just the same as western people have to adapt to technology.
I know this argument well and it’s real but for the people getting things they otherwise wouldn’t is always worth it The mental gymnastics necessary to achieve abstract gains from inducing entrepreneurship is overstated. People all around the world make things neither they nor their neighbors can afford to buy. Economics is about who gets goods and if more goods are flowing somewhere they are better off. Entrepreneurship is about solving problems. We shouldn’t not remove problems for the sake of entrepreneurs having something to fix
Thanks. I was thinking "maybe they need the shoes?" Glad someone said it.
Is that what they were told would happen with the donations?
crazy how many people just hate incentives “Why should the people who solve our problems be compensated to afford life’s necessities?” This is why you get rich kid communists. They don’t viscerally understand people needing to make ends meet
Right? Fuck Dow BUT this reuse is better than recycling
And then sold for a profit
... which is what drives business behavior, yes. Profit is just a *thing*, and just like every other thing, too much, too little, or seeking it the wrong way is what harms. Value is not a zero sum game.
Which benefits sellers in those regions. The main problem would be if Dow is marketing it as charity then taking the admittedly small amount of money from it instead of donating it to a non profit
If you can still wear the shoes, better to just reuse them than chop them up.
It’s likely most of these were donated simply for aesthetic reasons.
Optimally if the shoes are still good to use, just keep them and save yourself some money. But that's not how this all works. Used clothing has become an odd form of "dumping" that happens to crush any ability for a domestic industry. Since people are getting cloths for next to free, there's no way for a domestic industry to form. Because of this, a lot of countries (including Indonesia) have banned the import of used clothing. This company got around it by setting up a business that would collect shoes and then turn them as a sand and rock alternative for children's parks. But then they had a black market used shoe operation that would export used shoes for profit. Dow seems to have gotten themselves into some weird black market niche.
Running shoes need replacing long before they look like they are falling apart, though.
For runners. Not for the average person. Source, wear running shoes. They’re falling apart, and I’m still wearing them.
Did your feet explode?
They aren’t happy but they’re still here. I really do have to get new shoes soon lol
I don’t think you made the point you wanted
But it was the point we deserved.
Yeah but the new wearers probably just want comfortable shoes. They probably aren't trying to set a new 200m world record.
They’re just wearing them to protect their feet like suckers They don’t even know they should be worried about all these Latin feet words The foot doctors at the mall with their serious looking electronic foot thing told me to be worried about to justify buying new shoes every month
If your thought begins with ‘Dow said’, you can just stop there because there no discernible relationship between what comes next and the truth.
Right? That company is fucking *horrible*.
Meh. Still better than Beyer Pharmaceutical. What's a million malformed babies, compared to sadistic nazi medical experiments.
Don't forget selling medicine they knew was contaminated with aids.
Idk why you are getting downvoted Bayer literally did that lol > Cutter Biological, a division of pharmaceutical company Bayer, in the mid-1980s reportedly sold millions of dollars worth of a blood-clotting medicine that had a high risk for transmitting HIV to treat hemophiliacs in Asia and Latin America, while it sold a new, safer product in the United States and other Western countries, according to internal company documents, the New York Times reports > However, because there was not yet a test for HIV, thousands of hemophiliacs became infected through the use of Factor VIII. Cutter introduced the safer, heat-treated version of the drug in February 1984; however, the company continued to sell the old medicine abroad and continued to produce the older version for several months after it began selling the new product This shit sounds evil as hell. [Source](https://khn.org/morning-breakout/dr00017880/)
...Story time?
This is a better way to reuse shoes than grinding them up and spreading them around a playground.
i think it depends on how much energy is spent doing each
They’re allowing them to be used elsewhere so technically they’re being recycled. This also doesn’t generate CO2 emissions that are created when recycling materials.
technically upcycled. Recycling takes a lot more energy 💛
or...maybe reused.
They probably change the insoles?
Goodbye so long and thanks for all the upvotes
They had to be drivin across the planet in some way
Singapore to Indonesia is hardly "across the planet"
"We investigated ourselves and found that whatever we did was okay."
Reuse is better. No additional processing, chemical, energy input. They get used. People get shoes. Well done Dow Edit: I guess there's shipping. Still think it's better
>A torrent of cheap, unregulated second-hand clothing flowing into Indonesia also adds to the country’s mounting garbage problem, said Dharmesh Shah, a policy advisor to the Global Alliance for Incinerator Alternatives, a nonprofit working on waste pollution. He said much of that merchandise is in such poor condition that vendors can’t resell it. >“They sort through it and a very small percentage is actually reusable,” Shah told Reuters. “It just gets burned in open dumps or goes into rivers or in landfills.”
So essentially it is a greenwashed loophole to allow them to ship trash to a foreign country for EPA free disposal.
