Holiday Beach Cleaning
Why I beach clean — in rain, sleet, snow, and even the holiday season!
It’s no surprise to more and more people that our planet is facing an ocean plastic pollution catastrophe. As such, much of my conservation work is centered on making positive local impacts while also raising awareness toward the larger-scale solutions needed to stem this synthetic tide.
But I’m not here today to bombard you with the horrifying stats of how one day soon there will be more plastic than fish in our oceans, or that the oceans themselves are becoming more and more acidic. No. Instead, I want to point out how this type of advocacy doesn't always have to be so doom and gloom.
Make no mistake — this is a crisis — but your individual panic and anxiety will do little to solve the problem now. Is the solution for everyone to “wake up”, come together, and implement mass social initiatives and economic innovations? Yes. Will we achieve this change today? Tomorrow? Probably not.
But we can help by doing what we can to shift this awareness further in the right direction. Hence my holiday beach cleaning video above. While it’s vital for us to highlight the facts and harsh reality of our collective pollution, it’s just as practically important to enjoy the nature that we’re striving to preserve as well.
There will be many more videos this coming year about how plastic wires tangle around seagulls legs and microplastics end up in whales’ guts. But it’s just as important to look at specific varieties of beach trash — like old toys — in a fun way that still illuminates the larger problem.
So sit back, relax, and enjoy watching me make a jerk of myself running around with a Santa hat on in the freezing cold. The world needs change (and fast), but we also need to have a good chuckle now and then too!
—
Joe Labriola is a professor of writing and rhetoric. Follow his beach clean adventures on YouTube at Professor Labs or check out his Instagram!