California’s new law banning the use of all plastic bags in the state’s supermarkets is scheduled to go into effect on January 1, 2026.  Good.  We still have time.

If AT readers will remember, plastic bags were the environmentalist’s answer to save all those poor trees that were cut down to make paper bags.  With California’s new law, we now go back to paper bags, but for a price (undetermined at this time) — or, should the customer choose, he could bring his own bags.  How convenient.

A short while ago, California in its wisdom banned single-use plastic bags because they were adding to neighborhood blight and adding considerable weight and volume to the state’s landfills.  In their place came the reusable plastic bags for which the customer had to pay 10¢.  The result should have been predictable: still more blight in our communities, and considerably more weight and volume of plastic was added to our landfills.  Oops.

Many of us in California find that the state’s crusade against plastic bags deprives the customer of a choice in carry-home systems, but we also believe that California has only scratched the surface of the plastic problem.

We immediately need to begin banning all plastic from our supermarkets to achieve the environmentalists’ goal of protecting us from our foolish insistence on using plastic.  Just think: no more Saran-wrapped meat, no plastic bags for vegetables or fruit.  No plastic jars for ketchup or mustard, mayonnaise, or other condiments.  No bread in plastic sleeves.  No more coffee or tea or cottage cheese or yoghurt or sour cream or water or soft drinks in convenient-to-use plastic containers.  And best of all, no quart-, gallon-, or sandwich-size plastic bags could be sold, even though they are packaged in cardboard boxes.  It’s the principle of the thing.

Because of California’s savvy, progressive legislators, and its perennial Democrat governor, the state could be on the brink of another cultural revolution.  What can we do to help?

Plant trees, baby, plant trees.

Bill Guild is a former art historian, retired Boeing employee, and the proud father of two children.

PickPik.

Image via PickPik.