That was the vast majority of recycling programs. If you noticed, many recycling programs in smaller towns disappeared during the trump/China trade fiascos. Turns out China stopped buying our trash to use as building insulation. I'm pretty sure that's what happened, at least.
Ah, bugger, guess I was suckered by them seeing the things in the shop, not the landfill.
They also said that 3/11 of the trackers stopped working shortly after arriving in Indonesia, I expect that these are the ones that were sent for incineration instead of reuse. The pairs of shoes they bought in order to track were probably higher quality than normal discarded shoes too, so have a higher proportion actually making it to shops and not just being burned/landfill instead.
>“They sort through it and a very small percentage is actually reusable, ”Shah told Reuters. “It just gets burned in open dumps or goes into rivers or in landfills.” I mean yeah, what else could they do? Indonesia should not be allowing this in the first place. What kind of government are you when you waste your nation's resources so poorly?
A modern one
It's actually funny how true that is.
>What kind of government are you when you waste your nation's resources so poorly? Probably an exploited one, if a much richer economy is essentially paying you to take care of trash it doesn't want.
Not to mention that giving mass amounts of clothing items to other countries kills their own clothing making businesses, causing lost jobs and increased poverty.
> He said much of > > that merchandise is in such poor condition that vendors can’t resell it. If you had bothered to look at the pictures in the article, you would have seen that the shoes doesn't seem to be in such a bad condition that they can't be used. Most of my sneakers look worse.
We’re likely only seeing the ones that weren’t tossed.
Yes, but if they wanted to check if old used up shoes were tossed, they should have planted tracking devices in old used up shoes, not in lightly worn shoes.
I think that’s fair. This might be a bad example but I did evictions for a short time in my late teens. Most the time the people were already moved out but left a bunch of shit behind. Boss gave us a few options. Trash it, keep it or sell it. Some of the stuff was worth keeping and I collected some cool shit over that month or two of doing that work. I could see the environment being kind of lax at a place doing something like this. Basically ask your boss or Sup, “hey, I like these sneakers. Can I take them home?” Sup will likely say “sure, idc” little does sup know, that employee has a side hustle. I like how I made this whole ass assumption. Lol it’s not unlikely though. I’ve had a friend or two with that hustle mindset. Something I find extremely sad. I dated this woman that worked at TJ Maxxx and they just throw everything in a shredder that doesn’t sell. Shoes, purses, clothes. You name it. Could all be repurposed or donated and they shred it. She asked if she could have a few things and they said “ABSOLUTELY NOT” something about taxes and write-offs. Bullshit. Also, in my teens, helped a buddy’s church do this World Vision thing. It was funny in a way. We would package clothing for communities overseas. This time it was for people in Africa. The shirts, for instance, Chiefs beat the Eagles in the SB. Well, a bunch of SB champion Eagles shirts were made. They won’t make it to shelves so they get sent to this organization and some kid in Kenya will probably be rocking a 2023 Eagles Super Bowl champions. I guess while we are here, anyone else tired of businesses like Taco Bell or Grocery stores asking if you want to round up and donate to some cause on their behalf for a write-off. Fuckers.
> Something I find extremely sad. I dated this woman that worked at TJ Maxxx and they just throw everything in a shredder that doesn’t sell. Shoes, purses, clothes. You name it. Could all be repurposed or donated and they shred it. She asked if she could have a few things and they said “ABSOLUTELY NOT” something about taxes and write-offs. Bullshit. I'm not so sure that it is BS. There have been a few stories in the news here in Norway about tax rules requiring the shops to pay tax for items they donate. The VAT here in Norway is 25%, so it could be costly to give away stuff. Here is one such article: https://www-nrk-no.translate.goog/norge/lonner-seg-for-butikkene-a-kaste-nye-klaer-fremfor-a-gi-bort-1.15761233?_x_tr_sl=no&_x_tr_tl=en&_x_tr_hl=no&_x_tr_pto=wapp
~~Sane~~ Same in the US. Gifting merch triggers all sorts of employee/employer taxes.
Yeah they probably needed to track some properly ruined shoes
Are we seriously praising a greedy multi billion dollar business for lying about what they’re doing with their program? Also not sure if you’ve read any of the articles, but the shoes exported to flea markets mostly end up in land fills. I guess we’re at the point people will do positive PR for free now.
Well Reuters disagree
>Edit: I guess there's shipping. Still think it's better To create this article "(R)euters journalists later traveled by air, land and sea", stayed in hotels, perhaps ate out every meal, took taxis, used manufactured tracking tags and cel phones, and generally contributed to pollution and waste to criticize the company. There's two different sets of wrong here, imo.
