> From talk about regulating the size of big gulps to mandating paper straws to legalization of marijuana and the banning of smoking products, this country is going insane.
Smoking marijuana and big gulps are very different from paper straws. Rules around smoking and soda sizes are the government legislating freedoms. I personally don't mind regulations here, but I agree it's taking away your liberty to some extent. Paper straws are mandated for a completely different reason: because they impose an externality that the user doesn't adequately pay for. Philosophically these bans are for the same reason we don't allow you to leave garbage on a public bench or dump toxic waste in a river. Again, you can debate the merits of single-use plastic legislation, but I wouldn't lump it together with smoking and soda bans at all.
But why ban paper straws and not plastic wrapped plastic bottles with plastic stickers on a pallet wrapped in plastic? Just eliminating the "sixpack" part of the packaging of sodas would save more plastics than the straws bans do.
Sure, but my point is more that legislation on e-cigarettes and soda is an issue of civil liberty, plain and simple, and legislation on plastics has little to do with them (unless you think that it's your right to pollute the environment). You might not think that it's effective, but it's not a case of the government telling you you can't do something for your own good.
Smoking marijuana and big gulps are very different from paper straws. Rules around smoking and soda sizes are the government legislating freedoms. I personally don't mind regulations here, but I agree it's taking away your liberty to some extent. Paper straws are mandated for a completely different reason: because they impose an externality that the user doesn't adequately pay for. Philosophically these bans are for the same reason we don't allow you to leave garbage on a public bench or dump toxic waste in a river. Again, you can debate the merits of single-use plastic legislation, but I wouldn't lump it together with smoking and soda bans at all.