Cigarette Butts Banned In Illinois: Minimum $1,500 Fine to Anyone Who Throws a Butt On the Ground

reply to post by bigfatfurrytexan


It is even nerdier than you might think...
the owlbear

the owlbear
reply to post by bigfatfurrytexan

 

It is even nerdier than you might think...
the owlbear

I would totally roll a d20 against one of those.

the owlbear

The Occupy protester would have to be sitting in their car throwing them out the window...the bill is targeting MOTORISTS (sorry for the caps, man, forgive me). If this were about people walking around...yeah, I'd be on your side in saying this is extreme and probably a way to get homeless people away from parks.

Just to clear up a major misconception that media loved to build on and spread.

Occupy wasn't full of bums, criminals and degenerates. Not every camp, at least. I didn't walk to St Louis. I drove.....and one of my first lessons in how wrong the media was about what I'd come to join? A good % of the people in camp..and I mean LIVING in camp...had vehicles either on the metered street around the plaza, or in a downtown parking structure in the immediate area.

The fact this is targeted at motorists sounds real good. I'm sure the glovebox light being out as a vehicular violation wasn't targeted to harass gangbangers to death either. Had to be a good reason at one time to make that a part of the California Vehicle Code I manage to suffer under for awhile....but don't tell me it was ever used in a legitimate and safety related way, either. It was a tool..as this will likely come to be. A tool to be used when needed...when the right annoyance is there to use it on.

This law seems to leave plenty of room to abuse into more prison and more selective enforcement running from a citation to actual charges with time looming... That, over litter, is totally over the top of any form of logic, IMO.

reply to post by Wrabbit2000


Agreed and agreed...both the Occupy and Tea Party movements were invaded by parasites who were funded by the same people who fund their way into the pockets of legislators and executives. "They" wanted to find extremists on both sides and polarize ANY movement that might be deemed threatening to their de facto (and now de jure) plutocracy.

The more we can work together...the more they stand to lose.

It is a good law especially during a drought. But, I can see it being abused. Say, there was a butt in the road already that got kicked up by a car in front of a state trooper who has had a beef with their bumper sticker slogan and is just itching to pull over and harass them...but that would happen regardless. It doesn't help.
I just hope the bad outweighs the good and some Western states who tend to have tons of brush and forest fires take note. So I wasn't picking on you, wrabbs...the title is a little misleading if one doesn't read the thing in its entirety and views the website it was taken from.

reply to post by jhn7537


You are so welcome...now have a smoke and calm down. Saying the bad shat happens in a different part of the state is a copout. I did stay on topic, I tried to enlist that butt anger toward alcohol...it's a bigger problem than cigarette butts or guns. Illinois... We should just give you to Canada. You can get shot in Illinois, but rest assurded you'll land on clean ground...butt free. Yea I really see how all who came into this thread STAYED ON TOPIC. You would have gotten further by telling me to BUTT OUT...PUN INTENDED.

openyourmind1262
reply to post by jhn7537

 

You are so welcome...now have a smoke and calm down. Saying the bad shat happens in a different part of the state is a copout. I did stay on topic, I tried to enlist that butt anger toward alcohol...it's a bigger problem than cigarette butts or guns. Illinois... We should just give you to Canada. You can get shot in Illinois, but rest assurded you'll land on clean ground...butt free. Yea I really see how all who came into this thread STAYED ON TOPIC. You would have gotten further by telling me to BUTT OUT...PUN INTENDED.

edit on 10-12-2013 by openyourmind1262 because: (no reason given)

Once again you're driving home points that make ZERO sense... Did I once mention anything about gun violence or alcohol being less important to cigarette butts? You sure do like to make a boat load of assumptions towards me.

Not sure why I received two jag-like posts from you. Seems a little unwarranted, but oh well.

jhn7537
reply to post by akushla99

 

Thanks for responding! It's great getting that perspective from a smoker. Great to hear that there are smokers actually okay with this law. I figured the majority would be pissed about it.

Cheers jhn537

The excuse/claim that it is a cash cow, is a diversionary excuse...for those who smoke - from responsibility, and from those that don't - a convenient excuse to bring up revenue raising...

The reality is, in places where the risk of fire is likely - throwing a cigarette butt to the ground is akin to tossing a lit match (which is what is done to start a fire)...the law/rule has a practical reason for being enacted in that sense, littering provides the tinder and broken glass acts as a magnifying glass...many fires where I am from are started in this way...by no-one being anywhere near where the point of ignition is established...

On the flip side - I was privvy to a fine for throwing a cigarette butt from a car window by an Environmental Protection Officer...numerous in/out letters were exchanged, in which I demanded that a photo be produced of me, throwing a lit cigarette from a vehicle...needless to say, I could not be fined - these laws need to be monitored properly by those recieving them...I armed myself with the legislation, and the ways I could be booked...one of the ways was to simply be reported by a member of the public (presumably in another vehicle, who may not have liked the way I was driving) and all that was needed was my registration plate number and the time and place where it supposedly occured.

This law, like speeding laws, or safe driving laws, serve a safety purpose...and shouldn't really be there - but people just think they can do what they like, because they are good drivers, thier cigarette won't start a fire, thier lack of fencing around a swimmining pool won't be the reason thier child drowned...'it won't happen to me'...fact is, it does happen...

At the base of it, it is an abrogation of responsibility.

Å99

I live in the desert, where cigarette butts can cause fires that consume towns. Yet, year in/year out more of our wildfires are caused by

1. "tank battery" explosion/spark (storage tanks in the oil/gas industry)
2. lightning strike
3. glass or some other object focusing heat into kindling

We even have the occasional ring tail cat get fried on a pole in the middle of nowhere, sending fire causing sparks.

In my lifetime not a single one of our fires has been attributed to cigarette butts. Despite being on the busiest interstate and highway in the surrounding 350 miles

That said, i do not throw butts out my window. I put them into an ashcan I bought at the automotive store the day i bought my truck. Even if i did throw my butts out the window, there are littering laws to address this action which should suffice.

A $1500 fine is just mob rule. No one wants to complain about it, so it goes into effect.

bigfatfurrytexan
I live in the desert, where cigarette butts can cause fires that consume towns. Yet, year in/year out more of our wildfires are caused by

1. "tank battery" explosion/spark (storage tanks in the oil/gas industry)
2. lightning strike
3. glass or some other object focusing heat into kindling

We even have the occasional ring tail cat get fried on a pole in the middle of nowhere, sending fire causing sparks.

In my lifetime not a single one of our fires has been attributed to cigarette butts. Despite being on the busiest interstate and highway in the surrounding 350 miles

That said, i do not throw butts out my window. I put them into an ashcan I bought at the automotive store the day i bought my truck. Even if i did throw my butts out the window, there are littering laws to address this action which should suffice.

A $1500 fine is just mob rule. No one wants to complain about it, so it goes into effect.

edit on 10-12-2013 by bigfatfurrytexan because: (no reason given)

That's right...and if the 'mob rule' started fascilitating driving on any side of the road you wanted...how would that go?

There really are safety reasons...the fine is a way of enforcing the safety (unfortunately) because it is the one thing people cannot afford to Give away...money...

Some laws are patently ridiculous, and I have illustrated how easy it is for someone to get fined (even if you don't smoke) and the onus is on you to prove you did not do it...not for the fining officer to prove you did...because it is assumed (like with all enforcement agencies) that they do not lie, and are not fining for revenue...which is further exacerbated when ticket quotas for individual enforcement officers is extant.

Å99