Don’t Be a Litterbug (Updated)

It’s easy for me to see how episodes of road rage can lead to bloodshed. A few days ago, I was driving my daughter to school down Washington Blvd. in Los Angeles when I saw the driver in front of me open his window and toss out a small wrapper. I felt an instant surge of adrenaline and spewed to Leah how wrong it was to litter. A minute later, this driver opened his window again and threw a large bag from a fast food restaurant onto the street along with a half-filled soft drink cup which splattered on the asphalt. I was so flabbergasted by this action that I could barely breathe. Then I felt overtaken by a murderous rage that made me want to slam my car into this guy’s vehicle and force him off the road. My hand reached for my horn to give him the message that what he did was not okay. But wait…did I really want to engage with this obnoxious tough guy, especially with my daughter in the car? What good would it do? Would he go back and pick up his garbage? Would my screaming at him (there was no way I was going to sound calm and rational at that moment) make him less likely to litter in the future? Or might he pull a gun out of his glove compartment and shoot me in the head for my good citizenship efforts? After he was out of view, I thought I should have at least written down his license plate number and reported it to the police but I’m guessing they wouldn’t go after him unless they witnessed the action themselves. And even then…do people get cited for littering on city streets?

What would you have done in this situation? If it had been a rare, isolated incident, I probably would have forgotten about it by the end of the day and wouldn’t be writing about it now. But here’s the thing: this was about the 10th time I’ve witnessed someone throwing garbage out of their car window during the past few years. And, though my survey is hardly scientific, I’d swear that before that I hadn’t seen a single incidence of such blatant littering in about thirty years or more. What is happening in our society that makes some people feel it is okay to throw their garbage onto the street or the sidewalk without a second thought? Is there some kind of trend in the works that is reversing decades of social consciousness?

When I was a kid, littering was THE thing. We were indoctrinated at school and on television with endless public service announcements about the evils of littering—similar to the anti-smoking campaigns that my daughter was subject to at a young age, turning her into an eight-year-old nicotine vigilante whenever she encountered a smoker. I grew up in the era of Lady Bird Johnson’s efforts to beautify America. Here’s an example of the kind of message that was drummed into our heads on a continual basis:

It was hard not to be affected by the sight of that crying Indian who appeared in a number of commercials in the early 1970s. It was the dawn of a newly strengthened ecology movement in this country and the first wisps of awareness for the Baby Boomer crowd that we were responsible for the survival of our planet. I remember the huge deal made about the first Earth Day in 1970 and the endless save-the-earth campaigns that were often accompanied by pleas from our Native American friends to respect the planet as much as they did.

The actor who played the crying Indian in the wildly successful Keep America Beautiful PSAs was named Iron Eyes Cody. This serious and dignified man came to represent the whole of Native American culture to kids growing up in the 1970s, and our faces burned with shame at how our parents and ancestors had let his people down. How shocked would we have been at the time if we knew that Iron Eyes Cody was really an Italian-American actor named Espera DeCorti? DeCorti moved from Texas to Hollywood in the 1920s and began working in the movies. In those days, Indians were invariably played by Jews and Italians, and DeCorti, renamed Cody, went on to play an Indian in over a hundred films, While he didn’t have an ounce of the Cherokee blood he claimed, Cody did, in fact, live among Indians as an adult. He committed himself to Native American causes, married an Indian woman, and adopted two Indian boys. Even when he wasn’t filming he wore beaded moccasins and his braided wig. When he died at the age of 94, the Hollywood Native American community honored the actor, pointing out that his actions were more important than his non-Indian heritage.

For all the smarminess and glycerine tears of the anti-litterbug campaigns of the 60s and 70s, I believe they really worked. I remember people throwing their trash on the street without thinking much about it when I was very young, but this awful behavior seemed to stop cold turkey during the glory years of the Crying Indian spots. And the raised consciousness survived long past the original Earth Day hoopla. Just as it is utterly shocking today to see people smoking in enclosed public spaces (something that was the norm when I was growing up), it remains equally shocking to see gross examples of littering. And yet, in my world, these unpleasant encounters are increasing dramatically. What gives?

