Just about everyone is familiar with the Oscars and the infamous red carpet.
One Redditor went to the r/Anticonsumption community to share what happens to the red carpet in between shows each year.
Turns out there isn't just one red carpet. The photo is a screenshot of an original tweet by Bryan Cook (@BryanCooking), who posted a picture that said, "Please enjoy this photo of the Oscars red carpet, in a dumpster, in the rain."
The Redditor reposted Bryan's tweet with the sarcastic caption, "The glamor, the elegance."
It's a real waste. And while it's easy to look at Hollywood and point fingers, overconsumption has become a problem around the world. According to Statista, over 2 billion metric tons of waste is created globally each year.
However, in the world's richest countries, the material footprint per capita is 10 times higher than the level of low-income countries, according to the United Nations. As a result, these countries are disproportionately responsible for the planet's rising temperatures.
According to a 2021 report by the Guardian, "The U.S. population is 60% larger than it was in 1970, but consumer spending is up 400%." Heal the Planet reported that Americans consume more than their weight in products each day.
Overconsumption causes warmer temperatures because of the amount of energy needed to create and transport products, as well as the exhaustion of our natural resources.
Luckily, there are ways to reduce overall personal consumption by shopping secondhand, repairing broken items, and avoiding single-use plastics. Supporting brands that reuse and regenerate materials and products is another great way to keep our landfills less full.
Hollywood is known for its excess and wealth, but there are those trying to use their platforms for good. Jason Momoa founded Mananalu to combat single-use plastic.
He and several other A-list celebrities, including Laura Dern, Donald Glover, and Woody Harrelson, helped produce Common Ground, which delves into the "money, power, and politics behind our broken food system."
According to the film's website, Common Ground was the "highly anticipated sequel to the juggernaut success documentary, Kiss the Ground, which inspired the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) to put $20 billion toward soil health."
While those accomplishments are worth celebrating, this Reddit post is a reminder of just how easily trash can be created. Unsurprisingly, the collective reaction was frustration — not only because of the waste but the hypocrisy of it all.
"That's absurd," one user commented.
"At the very least they could have given it away," said another.
"Oh man. I feel so ignorant right now. I guess I just assumed they reused the carpets…" wrote a third.
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