A city of scolds
Seattle City Hall has cracked down on drinking and clubs, it's on the verge of banning fast food and taxing plastic grocery bags, and now even plastic-bottled water is a civic sin. Switch to tap water! says the mayor. Mossback thinks enough is enough.
Once upon a time, Seattle wanted to be taken seriously as a place with class. A few early French restaurants in Pioneer Square in the 1970s signaled that sophistication was on the march. Seattle's old blue laws (such as no standing in a bar while holding a drink) began to be repealed. Outdoor cafes were legalized. During those reform years, it even became possible to buy a decent case of French wine without having to drive to San Francisco. In fact, Seattle began to put itself on the map by adopting and then adapting various European fads. A latte, anyone?
But what ranks as cosmopolitan today is something entirely different. Instead of becoming relaxed and continental, our most ardent urban advocates have become uptight and nativist, from new liquor crackdowns to calls for secession. Take Mayor Greg Nickels' new campaign against bottled water. Once, you may have looked for an authentic bistro that served Evian with your meal. Now, sipping foreign water out of a plastic bottle is tantamount to firing a slug into Gaia's gut. And don't tell anyone you like foie gras.
Nickels won't allow bottled water to be sold at City Hall and is encouraging all of Seattle to dump the stuff in favor of local tap water. According to a news release (one of a blizzard coming from hizzoner), "Mayor Greg Nickels today kicked off a six-week public awareness campaign aimed at promoting the quality of Seattle's drinking water and encouraging people to stop buying bottled water." This being Seattle, the new campaign comes with a scolding. Says Nickels:
"What flows from our taps is some of the finest-tasting, purest-source water in the world. That's why it makes little sense for Seattleites to waste their money on bottled water — which costs 2,400 times as much as tap water and creates thousands of tons of greenhouse gases."
Drinking Evian is destroying the planet. The press release contains this calculation: "Seattle residents use the equivalent of about 354,127 pint bottles of water each day. That equals to some 40,719 barrels of oil each year, creating about 5,439 tons of greenhouse gases."
So importing and drinking bottled water is bad, but exporting Boeing aircraft and war machines is OK? Which do you think has a bigger impact on greenhouse gases? Which uses more oil? Which contributes more to destroying the planet?
And what about Starbucks, for god's sake? How much carbon is burned and how much greenhouse gas emitted getting those beans here? Unless I missed it, there are no coffee plantations in Wallingford.
If the mayor's next press release announced an intention to lead a charge to abolish the Boeing company, maybe we'd begin to see some moral consistency. As it is, we're wasting carbon on city bureaucrats who are tapping on their calculators to produce such stats.
OK, if you want to forget the big picture for the moment, let's get to the details of Nickels' anti-bottled water campaign.
First, yes, Seattle has pretty good water and ought to be proud of protecting its supply. If you like it, drink up. More power to you.
Second, in my experience, there is no better water than fresh mountain stream water which, of course, you can't safely drink anymore because of the risk of pathogens. And besides, recent research shows that even our most pristine mountain lakes are laced with mercury and other chemicals that have floated in on the wind or fallen with the rain and snow. If we want fresh, natural sources of local water, we have to stop polluting it.
Third, the taste and quality of local water is often impacted by the pipes it travels through. Maybe it's just me, living in older homes and apartments, but even when filtered, my tap water doesn't taste as good as most bottled waters. Few can afford to replace their plumbing.
Fourth, plastic is lousy, but it has certain conveniences. It's light and portable (easy to carry on walks, etc.). I tried special ordering mineral water in glass bottles for awhile but could only get it by the case. Have you ever tried lugging a case of glass-bottled water home from the market? I suspect plastic may be better than hauling the bottles home by car.
Fifth, free public drinking water is not generally available. You can buy Evian in gas stations and quickie marts now, but where have all the public drinking fountains gone? And how many are maintained in good enough condition that you'd actually want to use them? Downtown Seattle used to have Bubblers on many corners, but no longer.
Sixth, where do campaigns like this end? The city has tried to control what types of alcohol can be sold where, it's cracked down on loud music, smoking, it wants to start charging you for using the "wrong" type of grocery bags, it wants to eliminate fast food from the city, it has employees inspecting your garbage to see if you're obeying recycling laws, and our elected leaders are just chomping at the bit to start tracking where you drive and when so they can charge you by the mile. Big Nanny is watching.
Comments:
Posted Thu, May 8, 5:37 p.m. inappropriate
Come on Skip! You remember what W.C. Fields said: I never drink water fish (blank) in it! Or the Seattle version, I never drink Tolt watershed water, endangered salmon spawn in it and I simply do not want to carry the guilt of reducing in stream flows to the detriment of any threatened salmonids.