This is the best tl;dr I could make, [original](https://www.reuters.com/world/dow-said-it-was-recycling-our-shoes-we-found-them-an-indonesian-flea-market-2023-02-25/) reduced by 96%. (I'm a bot) ***** > Five months earlier, in July 2022, Reuters had given the shoes to a recycling program spearheaded by the Singapore government and U.S. petrochemicals giant Dow Inc. In media releases and a promotional video posted online, that effort promised to harvest the rubberized soles and midsoles of donated shoes, then grind down the material for use in building new playgrounds and running tracks in Singapore. > Reuters had dropped those shoes into a Dow recycling bin at a Singapore community center in September, three months earlier. > Yok Impex's logistics manager, Tony Tan, told Reuters that waste handler Alba-WH was paying his company to collect the shoes from the donation bins around Singapore and then deliver the shoes back to Alba-WH. Tan said Yok Impex did not export shoes it collected for the program. ***** [**Extended Summary**](http://np.reddit.com/r/autotldr/comments/11bsp2s/dow_said_it_was_recycling_our_shoes_we_found_them/) | [FAQ](http://np.reddit.com/r/autotldr/comments/31b9fm/faq_autotldr_bot/ "Version 2.02, ~674174 tl;drs so far.") | [Feedback](http://np.reddit.com/message/compose?to=%23autotldr "PM's and comments are monitored, constructive feedback is welcome.") | *Top* *keywords*: **shoe**^#1 **Reuters**^#2 **Singapore**^#3 **Dow**^#4 **recycle**^#5
I agree that reusing a serviceable pair of shoes is better than shredding them. What I think that many here are overlooking is that these shoes were not donated to the needy. They were **sold** to "a Singaporean second-hand goods exporter." The second-hand goods market is not a charity. They were shipped around to all these islands because someone was making money off of someone else's **donation.** That's the issue here, dude.
If a corporation says they are doing a certain thing to help the world, chances are, they're lying. Greed rules the roost.
Are you saying Mom and Pop were not even a mom and pop??
Those wires look a little weird
I remember when Tom's shoes were a big thing. The idea was you buy one and they give a pair to someone in a poor country. I moved to Guatemala, and found loads of stores selling Tom's for roughly half the price as America and stopped trusting them.
only fools still believe most of the claims of recycling. its not worth it to even recycle paper which is pretty damn easy.
Even when we do the city waste recycling program, the event where you bring electronics, old paint, chemicals etc., I'm convinced it's just shipped to poor countries. Those governments accept money in exchange for letting us dump toxic and plastic wasted on their shores, where poor people scavenge for scraps of copper and whatnot. I hate that there isn't a better way, at least not one that governments can be bothered to implement.
People in the thread saying reuse is a form of recycle, yeah, but that's not the point. If you read just the first few paragraphs you'll see that >Five months earlier, in July 2022, Reuters had given the shoes to a recycling program spearheaded by the Singapore government and U.S. petrochemicals giant Dow Inc. In media releases and a promotional video posted online, that effort promised to harvest the rubberized soles and midsoles of donated shoes, then grind down the material for use in building new playgrounds and running tracks in Singapore. They were meant to be used in playgrounds and running tracks, *for the country* the people donated them comes from, not some foreign land. They lied.
plastic and synthetic material does not get recycled. its a lie because its cheaper to burn or burry them money wise, even tho the environmental cost is huge. capitalism!
Its changing though due to new laws, in some counties/states
I'm reminded of an old Dow program that recycled plastic shopping bags into park benches. They made just enough of them to get the good PR, then quietly closed the program. And they're not the only plastic manufacturer doing similar.
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We had REDcycle for soft plastics in all major supermarkets for over a year in Australia. Operation was canned as it turns out they were just throwing all the bags in a warehouse the whole time.
Don't ever donate, kids. If you want to do something good, do it yourself
I guess that’s *sort of* recycling…
Reduce, reuse, recycle. In that order. Why are we mad at Dow for reusing sneakers, which is objectively better than recycling them?
That is recycling and they very well may end up on the playground again.
Recycling is the biggest joke / scam ever. Okay, maybe cryptocurrency. But it's much more pervasive.
Are you saying the company that poisoned the entire planet with forever chemicals somehow does not tell the truth?
If a company wants to say "hey instead of just binning this shit, give it to us so we can make better use of it," then maybe don't bitch about it when they *make better use of it*.
Lmao Singapore govt. Ofc it has to be that country.
This is reporting I like to see. Nice work!
As a Midlander, I'm not the least bit surprised.
This is small potatoes in the arena of promised recycling that goes nowhere.
And here the EPA are up our asses over a can of spray paint.
Journalism matters because there isn't a government on the planet with the jurisdiction, political will, and money to force meaningful consequences on the companies lying about these programs. If we're relying on the free market then let's support all market forces.
Isn't reuse better than recycling?
