What those stories about the environmental impact of plastic straws aren't telling you.

I'm reading "Plastic straws aren’t just bad for the environment — they can be bad for your body" (WaPo).

An estimated 7.5 percent of plastic in the environment comes from straws and stirrers, according to an analysis by a group of pollution research nonprofits called Better Alternatives Now, which based its results on trash collected by volunteers around the world.

I'm dubious about the reliability of that count. How the hell do you collect trash "around the world," sift it down to just the plastic, and weigh/measure the percentage of "straws and stirrers"? Since the push is to ban straws in the United States, I really only care about the total volume of straws in the U.S. trash, not the weight of the straws relative to other things in the trash in Sri Lanka, Bolivia, etc.

A recent report by the World Economic Forum projects that by the year 2050, the plastic in our oceans will outweigh the fish.

Mm. Yeah. I guess I really only care about the U.S. straws that go out to sea and become part of this massive plastic enterprise of outweighing the fish. Who puts garbage out in the ocean? I don't think we do that, and if we do, we should stop, and that would solve the problem of straws in the ocean.

But, before logic sets it, WaPo wants to warn us that there are other problems with straws: swallowing air (leading to burping and farting), directing sugar at a too-specific part of your teeth, exposing you to polypropylene (which is food-safe, but you never know!), causing wrinkles around the month, and possibly inciting you to drink more than if you had to put the rim of the cup to your lips.

Did you notice what is not mentioned? Hint: It's something WaPo would normally go out of its way to notice and yell about. SEX DISCRIMINATION!

Straws are FOR WOMEN. The ban HURTS WOMEN. I happened to say back in 2016 "I absolutely loathe straws. The only reason for them is to pierce those plastic lids on take out cups. I especially hate seeing a man drinking from a straw." And I did some research:

Is this some weird quirk of mine or do I have support? I have support:

1. "After ordering a drink, do you take the straw out?"

I'd get a good chuckle out of seeing a man drinking his hard liquor through a tiny mixing straw.

2. "Real Men Don't Use Straws," by Malcolm Freberg:

I want you to think about the most macho movie characters imaginable. The ones who define hero, the ones your dad hero worships. James Bond. Indiana Jones. John McLane. Now think about any scene in which they drink anything, be it water or alcohol or exotic space poison. I bet your Luminosity-trained brain couldn't insert a straw into that scene if it tried.

Harry Stamper does not suck Sprite through a bendy straw. Bruce Wayne does not drink pina coladas with a crazy straw. Real men don't use straws.... Hollywood and society had a meeting in our collective subconscious and decided that straws are for sissies. Obviously no one's going to see you sipping a gin and tonic through a cocktail straw and yell, "Hey Sally, that guy looks like he's sucking a tiny dick!" You may not have even considered that straws look like penises until you read that. I'm sorry -- but knowing is better than not knowing.

3. "Why Men Hate Straws":

Now, let's examine whether it's true that the ban on straws HURTS WOMEN. To argue yes, you'd have to say, it is primarily women who use straws and benefit by looking cute using straws. Men either don't use straws or don't realize how bad they look using straws, so they are either unaffected or (without realizing it) helped by the straw ban. But I can see the no side of this argument. Women are helped because they are freed from the burden of having to see men drinking from straws. And let's be honest, a lot of us are annoyed by the looking-cute straw antics of other women (e.g., the woman in the video embedded above and the woman in the photograph at the top of the WaPo article).

To be clear: I would not ban straws. I would stress disposing of straws (and all trash) properly. I think straws are utilitarian in to-go cups with lids, though I'd like to see less on-the-go drinking. And I wish restaurants wouldn't put straws in drinks served in glasses. I've been getting fat plastic straws in ice water lately. I take it out and put it on the table. And by the way, when did straws get so fat? It used to be that those fat straws were only for thick drinks — shakes and malteds. Soda came with a very thin paper straw — usually with a red spiral stripe — and it was considered special to get a Coke with 2 straws. I dreamed of bending the straws in 2 directions and sharing that drink with a cute boyfriend. But that was only imagination. In real life, he'd be a male drinking from a straw, and that would not look right, though — on reflection, many decades later — I might have looked cute.

And that's the question: Do you care more about how you look or about how your love object looks? The stereotype for males and females — that women care about how they look and heterosexual men care about how women look — argues against banning the straws (unless you factor in the mouth wrinkles). But reinforcing the stereotypes is SEXIST, so I'll give that argument to the straw-banners. I'm not one of them — as noted above. My position on straws is: 1. I advise you to shun them unless you're in a situation where you need a lidded cup, 2. Remember that you probably look stupid drinking from a straw, especially if you're a man, 3. Dispose of straws and all the rest of your trash properly.