In San Francisco, one restaurant is pointing out the absurdity of the city’s straw ban with a statement on their menu.
The Sentinel, located in the city’s Financial District, included the following message at the bottom of their menus:
“Napkins, straws, and bags are available upon request. You can still get needles for free though. Welcome to SF.”
San Francisco recently decided to ban plastic straws, based on a phone survey of straw manufacturers from a 9-year-old that somehow determined Americans use 500 million straws a day. Having solved the city’s needle, homelessness, and poop problems, it turned to the next great menace: Disposable plastic straws.
The Sentinel’s owner told CBS he didn’t want to start a controversy and was considering removing the statement from the menu.
San Francisco has been handing out clean needles to addicts since 1993, and residents have been complaining ever since of finding them on bus seats, in clothing, and on the street. While straws have been relegated to the back corners of the restaurant business because of their supposed environmental impact, needles are given out freely and littered throughout the city. When was the last time anyone in San Fran saw a used straw in the gutter?
This isn’t the only hypocrisy coming out of California. As my colleague Michael Knowles pointed out on his podcast a few weeks ago, giving someone a straw could land a person in jail, but knowingly giving someone AIDS is no longer a crime.
Priorities.