Posted Thu, May 8, 5:42 p.m. inappropriate
disagree: The bottled water and shopping bag campaigns are sort of like leaded gas used to be...fairly cutting edge today, but likely to be mainstream later. Both are important, and I'd be proud for Seattle to be a leader. (Well, not a leader on bags...the US is horribly behind certain other countries on those.)
Noise is interesting. Americans are horrifically rude with car alarms that beep when you lock your car, loud motorcycles, loud stereos, etc. -- things most non-NA cities I've been to are almost completely devoid of, probably because they've learned to live near each other without being jerks, or maybe they're fundamentally not selfish assholes like many Americans are. Further, those cities have vast high-density neighborhoods that don't have nightclubs. They don't assume that living in the middle of town means you don't deserve to sleep, as some people here do. Even dogs are blissfully rare.
Now jaywalking on the other hand...that's a sign of a healthy city. Healthy cities encourage people to walk. They have right of way but don't penalize people for crossing empty streets. We could learn from that.
Posted Thu, May 8, 6:39 p.m. inappropriate
It's not François Kissel's fault: Post hoc, ergo propter hoc. Don't blame the Evian served at Kissel's Brasserie Pittsbourg (the only French restaurant in Pioneer Square in the early 1970s, by the way). The effete snobs of 35 years ago didn't beget today's frenzied, self-defeating environmentalists, did we?
Posted Thu, May 8, 8:51 p.m. inappropriate
Another Bold Leadership Initiaitve: Now that's making a difference in the world: ban bottled water. Can we have a little "process" with that too?
Posted Thu, May 8, 9:42 p.m. inappropriate
Sophomoric: Berger's argument is silly.
First, Berger has proven that "Consistency is the hobgoblin of petty minds." Consistency is not an argument for the city of Seattle to not do something about global warming, even if it isn't on the scale of Boeing. That's a sophomoric argument and is completely irrelevant to the public good of banning plastic and reducing carbon emissions. We do what we can do in the circumstances presented to us right now, not in some theoretically perfect world of consistency.
Second, Berger's classic capitalist argument is that if it can be produced, then it should be up to the consumer to decide. As if environmentalists have had the same resources to advertise and affect consumer desires as Evian, a member of the Danone Group, a Fortune 500 global conglomerate. "Let the consumer decide to buy a Corvair, wear a seatlbeat or a helmet, or smoke anywhere he/she wants to--it's all about rugged individualism and free choice, regardless of whom it harms or how many it kills. Any intervention by a democratically-elected government is a 'nanny state'." Nickels represents, whether you like it or not, what the citizens of Seattle have said they want. Get over it for now, and look to the next election and a better candidate.
Third, though I have no particular love for the current Seattle administration, I can recognize that this is, in the context of American federalism, a local attempt to counteract the current federal administration's stupidity on environmental issues. Witness the current fight over state-federal control of CAFE standards. Nickels, as he does so well, is running to the head of the parade; he isn't organizing it; it's bigger than local politcs and Seattleism.
Finally, I used to walk around the UW campus smoking Gaulois because I thought it was, in Berger's word , "cosmopolitan." I was a sophomore.
Posted Thu, May 8, 10:09 p.m. inappropriate
Take the Seattle tap water challenge: The Nickels/Carr obsession with harrassing night clubs is certainly the most annoying, embarassing, and lamest political effort ever to take place on American soil. If another candidate were to step forward and say how utterly pathetic it is, I would cast my vote for him/her based on that single issue alone. Even if that candidate were a Republican.
But Mossback defending bottled water? Really? Isn't it about time someone snapped their fingers and brought us out of this hypnotic stupor that has us believing it makes good sense to spend more money for a liter of water than a liter of gas? Even if the finger snapper is Greg Nickels?
As for whether bottled water tastes better, that's an emprical question that can be easily answered with a double-blind taste test. Evian vs Seattle tap, 10 trials, I'll bet Mossback can't tell the difference.
Posted Fri, May 9, 2:26 a.m. inappropriate
RE: Take the Seattle tap water challenge: Oh please.
This is all about the elite telling the rest of us what we can do. "You shouldn't be allowed to choose; you should be told what to do or restricted in what you can do. After all, it's for your own good. And the children."
If people want bottled water, (a) they're not that smart and (b) go ahead and let them pay money for it.
In fact, it would be smarter for Seattle to run a bottling plant and sell its own water.