My exposure to these littering louts coincides with our move to our historic inner city neighborhood. At the risk of offending many of our wonderful neighbors who care deeply about the community and the planet, I have to say there is a certain contingent here that doesn’t seem to give any thought to how their actions impact their neighbors’ quality of life. Our neighborhood association has organized several clean-up days in which we canvas the streets picking up the mountains of trash that was thoughtlessly tossed on the ground, most notably fast food wrappers and beer bottles. Is it a question of education? Disenfranchisement? Community awareness? What can we do to help this new generation of litterers give a shit? I’m not sure that my initial instinct to murder them in cold blood is quite the response that Iron Eyes Cody or the founders of the ecology movement would advocate.

Update: My sister is yelling at me that I wrote a whole post on this topic without mentioning the musical she wrote with her friend Jeanine Buonavolanto in 1971 about pollution. Sensing her future role in the music industry, Sue penned lyrics to a dozen songs and corralled every girl in the eighth grade class to participate in the spectacle which was performed for all classes at Peterson School in Chicago and then in public assemblies. My brother even videotaped the show using our primitive black-and-white reel-to-reel system and I remember talk of sending the tapes to our friend Sam Bobrick who at the time was writing for the “The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour.” Alas, the pollution play was not picked up by the networks for the 1971-72 schedule, but I still remember every lyric. To get my sister off my back, please join me in a group rendition of the following song, set to the tune of “The Love You Save” by the Jackson 5:

Dirty air’s pollution
And that’s just what we’ve got
It’s all over the city
It could make a flower rot.

We breathe it every second
We breathe it every day
It makes the sky look dirty
It makes the sky look gray.

Stop the factory smoking if you can
Takes more than one man to do
The things we’ve all been wanting to.

Breathe on! Breathe on!

S is for “Save us”
T is for “Trying to breathe”
O is for “Oh, no”
P is for “Please, please, please, STOP!”

Take that, Jeff Tweedy.

Comments

[Churlita]

I'm right there with you on that. When I lived in Northern California, a lot of the tourists were from the LA area and they threw crap out of their cars all the time. We always referred to them as terrorists, instead.

[Yogo]

This is why we say Don't Mess With Texas, it's the slogan for the anti-litter campaign.

http://www.dontmesswithtexas.org/

[Larry]

Interesting post. I was just commenting the other day to the girlfriend (a lifelong Puget Sound resident), that in the four-plus years I've lived in the area (about an hour west of Seattle), I've never seen so much as a candy wrapper thrown out a car window, much less a bag of food. This despite (or perhaps because of?) being fairly close to a very large Naval base. While not L.A., Chicago, or New York sized (not even Seattle-sized), the local county has upwards of 240,000 people, and very little litter.

Could be the environmental conscience of the area, or it could be that the local powers that be have a bounty for litterers. There are actually signs that post phone numbers for turning in litterers on the signs that include the fine for littering. Those signs also offer a reward of up to $1000. It's just for info leading to a conviction, and it's mostly geared towards illegal dumpers, but I'm guessing it helps the local "conscience". Still, it's a bit like George Orwell meets the flower children.

[Arlene]

Danny, I feel the same way you do on this subject. I can't stand people who throw garbage out the window. They are total slobs and it makes me wonder what there houses must look like. One time I was at the gas station and while a guy was filling his car he was throwing garbage out of his car and onto the pavement and the garbage cans were right there...I mean some stuff was touching the can. I wanted to say something so bad, but my luck he'd pull a gun out. I just don't understand people like that.

[your sister]

I. Hate. You.

Love,
your sister

[Kerstin]

As usual, you are spot on!

I probably would have yelled at the guy, but as you correctly pointed out, it would have solved nothing and is a potentially dangerous thing to do! People are just incredible.

[Rurality]

I've been thinking about this a lot lately, especially since we seem to have moved to the litterbug capital of North America. This rural area has a far worse litter problem than anything I've seen in large cities.

[Heather]

I saw some a**hole in a pickup truck with West Virginia tags throw a bag of fast food trash out of his window when I was driving home through downtown Baltimore one day. I tailgated him and honked my horn and swore like a lunatic. I don't blame you for not doing that since you had Leah in the car. But I wanted that man to know that someone saw him do it and didn't think it was okay to just ignore it. It was terrible.

