The church uses them to bag up items to be given to the needy. My big point of contention is I don't think Americans are the ones getting all the plastic into the ocean. If I had had to point the finger at anyone, it'd be China. They don't give a rip about pollution. And the Texas size (literally) floating pile of garbage is out in the Pacific Ocean. Gotta think there would be a similar collection of garbage floating in the Atlantic if we were the ones responsible for it. I dunno, maybe I'm wrong, but I think we're pretty good about policing our garbage, even if some of our big cities are filthy. I mean, there's always going to be litter anywhere you pack several million people into a city like a can of sardines, but we still have street sweepers and public trash receptacles every 50 feet, it seems like. I don't think we're nearly as bad as some folks think we are.