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[Nabubrush]

Im really saying that I dont know what to do with this computer garbage.

Smoke it.

The rest of you, keep it down you damn dirty hippies.

[Arachno-capitalist]

If it has value to someone, is it garbage?  If it can be resold at a profit, is it garbage?  Maybe you could ask one of the economists you know...
Yet when someone tells you that someone will pay you for a resource you possess you choose to ignore that fact.  Or maybe being willfully ignorant is choosing to ignore the results of your conduct because doing otherwise might be inconvenient or conflict with your preconceived notions.
Clearly because the government doesn't make it simple for you to solve this problem you should take the most destructive course possible.  Because those are the only two alternatives.

No one I can find is paying me for my old computer garbage. No one I can find is coming here to take it from me. These people you heard of, I cant find them here. What I call my computer garbage is exactly that. My computer garbage. It has no value to me. It is entirely possible it has value to someone, but finding them is too costly. Economists call these searching costs.
I don't understand how throwing it away with the rest of my garbage is "the most destructive course possible". Im not throwing it at my neighbors car or burning it in a nursery - its going to a landfill where garbage goes.
There are things you could do with your garbage that you dont do because its inconvenient, so I dont know where this posture of yours is coming from.

[KeithHernandez]

Put it in the street a couple blocks away, not by a trash can.

Then, you can make government workers (i am assuming you don't like them) dispose of it, probably correctly.


I was kind of joking, but why not?  If they don't do it right they will just throw it away with minimal effort or it could be done correctly. (assuming you really are going to just throw it away)

You just have to make sure to put it somewhere will no one (that like lives around there) will just throw it away, but also where no one will run it over, then maybe the city will come?  They would where I lived, probably not where I live now.  Or, hey, put it by a police station or something.  No, they might just throw it away.  Put it where people put babies they don't want at hospitals!  I don't know, you could probably think of somewhere in your town.

[robot_god]

Just throw it on somebody's lawn.  Then it's their problem.

[V-Adore]

What this entire conversation seems to boil down to, in my view, is simple: "Arachno-capitalist knows the right and wrong things to do, but he willfully chooses to do the wrong thing because the right one is inconvenient, plus he likes arguing on the Internet."

[Doc]

To be fair, I think we all really like arguing on the internet.

It took me a little while to work out why this problem has never faced me when I realised: I've never thrown out a computer part, no matter how obsolete.

[AlohaDawg]

So, at least for the time being I live on a small, green island that is considered a tourist destination because it is beautiful.

There is no curbside recycling.
The sewer infrastructure spills raw effluent into the ocean when it rains.
There is no special waste disposal for household chemicals.
The worst litterers / polluters are local people.

It's an interesting question philosophically, in the end, rational self-interest in the short term always wins out over individual long-term altruism. Sadly.

Someone needs to make it worthwhile for everyone to do something outside their immediate self-interest before they will do it.

Sad but true.

[linnea]

What this entire conversation seems to boil down to, in my view, is simple: "Arachno-capitalist knows the right and wrong things to do, but he willfully chooses to do the wrong thing because the right one is inconvenient, plus he likes arguing on the Internet."

Can'd for truth.

[pmcd9]

The only time I ever disposed of a computer I threw it in my burn pile (damn I miss the burn pile).   I am probably not the best person to weigh in on this subject as I had no idea that there is harmful stuff in computers.

I like Keith Richards idea, put it somewhere where the government will be forced to deal with it.

It's possible that the environmental effect of driving across the state is worse than putting the computer in a landfill.

A-CAP, you live in New York City right?  What does "across the state" mean exactly?  You have to drive it to Buffalo?  I'm going to go out on a limb and say that there is a local collection center and you just haven't found it.

[CortJstr]

My county puts out a brochure that just lists places that take old computers, broken VCRs, unwanted bikes, &c. Luckily my SO's work runs a big recycling program and just has big bins by the mailroom for stuff you can't legally throw away like dead batteries an unusable electronics, so that's pretty convenient for me. My 8-year-old DVD player finally died, so it's going there this week.