Posted Fri, May 9, 7:07 a.m. inappropriate
A Nanny State Made In China: As a born-and-raised Seattleite, who has voted almost exclusively Democratic (except for John Spellman for Governor in 1980), who has voted yes on virtually all property tax increases, even for the monorail, I have had it up to my eyeballs with the Nanny State behavior of City Hall. City government has been taken over by evangelical environmentalists who differ from thier bigoted evangelical religious cousins only in their secularism.
What I find incredibly funny and ironic is the exhortation to use reusable bags instead of plastic bags. My daughter brought home a "Green Bag" and encouraged me to use it instead of plastic bags, which I recycle into trash bags for my kitchen garbage pail. I looked on the label in the bag and it said "MADE IN CHINA". I laughed so hard I nearly puked. How many tons of greenhouse gases were produced to make and ship this bag to politically correct Seattle?
If Mayor Nickels and crew were serious about these issues, they'd find local actions to change the landscape. For example, why not reach into our own history and find a solution to the plastic bag problem? The Duwamish and other native people made beautiful, waterproof baskets out of cedar bark. Is it ludicrous to think that these techniques and materials might be updated to create an environmentally safe tote? Could we employ local people using local materials to make these? Unfortunately, it's easier for City Hall to wag fingers than to lift a finger.
Posted Fri, May 9, 8:09 a.m. inappropriate
Picture this: My bank, which shall for now remain nameless, wanted to charge me $1.50 every month to return my canceled checks. I told the manager "Up yours! I want you to waive that fee, now and forever, or I'm taking my business -- and my money -- elsewhere!" They waived the fee.
Fast forward to a checkout line. I plunk $50-60 worth of groceries down at the checkout line and tell the cashier: "Now I want you to waive the 20 cents for the bag, or I'm going to leave those groceries right here and walk out the door."
Can you guess what that cashier will do? I can. No charge for the bags. Multiply that by 10-20 thousand pissed-off curmudgeonly customers and there goes *that* dumb-ass idea.
As for bottled water: Never spent a nickel for it -- not ever -- and never will.
Posted Fri, May 9, 8:54 a.m. inappropriate
RE: Take the Seattle tap water challenge: "This is all about the elite telling the rest of us what we can do."
Anyone else find it ironic that we're using the term "elite" to refer to the opponents of bottled water?
Anyone else find this trend of discrediting opponents by calling them "elite" to be kind of tiresome?
Posted Fri, May 9, 9:44 a.m. inappropriate
"...finest-tasting, purest-source water in the world.": I don't know where the mayor gets his water, but when I worked in Seattle a few years ago, the stuff that came out of the drinking fountains tasted like it was pumped from a swimming pool. Of course, it probably helps whiten your teeth...
Posted Fri, May 9, 10:24 a.m. inappropriate
It's okay to get caught up in the environmental movement: I think this is a great conversation that we should be having more often.
Our city should get caught up in environmental activism. We certainly can't wait for the rest of the country to do it. When we can show that these small steps don't do any harm and actually give us a city we can be proud to live in then maybe other cities won't be so afraid to take similar steps. I can't stand that there's a backlash against doing the right thing because some old stogies feel it's somehow sterlizing the city.
Posted Fri, May 9, 10:49 a.m. inappropriate
On epiphanies and where we can send the bottled water: A couple years ago the Seattle Planning and Development Department held a series of presentations by experts who told us how we could become a greener city. At one I attended, free bottles of water were given to the crowd. I took one because I collect items that seem to fit the category of "wretched excess". Perhaps it was a premonition that the city would someday understand the contradictions in its own behavior.
The bottles, and they were real heavy glass with a neat wine bottle shape and not the imitation plastic kind, were a gift from a local structural engineering company that was promoting itself, perhaps in a quest for future public projects. The bottle label didn't indicate the exact water source, but it did give the name of a BC company that, according to their web site, ships from BC and Oregon. So the water had to have traveled at least a couple hundred miles. Whatever the source, the bottler felt compelled to add a little ozone to kill any sneaky pathogens that got into their product.
Obviously, under the new policy, the City in the future will not succumb to gifts wrapped in free corporate advertising when they have an obvious carbon footprint. So that's the first epiphany. A good one.
The second would occur if the Mayor suggested that if Seattleites feel a need for bottled water they should first buy it for the people who could really use it - like the survivors of the Myanmar disaster.
Posted Fri, May 9, 11:01 a.m. inappropriate
RE: Sophomoric: "Nickels represents, whether you like it or not, what the citizens of Seattle have said they want."
