Plastics have been an issue for decades, and they should be: We don’t want them polluting our oceans and befouling our natural spaces, and that is why the U.S. has taken many steps to address the problem.
Plastics are also a key component of modern life, however, and much of what we take for granted would not be possible without their discovery.
In 2015, marine biologist Christine Figgener filmed her team removing a plastic straw stuck in a sea turtle’s nose, and the footage went viral —over the years, it has racked up an astonishing 116 million YouTube views. It created a firestorm among the environmental community, and virtually every blue city and state in the books quickly placed restrictions on plastic straws, with many pushing those horrid paper ones that melt after about a minute.
There’s no question that it’s a moving video, but I am unable to find a single incident other than this one where a plastic straw up the nose was the culprit in a turtle tragedy.
The Wife™ was so incensed by the restrictions that she went out and bought a big bag of contraband plastic straws and now always has them in her purse. She’s a keeper.
It was a combo platter. The sea turtle picture sold the BS claim that Americans use 500 million straws PER DAY.
— Roxanne Hoge (@RoxanneHoge) April 13, 2022
It's why I conceal carry mine. Try it. Never drink wood pulp again. pic.twitter.com/qlvCXTMYBG
Always remember, "The road to hell is paved with good (woke) intentions." Turns out the solution may be worse than the problem:
A damning study out of South Korea has revealed that paper straws might actually be worse for the planet than plastic ones, especially when their life cycle is traced from the factory floor to the landfill.
The findings suck the air out of some long-winded environmental protests, which claimed for a decade that plastic straws were on par with toxic fumes or forest fires — and fought to make iced lattes nearly impossible to drink through a soggy, wilted tube of cardboard.
A new study from South Korea found that paper straws are somehow worse for the environment than single-use plastic straws.
— Pubity (@pubity) October 25, 2026
None of the "eco-friendly" solutions actually worked, and switching away from plastic straws didn't really help the environment. pic.twitter.com/aJYnZEWRuT
Like so many “progressive” laws and restrictions pushed on the people by leftists and Democrats, things like straw bans punish the people while doing nothing particularly beneficial. Take, for instance, folks in California, who have to take a shower under a trickle because of statewide restrictions on water pressure.
No, we don’t actually have a water shortage — billions upon billions of gallons fall on the Golden State every year — the artificial shortage is because the Left is too busy trying to get you to bend the knee than to actually collect it. (See: It's Raining Cats and Dogs in California—but What Happens to All That Water?)
What's wrong with these supposedly eco-friendly paper straws? Aren't we showing our virtuous nature and helping the turtles and the planet and being oh such good citizens by adopting them?
Nope:
The research comes from South Korea’s Ministry of Climate, Energy and Environment, which analyzed four types of straws — paper, plastic, biodegradable plastic, and sugarcane-based — across 16 environmental categories.
Traditional plastic straws showed the lowest environmental footprint in 10 of the 16 categories, including human toxicity, particulate matter, and overall climate change impact.
Meanwhile, paper straws were found to generate over six times more carcinogens than standard plastic, along with double the impact on environmental acidification.
Did you see the study that came out that paper straws are more harmful than plastic ones? pic.twitter.com/G88CcHMdDQ
— badger_bad7846 (@badger_bad7846) October 28, 2026
So many of the solutions from what Rush Limbaugh used to call the “environmentalist wacko” crowd are not actually “solutions” at all. I have no problem with electric cars — if that’s your lane, by all means, take it — but don’t pretend it’s “clean.” What do you think recharges the battery when you plug it in? You got it — the electric grid, which is still largely powered by fossil fuels.
Meanwhile, EV batteries have historically used cobalt, much of which is sourced from the Democratic Republic of the Congo — often mined allegedly by child slave labor.
Think windmills are God’s gift to the environment? Well, they kill legions of wildlife, including Bald Eagles and, allegedly, whales, they have short life spans, and they’re virtually impossible to recycle. Other than that, they’re great.
I’ve spent plenty of my life outdoors, hunting, fishing, pack-tripping, and camping, and I appreciate the environment as much as the next guy. I want to protect it too. But so many of the extremist crowds’ solutions — like declaring war on fossil fuels — backfire and hurt the regular guy. In California, they’ve worked so hard to ban drilling and oil extraction and have driven most of the refineries elsewhere. Does that do anything remotely helpful? No, now the oil is extracted and refined elsewhere — and the exact same carbon emissions are still produced — only Golden Staters have to pay the highest gas prices in the country.
Turns out expressing your virtue is an expensive endeavor — and the more we learn, an ineffective one.
Now I’m going to get one of The Wife™’s straws, stick it into something cold and tasty, and laugh my head off.
