Like constipated curmudgeons on a crapper, greenies are really straining. Their latest "outrage": American toilet paper is too soft, and wiping your backside with the stuff causes more harm to the environment than driving a Hummer.
Well, driving a Prius causes more harm to the environment than driving a Hummer, too - so what's the point?
That appears to be - once again - "greedy Americans are destroying the environment". As usual, Americans should look to the progressive people of Europe and Latin America for guidance. In Europe and Latin America, up to 40% of toilet paper comes from recycled products.
"We have this myth in the US that recycled is just so low quality, it's like cardboard and is impossible to use," said Lindsey Allen, the forestry campaigner of Greenpeace.
Wait, what? If the progressive people of Europe and Latin America are all so much better than Americans, then why, exactly, do they rush to enter our country - whether by legal means or otherwise? Undoubtedly, a part of the equation hinges upon the toilet paper disparity.
In many European nations, a rough sheet of paper is deemed sufficient. Yeah, and our grandparents used to rely on the Sears catalog. So what? Back in the day, corncobs and large leaves were used. Try flushing catalog pages and corncobs with today's government-mandated "low-flow" toilets. Even if you could manage to flush them, it's a sure bet that your local sewage treatment system would die of indigestion. The "green" view of other people reminds me of an old "Dilbert" strip (click to see the whole thing):
So how important is the toilet paper outrage to the "greenies"? Apparently, it's such a big deal that they feel completely comfortable with disseminating outright lies:
Although brands differ, 25 percent to 50 percent of the pulp used to make toilet paper in this country comes from tree farms in South America and the United States. The rest, environmental groups say, comes mostly from old, second-growth forests that serve as important absorbers of carbon dioxide, the main heat-trapping gas linked to global warming.
Um...sorry, but old forests are actually emitters of carbon dioxide. Absorption and sequestering is a feature of young trees, not old trees. Of course, this is a great argument in favor of selective harvesting and replanting - which is complete anathema to "greenies". In their peculiar religion, it's a sin to cut down any trees - but cutting down older, carbon-emitting trees is doubly sinful. Who knew that sins come in single- and two-ply?