Oh, the famous Jeanine, the same one from "I Got You (At the End of the Century)"? Awesome. I am so glad my little brother doesn't blog. He's got major adolescent dirt on me, musical stylings and all.

[Dave]

My reaction is pretty much the same. I get so infuriated that I can barely see straight.

Unfortunately I think we now live in an environment where "PC" is laughed at. That being Politically Correct is no longer being aware of how your actions affect others, but is, instead, looked at as being weak, or overly cautious, or just plain stupid.

Flipping someone off seems to be the best way to deal with someone who doesn't care for our actions. And I, for one, am tired of that.

Together we all have to live in this world, this country and our neighborhoods. The very least we can do is have a little respect for others, and expect the same in return. And part of that means don't throw trash in my front yard, wherever that yard happens to be.

[Judy]

I try to be quiet when I see something like that, being a new yorker is especially dangerous. I've yelled at people and everyone in the car (my family) ducked thinking someone was going to shoot us.Sometimes it's just not worth it to yell.

[OldOldLady Of The Hills]

It is interesting Danny that I see strange litter crap up here on the side of the hill across from me all the time, and have for years...In the street, too....Big Drinking cups and those pesky fast food papers you mentioned and other stuff---obviously thrown from someone's vehicle as they are coming and or going from this area. It pisses me off, no end! I don't understand that. To be so non caring and really deadened to what this crap looks like sitting among beautiful plants----OY OY OY! I agree with you that those PSA's really helped....'back in the day. I can remember emptying my car ashtray right on the street or in a parking lot, not thinking anything about it...I'm going back to the 60's.....Now, I am absolutely appalled at how I could have possibly not understood how disgustingly horrible that was....! Of course I stopped smoking in 1970, so my littering of those butts stopped, too! But truly, I cannot imagine throwing anything out of a car window in 2007....! And that has been true for over 30 years now....!

In regard to the car incident you experienced:
My first impulse would have been just like yours...but I would not want to get into an altercation with a possible gun totting person...I would have written down the persons license plate number and reported him, weather they would do anything or not is another question...But at least I would feel I tried.

[communicatrix]

Danny, you forgot to address the one thing we all really want to know: what was Jeanine Buonavolanto's Indian name?

[Rhea]

I, too, believe that if we hadn't been 'brainwashed' by TV commercials not to throw litter out the window of cars we would still be doing that today. It was a highly successful campaign, and worthwhile!

[Mary Beth]

I live in Kyiv which is full of trash, but part of the problem is the lack of governmental support. There are almost no public trashcans in Kyiv---that's something Lady Bird Johnson and her "Keep America Beautiful" campaign helped to provide. It's a lot easier to keep a city clean when there's PR and money from taxpayers. But Ukraine is a poor country...the US isn't, no excuse, wonder what I'll find when I return this summer.

[Scott]

Get over it, this is LA. The main plague that I see in LA is illegal immigration. A couple of napkins, a bag, and a soda are nothing. Like i said before, GET OVER IT. The trash will be picked up by the criminals doing community service, or by the overpaid street sweepers. If you dont like trash on the streets, then I suggest that you move to japan.

[mcarthurpark]

Twice I have confronted litterers by following them and telling they they should be ashamed. Once I actually picked up the bag of taco bell trash a woman threw out her car window, then I knocked on her window when she stopped, she rolled down her window to see what I wanted and I handed the trash back to her. She claimed she didn't realize it had fallen out of her open window accidentally. I wonder if those people think twice about littering now, I hope so.

[PTS]

I'm with ya, dude. I own a shop and every morning and then throughout the day, I am in the parking lot with my broom and dustpan picking up after these idiots. Cigarette butts, scratched lottery tickets, wrappers, empty cups, napkins. WTF? It's so irritating and I know they get off on watching me pick up their trash. Losers, I tell ya...

[[email protected]]

when i was a kid in the seventies i would go in for my annual check up and mt doctor would smoke while consulting with my mom....oh, so did my dentist...anyone remember when people smoked on airplanes? yuk!