[jay-ell]

a-cap, have you gone to your local government's web site to look up your options?  I'm assuming this is the first thing you did, but I also assume that your local officials would try to make it easier to recycle computers than to throw them in the dumpster in an effort to keep mercury and lead out of your local water supply. 

For instance, my county trash pickup program will pick up computers curbside for free.  I'm willing to bet there's something similar near you, since I don't exactly live in an environmentally progressive state.  (Hog waste, anyone?)  So if you haven't checked into this, please do.  And if you have and there are really no good options, make a decision and move on.  I will not hesitate to split this topic out and lock the ever living hell out of it if this continues. 

Please don't clutter up the TIG thread with your environmental-economical conflicts. 

[Arachno-capitalist]

What this entire conversation seems to boil down to, in my view, is simple: "Arachno-capitalist knows the right and wrong things to do, but he willfully chooses to do the wrong thing because the right one is inconvenient, plus he likes arguing on the Internet."

And I want to have make outs with karl marx.

[side_show]

It's possible that the environmental effect of driving across the state is worse than putting the computer in a landfill.

True.  I suppose the thing to do would be to stow the computer garbage away until one happens to be headed to wherever a recycling plant is for other reasons, or to find someone who's going to the area anyway and ask them to deal with it.  Which to me is not at all difficult or even a problem really.  Of course for this to work one needs space to store such items until the opportunity to properly dispose of them arises, but we're talking personal computer stuff here, so under a bed, a shed, a garage, a basement.... it's not hard.  It's odd to me to have someone complain about this being so problematic.  I have access to one of the better recycling programs out there though, and don't think a lot about how good I have it in that regard.  For me there's so many easy ways to solve the problem.  Still I have loved ones out in the country, who don't even live in towns, and they still do all they can to take care of this stuff, and never complain about it or have any difficulties figuring it out.  And we're not talking hippies here, just basic common sense people who are willing to be patient and deal with things like this when the opportunity arises.  

I guess the question of why one would do anything if it doesn't benefit them is a what puts people off.  Altruism is an important character virtue.  Whether it's part of one's political belief system or not, the unwillingness to do something unless it serves you in some way speaks to an underdeveloped understanding of how to be a person that people like.  I mean, we all struggle with this.  I struggle with this.  Everyday.  Id.  Ego. Superego.  I came to work today, and a coworker had left a bunch of his shit all over my desk.  Again.  I picked it up, I carried the pile of his stuff toward the garbage.  I paused.  I turned around.  I dumped it back on his desk.  Selgiraffeness is unattractive, and fucks things up for everyone else.  But inside, everyone has selgiraffe tendencies.  So I suppose what people are getting ruffled about is... basically "don't be a dick."  Fight against selgiraffe desires instead of expecting them to be served.  Doing the right thing, in many cases - not just this one, isn't easy. Whether you choose to do the right thing or the easy thing is the measure of who you are.  You will not be a "bad person" if you thow your computer in the nearest dumpster, but taking a world view that if doing the right thing in the broader sense isn't worth doing unless it's easy and unless it serves selgiraffe desires speaks to a pretty big character flaw.  So, you know, do whatever you have to do with your garbage.  

[pmcd9]

And that's why you get all the tiny cans Mel.

[Nabubrush]

The only time I ever disposed of a computer I threw it in my burn pile (damn I miss the burn pile).   I am probably not the best person to weigh in on this subject as I had no idea that there is harmful stuff in computers.

I like Keith Richards idea, put it somewhere where the government will be forced to deal with it.

It's possible that the environmental effect of driving across the state is worse than putting the computer in a landfill.

A-CAP, you live in New York City right?  What does "across the state" mean exactly?  You have to drive it to Buffalo?  I'm going to go out on a limb and say that there is a local collection center and you just haven't found it.

Holy shit, which one of you is Charlie Watts then?

Back on the fuckin' topic - I'm going back to work today, motherbitches.