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naraburns  nihil supernum  2yr ago (text post)   32433 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of October 31, 2022

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even people who consider themselves as honest may commit petty crimes if they think they will not get caught

Firstly "people who consider themselves as honest" is not the same as "people who are honest" in fact I would wager that actual amount of overlap between the two set is rather small.

Second I have to agree with @Walterodim, I can barely think of any single act that's a more of a clear marker of a person being unworthy of association than littering. I can imagine of a number of different circumstances under which I would find homicide to be acceptable, I struggle to think of any where littering would be.

good news I have never littered, so I guess that puts me at least in the top 25% of society, in your eyes at least

(75% of people admit that they have littered in the past 5 years)

People come up with all kinds of justifications for littering. When I worked with teenagers I had to repeatedly tell them that just because something was biodegradable doesn't mean you can just throw it wherever. Aside from concerns about attracting unwanted animals, this picnic spot wouldn't be as nice if there were apple cores and sandwich scraps everywhere. And then there are people who feel entitled to a garbage can and think littering is acceptable if adequate facilities aren't provided. One of the enduring images in Pittsburgh lore is the aftermath of the 2013 Kenny Chesney concert, when crews had to remove an estimated 30 tons of trash from parking lots adjacent to Heinz Field Acrisure Stadium. The images of lots that looked like landfills were all over the local news and there was plenty of outrage over people's ignorance. But there were some quarters who blamed the parking authorities for not providing enough dumpsters. I called bullshit on this because unless you're tailgating right next to the dumpster, you'll need a bag anyway, and if you have a bag, then you can take it home with you. Yet I still got pushback from some people who thought this was an entirely unreasonable proposition.

Those 1980s anti-littering campaigns sure left a mark on people

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