Prohibition makes everything worse: dozens of beer cans, 2 water bottles and 1 gatorade bottle.
We live in a rural looking area directly next to several good sized towns. Our roads don't connect to much that is useful, so it is a good spot to go "for a ride".
Every since we moved here around six years ago (and I'm sure for a long time before), our stretch of road has had a unique "flavor". For example: at all times of the day or night, cars will stop right in front of our house for a minute or so and drive off. The vast majority of the traffic is blowing smoke, if you know what I mean. Now, I don't have a problem with that. I don't feel that smoking pot is much, if any impairment and I don't think these people are a bother to anyone. Consider however, that these people would not even feel the need to "go for a ride" if smoking pot was accepted and not criminal. Can you really argue that it is more dangerous than alcohol?
Alcohol is something else entirely. I would rather people stay the hell off the road if they are going to drink much. I'm not bothered if someone is driving around with a beer in their hand. Growing up, I saw plenty of that and no one ever seemed dangerous in the least. The problem is similar to pot, but not the same as pot. People feel they can drink all they want at home. It is acceptable and not criminal. The problem is they do continue to drink even while driving regardless of the law. Most states have an open container law which criminalize drinking and driving as well as having an open container of alcohol in your vehicle.
So, you can buy alcohol and have it in your car. That makes it possible to drink and drive, but then what do you do with the containers as you drive around drinking? Throw them out the window so you don't get caught with them - of course.
Clearly the issue is lack of homeless people in your area. If you live in a state with a bottle return policy (10 cents here in MI) it is increasingly rare to find any empty beer cans with the ever industrious homeless population out there looking to make a quick buck :)
Lol. Great point. When I was a kid in northern NY, I made out pretty well doing that. Its probably against the law for kids to do that now - especially in NY.
Well, even if drinking while driving was legal, people would still contaminate the environment, they are just to lazy to search for a garbage can.
I'm sure that is true to some degree, but the ratio of beer cans to other trash is huge here.
people don't usually pound a 12 pack of waters.
are you sure it's not meth?
Who knows, but I do smell a lot of pot.
people throw the wrappers from those blunt wrappers everywhere, those are a mess.
i pity over the people who throw waste materials over roads in attitude, this is real waste for having those people on mother earth, they pollute mother earth, Sooner or later, we will have to recognise that the Earth has rights too, to live without pollution. What mankind must know is that human beings cannot live without Mother Earth, but the planet can live without humans...
Good point. We can't continue forever without a reckoning.
Prohibition in general creates a lot of problems, but I'm not sure littering is one of those. Even with items that are not prohibited—as you mentioned in the title: water bottles, gatorade bottles—people litter. Smoking isn't illegal (yet), but people litter their cigarette butts everywhere. Here in Japan it isn't illegal to carry around trash, yet people litter it everywhere. I pick up trash some mornings and I know others who do it every morning and we always end up with at least one trash bag full, often more. People litter because they are lazy and because they don't think they are doing any great harm (or they convince themselves of this). Now in the case of beer cans, not wanting to be caught with them in the car certainly doesn't help, but it is far from the cause.
You are right. In general that is true, but here specifically, I think we would not see so many beer cans if not for prohibition.
I totally don't understand what the hell is wrong with people.
I live in a somewhat similar place, except we don't drink here much so the trash is more like regular trash. But it still annoys me so much when I see that , I want to throw the trash back on their faces.
For sure. I realize that a certain amount of trash will be accidental, but obviously lots of people don't care. I saw a pile of jerks set bags of fast food trash in the parking lot recently. grrr.
Sometimes I fail to understand how people could simply not care
Drinking and driving is an absolute no go.
As well environmental pollution is..
We should care more about our beautiful planet earth before we destroy it completely..
we should try and care more for our planet.. it's upsetting how many people are too lazy to look for a bin
Great post