According to the World Bank, the United States alone produces 624,700 metric tons of trash per day. Nations around the world generate 1.3 billions tons of waste annually, and the number is expected to escalate to four billion tons by 2100. This is the nightmarish crisis that we’re facing now.
Trash can be found everywhere from above the ground to under the sea. The overwhelming pollution has impacted the public health, destroyed the environment, and will bury our future generations in a pool of toxicity. Yet it is not the scariest thing about this situation. It is people’s indifference to the problem that shocks me the most. For so long, we have been oblivious to the fact that the trash crisis is getting worse, mounting with crazy speed, which has inevitably made trash become the new normal. Luckily, the Trashtag Challenge is here. After a substantial amount of silly and reckless viral online challenges from eating laundry detergent packets to jumping out of moving cars to slapping babies’ faces with cheese finally there is a challenge that is worthwhile! The Trashtag Challenge is all about cleaning up public beaches, parks, neighborhood or even their own yards. Participants post before and after pictures of the areas that they cleaned. More and more people are out, doing the challenge and it has become a full-blown trend. They get out satisfaction of seeing places returned to original condition - clean, without any trash. Byron Roman started it on his Facebook page a few weeks ago. The Trashtag Challenge has now spread across all the social media platforms, inspiring young people from all over the world to take a walk outside and clean up litter. Not only does the challenge open our eyes to how much trash has spoiled the environment, it also shows how simple is it to fix the problem and give back to the community in a major way. |
Byron Roman, the Trashtag Challenge trend-setter.
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