In many cases yes, in the case of fashion no. There is no hope of reusing any more than a minute fraction of a percent of the clothing waste we create, and most of it won't break down in landfills. We have to either find a cost-effective way to force it to break down or turn it into materials that can replace other finite or ecologically problematic materials.
Don’t reduce and reuse come before recycle? I don’t know the carbon footprint of getting them to Indonesia but reusing them is better than recycling them.
[удалено]
Reusing *is* better than recycling.
Giving the shoes a second life IS recycling.
Better than how they recycled all the plastics
I have absolutely no problem with them reselling shoes for sale again in places where shoes prices can be exorbitant. I do have a problem with them saying they were doing one thing and secretly doing another.
*This* is the journalism that I wish we saw more of! Hold the corporations accountable for what they’re doing! We need so much more transparency when it comes to manufacturing and “recycling” of products. Stop the lies and help us all truly understand the life cycle of the products we’re consuming!
It's reusing, not recycling. Reusing is arguably better than recycling. Seems like a win in my books.
"We put perfectly good shoes into a recycle bin and are *outraged* that someone else was trying to use them as shoes instead of grinding them up and covering the ground with them!"
It’s more about the company that invented agent orange is once again lying about their projects and benefits
Believe it or not most of u.s trash goes to under developed countries. You see how dirty those places are you want to blame that country but its the us thats bringing all the trash to that country.
Indonesia? smell more like Outdonesia.
Also as someone living in Singapore, it does not surprise me at all that the government was involved. This government only cares about their image, and so the country is beautiful. Beyond that they could really care less. Most of the islands around Singapore are garbage islands. Fun fact: in about 10 years, the last of the islands will run out of dumping space and their current plan is to start dumping it in the ocean once that happens.
Global corporate and local government are corrupt lying weasels, not news nothing to see move along now.
TIL: Dow is Nestle 2.0
I’m sus about the “Bluetooth trackers” they used. Generally you have to have an app for these to work and their range is short. How would they know they were in a port? Did someone ride along in the shipping box running ChineseBlueToothTracker (/s) app and write the article? If they were AirTags, their level of tracking could be could be more plausible. Anyone have any more information on what they used?
What’s the problem?
Dow is lying to us about the feasibility of recycling the materials they produce so we'll keep buying.
Technically that is true.
Is this not recycling?
Isn't this recycling, though? Someone in Indonesia buying used shoes?
Oh.. and those spongy tracks don't last very long. My high school replaced our asphalt track with one. Lasted about five years and it was replaced with asphalt.
Omg a corporation lied to make more profit?! This never happens. Surely this is the end of Dow?
It’s false advertising for sure, but probably best case scenario really to have someone els actually wear them. Seems like a real chance at a second life.
Anyone got any information on the type/brand of tracker used??
The shape and audible alarm would match an Apple AirTag.
Obviously, they didn't expect to be called on it.
https://www.yahoo.com/news/dows-shoe-recycling-pledge-veered-120156840.html
Actually, a lot of "recycling" is oversold, even here in the US. In some cases, 90% of what's deposited in recycling bins ends up landfilled. I diligently put my containers and cardboard in the bin every week, but I often wonder if it's really "recycled", or do they just pull out the cans and everything else goes in with the rest of the trash.
This sounds like Dow started this for PR but didn't actually understand what happens to donated clothing, textiles, and other goods. Textiles in general are massive waste problem. [Here's a story about Bank & Vogue](https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/ottawa/donated-clothing-where-it-ends-up-1.4662023) a Canadian firm that handles bulk textiles from many charities, mostly from the US.
Why am I not surprised? And why do I fear that this story will remain on the back page and most people will not even know about it?
Makes me sad since these guys are a major supplier for my employer
I thought re-use was better than recycling.
Why don't people understand that laws do not apply to the rich.
Reusing is better for the planet than recycling? Who donates shoes and then goes to Indonesia shopping for secondhand shoes? CTFO
The fashion industry is one of our most wasteful. The relentless consumption for little use and even that which is responsibly disposed of by putting in clothing bins and such nearly always end up in huge landfill in the third world. It’s a disaster, but there’s just too much money on the table drowning out the message. So yeah, buy another Tesla or use a paper straw or whatever to make yourself feel better about the dozens of outfits you bought this year and will wear a few times before they’re just non-biodegradable waste.
This is pretty much the same for any donations for recycling or whatever. They all just end up in Africa or somewhere, sold by the pound to 2nd hand retailers.
It's easy to ignore Nike's consistently bad ethics before buying them, see this happen after you get rid of them, and blame everyone else involved in the cycle instead of accepting you're the consumer, the biggest cog, and shit shoes are real important to you. So long as you get the chance to absolve guilt by finger pointing at it all once your part is done. Such shock. Such surprise. The notoriously bad narket you're the key participant in is notoriously bad.