• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer
  • Home
  • About
  • Background
  • My Other Sites
    • Life in the Right Direction
    • Peter Whiting At Home (and elsewhere)
    • FabHappy
  • Contact
    • Email me

Use 10 Percent Less

All things must change when the consumer changes

  • Less Pollution
  • Less Waste
  • Recycling
  • Less Fossil Fuels
  • Climate Change
  • Nature
  • Societal Change

Canvas Bags

July 22, 2018 by Peter Leave a Comment

‘Canvas Bags’ – a fun song and video from Tim Minchin. This was posted back in 2011 but it’s still just as relevant today.

This song reminds us that we, the consumers, have the ability to change everything. All we have to do is refuse to use conventional plastics and the world will change. It will have to. One way for us to do this is to simply stop using plastic for carry bags, and refusing it when anyone in a shop offers us a plastic shopping bag.

I love the theatre and irreverence that Tim Minchin brings to this topic through this song. It simultaneously bears an important message and is a lot of fun.

Canvas Bags – Full Transcript

Take your canvas bags
When you go
To the supermarket
Why use plastic ones when you know
You know the world can’t take it

Take your canvas bags
When you go
To the supermarket market market yeah yeah
Don’t you use those plastic ones
No, no, no
Don’t you know that you’ll feel better for it

Take your canvas bags
Take your canvas bags
Take your canvas bags
To the supermarket

Take your canvas bags
Take your canvas bags
Take your canvas bags
To the supermarket

Take your canvas bags
Take your canvas bags
Take ya canvas bags
To the supermarket

Take your canvas bags
Take your canvas bags
Take ya canvas bags
To the supermarket

canvas bagsBreak it down
Take your canvas, take your canvas, take your canvas bags to the supermarket
All the ladies in the house come on and let me hear you say ‘canvas’
All the fellas in the house come on and let me hear you say ‘bags’

Take your canvas bags
Take your canvas bags
Take your canvas bags to the supermarket

Just think about the world
And how the world would be fantastic
If we could get rid of all the plastic
We just need to get enthusiastic
Organise a competition, gymnastic
Or a bag-making comp at your school
Fuck it, make it interscholastic
Canvas is for everyone
Whether you be rebellious and iconoclastic
Or conservative or ecclesiastic
I don’t care if you’re loud and bombastic
Or quiet or virtually monastic
Sober or on the floor spastic
A yoga master or completely inelastic
I’m not trying to be ironic or sarcastic
Do something drastic
To rid the world of plastic

Take your canvas bags
Take your canvas bags… yeah, yeah, yeah…

Take your… hand clap you bastards, yes, yes, sing-along if you’ve figured out the words, keep it going folks

[Tim runs off stage and gets a fan to create a wind effect]

Take your canvas bags
Take your canvas bags
Take your canvas bags to the – Supermarket

Filed Under: Less Pollution, Recycling Tagged With: plastic

Reader Interactions

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Primary Sidebar

  • Facebook
  • RSS

Check your inbox or spam folder to confirm your subscription.

Hi, I'm Peter Whiting. I believe if we just started consuming 10 percent less stuff, we could set the world on a much better path. And 10 percent isn't that much...

Recent Posts

  • Rescuing old paint
  • Nanabozho was fishing
  • Climate Change – what can we do?
  • Useless emissions, for what?
  • Drink water to reduce CO2 emissions?
  • Olio – using less by sharing
  • Renewable isn’t always good
  • The Power of Less – from Good Energy
  • Fairphone – a better phone option?
  • Buy local to reduce emissions
  • Anything but Plastic – it’s good to use less
  • Shaving without plastic
  • Extinction of convenience
  • They need us more than we need them
  • Plastic, pollution and the coronavirus
  • Concerns about HS2
  • Just don’t waste – Sir David Attenborough
  • Disposable Batteries – what a waste!
  • 250 potatoes
  • UK Climate Debate and Pollution

Recent Comments

  • S. E. on It’s Not all Rose Gold Straws and The Perfect Pantry
  • S. E. on Olio – using less by sharing
  • Lockdown and Private Jets - Peter Whiting at Home (and elsewhere) on Plane Pollution – a huge problem
  • Anand M on Climate Change – what can we do?
  • SimonR on Climate Change – what can we do?

Categories

  • Climate Change
  • Less Fossil Fuels
  • Less Pollution
  • Less Waste
  • Nature
  • Recycling
  • Societal Change
  • Uncategorized

Footer

  • Home
  • About
  • Background
  • My Other Sites
    • Life in the Right Direction
    • Peter Whiting At Home (and elsewhere)
    • FabHappy
  • Contact
    • Email me

Categories

  • Climate Change
  • Less Fossil Fuels
  • Less Pollution
  • Less Waste
  • Nature
  • Recycling
  • Societal Change
  • Uncategorized

Tags

air travel alcohol Arundhati Roy battery biomass BP butterflies climate change climate justice CO2 consumerism coronavirus dental floss economy environment farming fish forests fossil fuels Greenpeace HS2 logging meat mining nylon overconsumption packaging paper pesticides planes plastic razor renewable energy shale gas sharing soap solar sustainability toothbrush trains trees water

Archives

Check your inbox or spam folder to confirm your subscription.

Search

Copyright © 2025 - FabHappy Limited