True and here's the irony. Out of the "process" that officialdom and crosscutters alike say they hate, come most of the great ideas for which Seattle is famous. WTO included. The problem comes with stealing ideas, distorting them so originators have trouble recognizing them or wish they'd kept their mouth shut, and imposing them, distorted or not, as curt royal edits upon a city of "dullards." No "hurrying to catch up with my people" just flap the lower lip and preach.
Posted Fri, May 9, 11:14 a.m. inappropriate
So tired: I am SO tired of do-gooders, butt-inskies, and Californicators ("I moved away because I didn't like it there any more." Just not enough to try and re-make where ever you are now into another CA.), who are SO morally superior and all-knowing, that they have the right to tell everyone else how to live their lives.
The standard line is, "It's for your own good."
Well, ya know what gang? DON'T DO US ANY FAVORS! (Apologies for yelling, but it's been building for decades.) You need to get a life and stop trying to control everyone else's.
Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness (that liberty is important!). Remember?
theRaven
Posted Fri, May 9, 11:32 a.m. inappropriate
RE: A Nanny State Made In China: "The Duwamish and other native people made beautiful, waterproof baskets out of cedar bark. Is it ludicrous to think that these techniques and materials might be updated to create an environmentally safe tote?"
There's this stuff called hemp? It can grow anywhere, and replace most (if not all) of these things that leave a "carbon footprint".
To quote Jack Herer:
"60% to 80% of everything was made from Hemp 6,000 years ago up until around 100 years ago: for example, clothes, rugs, drapes, curtains, diapers, canvas, string, rope, sails, houses, cars, etc... I did not learn one word about Hemp in grade school, high school or college!
Isn't it strange that the #1 medicine, the #1 fiber, the #1 food, the #1 fuel, the #1 paper and the #1 substitute for wood can be made from Hemp and it is illegal!!...
...It is the healthiest plant for the ground and air. Hemp is the only known plant that can be grown from the Equator to the Arctic and Antarctic Circles; from the mountains to the valleys, from the oceans to the plains, including arid lands and everywhere in between. Hemp is the healthiest plant for the ground out of the 300,000 known species, and the millions and millions of subspecies of plants on Earth, because it has a root system that grows 10 to 12 inches in 30 days compared to one inch for rye, barley grass, etc. The roots penetrate up to 3, 6 and even 10 feet deep, pulverizing the soil and making it arable. After harvest it leaves a root system that is mulched into the ground, revitalizing the land and making it live once again. It is the KING KONG of the King Kongs of all plant life."
We need to quit whining and start doing.
theRaven
Posted Fri, May 9, 11:38 a.m. inappropriate
RE: So tired: Amen, Raven. I keep wondering what group is sitting around city hall thinking up new good deeds. I expect that one of them will read that cutting toenails with the curve causes ingrown toenails. Pretty soon, for our own good, the mayor will have a ToeNail office whose job is to stop us randomly and check that our toenails are cut straight across (for our own good, to prevent the pain of ingrown toenails). Think of the pain we will avoid when he gets that office going!!
"Excuse me, sir, off with the shoes and socks please." $200 fine possible, you know.
Posted Fri, May 9, 12:48 p.m. inappropriate
RE: So tired: Thank'ee Spike! Great observation, though you may not want to give the TSA any ideas.
I hope toenails aren't the next thing that shows up on their dangerous do-hickies list...
theRaven
Posted Fri, May 9, 6:08 p.m. inappropriate
WHEN BAGS ARE OUTLAWED ONLY OUTLAWS ....: For our groceries my wife has completely switched to the stout cloth bags with serious graphics and big loop handles and by now they litter our car and kitchen. I have decided against using them for the kitchen waste.
What I have done is buy a nice big dispenser box of plastic bags for our garbage (they are really much better than the ones the grocery stores give away, thicker plastic and they even have drawstrings!). They don't cost very much and it makes me feel like I am doing my part.
Posted Fri, May 9, 7:39 p.m. inappropriate
No desire: I have absolutely no desire to tell Raven how to live her/his life, just so long as it doesn't involve second-hand smoke in my face, carbon emissions in my children's air, or that any of us have to pay for the medical consequences of preventable diseases and conditions that result from her/his "pursuit of happiness."
Mortimer Adler said, "Liberty is freedom constrained by justice." So, do what you want Raven, just don't encroach on my, or my children's, freedom--that's the meaning of justice.
Get over the notion that you actually live in some individualistic bubble that doesn't have effects on others. An American myth that has produced devastating consequences for others.
Then again, you wouldn't be writing to Crosscut, or reading it for that matter, if you actually believed that lie.
