What if God Smoked and Threw His Butts on You?

So, God is smoking. And God is 23 feet tall or so. He takes his last puff and, ah crap, there's no ashtray next to his throne. God's robes don't have pockets. So, God tosses his cigarette butt down on a cloud. Out of sight. Out of mind. That was so easy, god thinks, who needs antiquated ashtrays? Soon enough, cigarette butts the size of baseball bats are littering earth. They're making the humans sick. We shake our fists at God as we watch 50% of our population become stricken with different types of cancers as a result of this toxic rain. Sure, God loves his people, but hey,can we really expect that he properly dispose of his waste? He's so busy.

Meanwhile, on a more terrestrial level, a preliminary study finds that cigarette butts are toxic to fish. As detrimental as these findings could be due to the sheer number of smoked and tossed butts that make their way into our waterways, I am not the least bit surprised. And for a couple of reasons:

First, as reported in 1994 by the cigarette companies themselves, cigarettes contain 599 additives, which, when burned, create more than 4,000 chemical compounds(1). Second, one of many lessons you learn when running a bait and tackle shop is how difficult it is to keep fish alive. They are highly sensitive creatures and are affected greatly by changes in temperature, light, and environment. Change the chemical components in their water and you’ll find yourself with a tank full of minnows floating belly-up in no time flat.

In my eyes, a fellow human carelessly chucking a still-lit cigarette with a devil may care casualness is the epitome of selfish ignorance. When I call friends out on it, I usually get a slightly embarrassed response and a “sorry”. Then, they sheepishly roll their eyes and nervously giggle. Dear, sweet friend, it’s not fucking funny. Your actions make you look like a cretin.

If you smoke, from this moment forward, don’t even think about littering your cigarette butts. If you know people who smoke, from here on out, do not turn a blind eye when they discard their toxic waste onto the same earth you tread. Richard Gersberg, one of the researchers on the SDSU study said, “You might as well have small vials of toxins -- trillions of them -- in the water." It should have never been an acceptable practice to toss smokes on the ground, but somehow the rapidity and simplicity of the action has allowed it to slip under the radar of the average person’s conscience. Add to that the ubiquity of the cigarette flick throughout the history of motion pictures and we have an entire global population that has been duped into a misconception

However, this blind acceptance is the old reality. It’s time we move towards one where, regardless of whatever habits we subject our own bodies to, we don’t intentionally foul our earth and its ecosystem with their toxic detritus.

BAT December 12th, 1986, Mutagenic Activity of Flavour Compounds. FN AQ2222, BN 400916808-400916815)