ONE WORD BEN: PLASTICS

ONE WORD BEN: PLASTICS: Back before late ’08 when the bottom fell out of the free-for-all, credit-spawned, consumerism bubble it was common to hear people bemoan the gobble, gobble, gobble of your typical over fed, too-much-stuff turkey-American.

But in spite of the hope of many that perhaps the crash presaged a new era of right-sized consumption, we’ve gone right back to our old, traditional, grab-it-while-you-can rituals, like Coneheads demanding the restoration of our right to “consume mass quantities”.

And as if to underline the way that, when challenged to do the very least we can do- and we mean the very least- we act like whiny, weaned infants demanding the restoration of our endless supply of teat.

So it shouldn’t be any surprise that, backed by a wave of sniveling, self-centered assholes, Councilperson Mel Rapozo is trying to make sure the baby has his bottle by reversing the ban on plastic grocery bags that went into effect last month.

And make no mistake about it. This would be a reversal.

According to Joan Conrow’s post yesterday the bill would exempt “Food Service Establishment(s)” and defines them as

any building, vehicle, place, or structure, or any room or division in a building, vehicle, place, or structure where food is prepared, served, or sold for immediate consumption on or in the vicinity of the premises; called for or taken out by customers; or prepared prior to being delivered to another location for consumption. This term includes, but not limited to restaurants; coffee shops; cafeterias; short-order cafes; luncheonettes; taverns; lunchrooms; places which manufacture wholesale or retail sandwiches or salads; institutions, both public and private; food carts; itinerant restaurants; industrial cafeterias; and catering establishments.

That of course means that every supermarket with a “deli” on the island is exempt, as is any place that “prepares food” even if all you do is serve coffee.

This is supposedly about “health issues” and maintaining “sanitary conditions” but it’s anything but.

What kind of slobs are these people that they can’t make sure their takeout doesn’t spill all over the place without rewrapping it in a plastic grocery bag? Don’t forget that those plastic bags that people use to wrap fruits an veges and meats are already exempt.

But that’s not enough for your fat, pre-diabetic ass? You obviously need all that greasy, fat-laden gravy on your nutritionless white rice but are you such freakin’ pigs that you can’t get your slop from the store into your pie hole without spilling it all over your morbidly obese lap?
All that plastic that the deli wraps your food in isn’t enough for ya, eh? You need another bag to put it all in, in anticipation of the fact that you’re in such a rush to cram more garbage down your gullet that can’t get out of the store without spilling it on you $500 designer jeans.

Health? If you cared about health you wouldn’t be eating all that processed pre-prepared crap and go home and cook a real meal.

Sanitation? You mean after you’re careless enough to let your stuff spill out into the bag you’re so intent on getting every last drop into that gaping maw of yours that you’ve gotta lick the bag?

Perhaps the most ridiculous aspect of this bellyaching gripe session that’s been going on since the ban is that it comes from people who claim to be nature lovers and even environmental activists.

If you love your plastic grocery bags so much why don’t you go live in the Texas-sized plastic bag gyre out in the middle of the Pacific? Perhaps you should go on a diet of the shearwaters, dolphins and turtles the bags kill.

If you can’t live without your nasty plastic grocery bags maybe we should make ones big enough to wrap you in when we bury you in the ground... we wouldn’t want to spill you and make a mess on the way to the cemetery.