Posted Sun, May 11, 8:03 p.m. inappropriate
RE: No desire: bkochis, I find that difficult to believe when everything you say is telling me how to live my life. Don't do this, don't be this way, etc., etc., etc.
When I smoked I always tried to be conscientious of those around me, and avoided expelling my fumes directly in someone's face. That's bad manners.
If/when I may contract whatever as a consequence, I'm not going to whine that "I didn't have a choice, they made me!". I made the choice.
There were some 30 studies done on "second-hand smoke" back when; 24 of them were ignored by the government; they didn't reach the "correct" conclusions. The half-dozen that were over the top were cherry-picked to make the "facts" fit. It's really whether or not you're genetically pre-disposed toward those kinds of ailments. Our tax dollars at work.
My vehicles have always been well maintained. Talk to the current administration about carbon emissions, and lack of dealing with them. Like that's going to help. You're not the only one with offspring, and just because you made one or more doesn't make you, or your desires, any more important than anyone else's. Last I checked, it's still one person, one vote.
For you to intimate that I may have "preventable diseases" is just plain mean and rude. And I've always paid my own way. If you have something factual or constructive to say, please do, but don't just inanely attack the messenger, that accomplishes nothing.
Very nice quote but, liberty is freedom? They mean the same thing, freedom is just more general.
Liberty, as our founding fathers looked at it:
The right and power to act, believe, or express oneself in a manner of one's own choosing.
Freedom from unjust or undue governmental control.
A right or immunity to engage in certain actions without control or interference: the liberties protected by the Bill of Rights.
~American Heritage Dictionary
Oh, that's right! We don't have a Bill of Rights anymore, it's been dismantled. Silly me.
The definition of justice is:
The quality of being just; fairness. Conformity to truth, fact, or sound reason. ~AHDictionary
Qualities sadly lacking in many these days. To be just, one must be guided by truth, reason, and fairness; to actually be in possession of a moral compass. Therefore to "constrain[freedom] by justice" is an oxymoron because you wouldn't be acting out of, or conforming to, any of those qualities necessary to be in possession of a sense of justice.
Wanna trade quotes? Here's one back.
"If we confuse dissent with disloyalty– if we deny the right of the individual to be wrong, unpopular, eccentric or unorthodox– if we deny the essence of racial equality then hundreds of millions ... who are shopping about for a new allegiance will conclude that we are concerned to defend a myth and our present privileged status. Every act that denies or limits the freedom of the individual in this country costs us the ... confidence of men and women who aspire to that freedom and independence of which we speak and for which our ancestors fought."
~Edward R. Murrow (June 1953)
Get over your unfairness that you actually have the right to tell me (or the rest of the country, for that matter) how to live my life and what choices I have to make. I'm sure yours is busy enough.
I've traveled in Europe in recent years and experienced the world-wide enmity for this country first hand. Most that I met felt that we, as a country, have lost our moral compass. Not to mention our collective mind, thank you very much.
theRaven
Posted Tue, May 13, 2:12 a.m. inappropriate
Quimby must go----: All very good to rant and quote-- but how do we stop Quimby and his gang from micromanaging our lives? Although filling an ever increasing physical space ( bricks and glass houses come to mind) he is still a small man with more power than any of his undergrade prof's would have dared hope for him. His vindictaivness makes Hillary look like a cookie baking socar mom. His super human quest for more power makes Hillary look like---well, actually Hillary probably still has him on that---- but there's little doubt that he wishes to control our lives very narrowly. Whats next? Single child laws? Cotton only clothes? Electricity Free Tuesdays?
Quimby must go. Down with Quimby!
Posted Tue, May 13, 7:26 p.m. inappropriate
Glad: Well, I'm glad you got my point. Yes, I am telling you how to live your life because how you live it affects my life and that of my family and others in this community and generations to come. That's because we share the same air, water, land and land fills, resources, tax base, roads, health care industry, and food supply. The "smoke in my face" was a metaphor for the fact that you can't smoke without affecting me in bars, restaurants, or any space because I end paying for the lung cancer you'll contract as a result--even after you're dead I and my children will keep paying for the chemotherapy and the operations. Whether you conscientiously or otherwise don't blow it directly in my face is irrelevant.
Freedom is the ability to do whatever you want; liberty is that freedom constrained by the justice of not harming others in the process. You do not have the freedom to smoke in an elevator--that's justice. If I have my way, you will not have the freedom to buy plastic water bottles or plastic bags that I have to pay to dispose of because it's "convenient" for you and it's your "freedom" to do so.
We live in a modern urban society, not rural homesteads miles from each other except for ma and pa down the road. To pretend otherwise is the adolescent fantasy of a naive libertarian.