I think about this so many times. Not just about the bird friends but about all life on this planet. So many times I see people buy things with this plastic waste that was unnecessary. We vote with our money in the sense that what gets funding. If we keep on giving money to companies with ties to the plastic industry we keep the industries alive that will end up killing our bird friends and then maybe us as well. This is such an important question you ask here.
Problem with us is that we always wake up just before it is too late and in this instance it seems that we have really lost it. Plastic molecules are now settling on the ocean's bed and before we know it, we and the birds will be eating plastic. The stuff is not bio-degradeable as you know and it's a curse invention whose fruits can be seen all over the landscapes.
We just have to push for a return to bio-degrable materials. even if it creates job losses, as rather no job than no life.
It has really become a very serious issue.
I think it can create more jobs. If more people learn how to make compost and grow even the most rudimentary or basic food I think we will cut down on all of this. It might be a wild theory that I have not wholly thought through (i am after all a philosopher and not a good one!) but most people live "unconsciously" and just go by their day to day life. When people become more aware, and "see clearly" i think we will see a change. For now, I think most social media addicts etc will not see beyond their own ego and this "spills" over to other people too.
Oh yes, the Covid was responsible for many to start looking at the inner self, as their day to day habit was abruptly shut off. Those, people like you and others saw the dwang that we are in the thoughts turned to "what can we do to improve matters".
Awareness is the answer, but I am afraid that we are too far down the road for any instant solutions.
We have a few public food gardens here, but nobody wants to work in them, as it is easier to beg at the traffic lights. Score a 20 bucks, have a shot up the arm or nose and live in Nirvana every day.
There is a brilliant youtube channel (Soft White Underbelly) where the guy interviews skid row drug addicts, etc., and the same thing is evident there: even if people are given free rooms, free help, free rehab, most of them reject it for the quick shot to live that daily Nirvana. It is a sad fact that had work is looked down upon if the simple option is available.
Oh yeah, up in Johannesburg we had a guy with one leg standing at the robots begging and I offered him a free PC training course that our charity was running for un-employed persons.
He refused, but I kept on trying and eventually he sat me down to tell me what was going on. They were a ring of 7 guys and 3 ladies that stood at different lights every day. At the end of the day, they would all pool their incomes to buy food and drugs and this was their lifestyle.
So then who needs to work?
True right? We often think these people are there due to circumstances beyond their control (and there are many such cases), but sometimes it is a choice. I am going into therapy (as I said in another comment, philosophical counselling) and dealing with people who actively make the choice to stay in bad situations is not easy to work with. I am sure you have countless such stories.
It is indeed about the mindset of the people my friend. Many are raised in poverty and they are raised to think that it's all that there is. Survival.
But each of us are born with natural talents and it's the discovery of those talents that we work on.
Yes, I have seen the impact that our basic PC training project had on disillusioned souls.
Just the fact that they have suddenly learned how to switch a PC on properly changes their entire mindset and they naturally become eager to learn more.
It is that same eagerness that we target, as it leads to self improvement.